Pharrell Williams for GQ US April 2014

Photographed by Paola Kudacki

On Hillary Clinton being the next president of the US: “Let me tell you why Hillary’s going to win. Everywhere you go in this country, you have red and blue. You got the Democrats; you got the Republicans. You got the Bloods; you got the Crips. You know what else is red and blue? Blood. Blood is blue in your body until air hits it, and then it turns red. That means there’s unity. There’s gonna be unity. So when you think about a night where there’s late-night talk-show hosts and it’s mostly women, that’s a different world. Right? A world where 75 percent of the prime ministers and the presidents were women: that’s a different world. That’s gonna happen, and it’s gonna happen when Hillary wins.

 Because you know what? No matter how staunch of a supporter you are of no-abortion, whatever you are: you’re a woman, and there’s no way in the world you’re going to vote for somebody that’s going to try to tell you what to do with your body. Hillary’s gonna win. Listen, I’m reaching out to her right now. She’s gonna win.”

Katy Perry for GQ US February 2014

It’s been six years since Katy Perry announced herself with “I Kissed a Girl,” which became her first hit single (and somehow made Chapstick sexy). Ever since, her immense popularity has stemmed largely from her ability to straddle that divide between Madonna (one of her idols) and girl next door. Far more wholesome than that twisted genius Lady Gaga, Perry still exudes vastly more heat and sensuality than, say, Taylor Swift. Part of that’s due to Perry’s top-heavy physicality, but her sly lyrics and full-throated delivery deserve credit, too.

In her music, all of which she co-writes, she handily mixes innocence with lust. She wants to be your homecoming queen and made her mark singing about reading Seventeen and learning how to shave her legs. But she also yearns to melt your Popsicle and see your peacock, cock, cock. When you add in God—she was raised Pentecostal and once recorded on a Christian label—things get even more complicated.