Justin Timberlake in 2013

yeah i wasn't on board w/ jt immediately, i always favored bsb plus i remember him kissing and telling about britney on stern and was offended (reminded me of the kennedy quote about nixon: 'no class'), think it took til the third hearing of 'like i love you' to buy in. dude shot an awful movie in town here a year or so ago - everyone i know who dealt w/ him had nothing but good things to say about him and he gave the record store i used to work at a shoutout on twitter so totally believe dude really is a bro. at the same time have always wished he could sing half as well as usher.

pretty sure if you said, "Hey, bro, I love you but you're no Usher" he'd agree and wouldn't look like Nixon thanking Ike for something.

Have to agree with the linked piece in that the urgency with which some folks are eager to crown him is a bit...disquieting. Especially the weird postracial warm and fuzzies feeling he apparently inspires in those who feel compelled to write about him so breathlessly. Rolling Stone had already crowned him new king of pop in 2003 when he only had Justified under his belt. But clever marketing is a hell of a drug.

damita jo still went platinum (which is fucking amazing tbh), all for you had crazy promotional muscle behind it and only went double platinum, following up the velvet rope which with even more promotional muscle (SIX videos) only went triple platinum - half of what janet and rhythm nation sold (a damn shame as velvet rope might be her best album). i could buy that the super bowl incident caused the label to cut their losses earlier than they might've otherwise, but arguably so did her failing to recover (she didn't do snl til april) or her career already on a downward slope or just yknow she was middle aged in a market that had very little time for middle aged artists. also yknow damita jo was her weakest post-control album by far at that point.

rolling stone declared rock back on the basis of the vines first album

it's funny when there was that questlove quote about timberlake not doing like mj hooking up w/ teddy riley and sticking w/ his 'quincy' in timbaland instead of working w/ say diplo i blanched at the thought of timberlake working w/ diplo and then remembered o right i fucking loved 'climax'. but timberlake couldn't pull off 'climax'.

JT just seems like an avatar for 30somethings who miss when chart pop USED to be cool and can't be bothered to figure out if there have been any worthwhile producers since the heyday of Tim/Neptunes

I just caught a bit of the album release special on the CW and JT gave me a vibe of... edward norton

at his dorkiest he gives me a Norton vibe. From "The Honeymooners."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WsiIPY_vzFU

I didnt ask for it

i miss edward norton

what is coke snortin'

well played

o man remember this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZbaW0HZ_Qy8

the era when actors boasted Clinton hair.

lol

this didn't actually happen but i'm gonna just outright lie here and say that griel marcus did a riff on norton's character in primal fear as a clinton analogue in a real life top ten from back then.

you could've brought Greil Marcus a chocolate brownie in the shape of Willa Cather and he would've seen Bill Clinton.

anybody read his doors book? lex you read that thing?

Cather's?

Anyone heard "Mirrors" on the radio yet? 2nd single and it's hanging out in the twenties on the Hot 100. I think it really works as a single through after the five-minute mark (which is pretty awesome), but not really with the three minute or so coda.

"Suit & Tie" has kinda surprisingly turned out to have some legs on radio so i think it'll be at least a month or two before "Mirrors" really gets heavy airplay

S&T has been "Adorn"-like down here in how quietly it's become omnipresent.

bite your tongue

"Mirrors" is really well-written. There are only two verses! And then three times through the chorus, but the thing is fifty seconds long!

Love that they pull off doing the third time through the chorus with the instrument dropouts and the handclaps. And the "whoa-oa" background vocal is from some Buggles song and maybe some other '80s song.

bite your tongue

― Stephen Thomas Duttywine (some dude),

point your toes

A+

Wonder if Trevor Horn has heard it yet.

Checked and the Buggles song is "Elstree."

kinda diggin' this Justin Timberlake is the personal representative of Dr. Yakub on Earth interp tbh

I do feel obligated to say that Damita Jo is kinda underrated and had some jams tho

Oh god I've just noticed the squishy mouth noises on Strawberry Bubblegum. Like at least Beyonce had the good grace to let Kanye shit all over what was already the worst track on 4, but Strawberry Bubblegum is sonically gorgeous and just ruined by so many 'eww god no' moments.

looking more and more like JT's New Jersey.

Tbf strawberry bounce. >>>>>>> strawberry bubblegum

Just to add to what I said last night, if "Mirrors" was 5:30 and ended after that awesome coda, I think it's classic songwriting (verse-chorus-verse-chorus-bridge-chorus) and it IS anchored by that sixteen-line, fifty second chorus.

Also like the repeating second half of the verse, how it's contrasting like it's a section unto itself and is a refrain of its own (especially the way it starts with that "pocket full of soap" line), as though the chorus didn't already provide enough repeating hooks.

"mirrors" is #1 in the UK

music television is caning the brit awards performance, a maximalist one of strain & effort & punchiness besides which the og sounds like ambient chillout

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NXtEnURrlBY

lol tf with that pedestrian beat on mirrors

yeah, mirrors strikes me as the most generic and boring cut on the album, like he needed to put in one bruno mars-ish track to stay down with the kids and this was it

midtempo power ballads are really the new threat to everything

I want to agree that Bruno Mars proved that middling New Wave "homages" are a threat. Be afraid of Trey Songz trying his own "New World Man."

that=but

Live performance just emphasizes how over the top that thing is imo.

Not sure what the trend I'm describing has to do with new wave. If anything, "Locked Out of Heaven" is the one big Bruno Mars hit that circumvents that issue. And MMTS has already fell victim to the power ballad trend. This is has been on the radio here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=foZLo_sSnkk

It just feels like this is replacing EDM-pop as the standard default-to.

ha I was just making a crack. Thin-voiced crooners doing New Wave would force me to swim out to sea in the hopes of being attacked by sharks.

after about ten listens, i've boiled this down to Pusher Love Girl/Tunnel Vision/Let the Groove Get In
and 2 minutes apiece of Don't Hold the Wall/That Girl + the coda on Strawberry Bubblegum
that's a solid 30 minute EP and enough for me to rep for this IMO

i think the songs i like all are based around casiotone presets!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mfKwtsx9RYo

Thin-voiced crooners

Like Smokey Robinson or Al Green?

yes exactly like Smokey and Al Green.