Justin Timberlake - FutureSex/LoveSounds (Jive)
This is a dirty album. Filthy. As soon as moody opener FutureSex/LoveSound begins, with a brooding bass line and the kind of predatory innuendos that have young women the world over wishing they hadn’t stayed for coffee, you know what you’re in for. He’s basically going to try and get off with you for an hour. Which sounds excellent on paper, but does it work in reality? The answer is of course a resounding ‘yes’, something that is confirmed the very moment gigantic, Timbaland-produced single SexyBack springs into life. It’s only track two, but Justin is already flying, giving the eye to every woman in the room whilst assuring us all that he is indeed “bringing sexy back”. He’s not wrong, either. This is a collection positively bursting with the kind of dirty lust that would make even the most ardent sex fan stop and think. Brilliant!
It’s not all great sex though. Indeed, there are a couple of occasions when JT loses his magic touch and fails to perform. Main offenders here are Sexy Ladies (a phrase we haven’t heard since 1992) and the ridiculously-misplaced, gangster style Chop Me Up, which sounds far more like a threat than any decent chat-up should. Rent-a-guest will.i.am also pops up on something fairly insipid in the second half, lending more of his awful rapping to what they probably thought was a “laid back track”, but is in fact comedy lounge music.
We can forgive Justin occasionally tripping over his jeans or keeping his socks on though, because the rest of his performance is so mindblowing. Probable highlights are the two tracks in the middle of the album, LoveStoned and What Goes Around, the first of which starts off like the Seinfeld theme tune on poppers before moving off into the epic land of sweeping strings, hard-funking its way through a massive chorus (“she’s got me lovestoned/she’s bad and she knows") and some of the most enticing cat calls you’re likely to hear. After about four minutes it all gets even more crazy good, and the break at the five minute mark is just breathtaking. What Goes Around is another big one; an epic in the Cry Me A River mould, about a girl who cheats on Justin only to be cheated on herself by her new lover. It’s also home to one of the bitchiest told-you-so payoffs on record, and it’s ace. JT’s getting everything absolutely spot on. Even the ballads that close down the album work; Justin’s clearly not averse to a kiss and a cuddle after his bedroom heroics, and All Over Again is bound to have you in tears, harbouring an unnaturally strong desire to marry the guy. Beautiful.
So JT’s done it again. It’s still not quite the sum of its obvious reference points (80s Michael Jackson, Prince etc.), and there’s nothing here that quite matches Like I Love You in terms of head-spinning brilliance (a fact rammed home by the all-too-brief sample used on the Snoop Dogg collaboration), but FutureSex/LoveSounds is a fine album nevertheless. A big, sexy, party record that’s got its Sunday morning moments too, it’s a must for budding Lotharios everywhere.
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