Getcha sexy on/Shake that booty!
posted by Leila in musicLast night I downloaded FutureSex/LoveSounds, the Timberlake/Timbaland collab that the indie community pounced all over soon after Pitchfork’s 8.1 review1. I know I’m a year late, but I needed time to deny my love for SexyBack (which I still believe was never a natural occurrence, but a result of spending too much time with my robot boyfriend who has a strange affinity for distorted, monotone vocal performances) and surreptitiously sneak the trendy (which I am not) through the back window.
I’ll admit now that I secretly held high expectations for this album — too many other people had lavished the highest praise upon it, and really, who can disagree with the hipster masses? It didn’t matter that this was Justin Timberlake, the boy who I’d last doted upon at the age of nine due to the forces of peer pressure since every other girl in the fourth grade thought he was cuuute! and wanted to “chill” with him in that completely innocent prepubescent way but had never actually liked all that much — he’s a grown-up now, and so am I, and gods be damned if I was going to let the embarrassment to humanity that *NSYNC was influence my opinion of this effort. And hell, if Pitchfork says it’s good…well, isn’t there at least a possibility that it’s good?
Let’s just say that I had conveniently forgotten that I almost always disagree with Pitchfork’s opinion of good and bad, the only notable exception being In the Aeroplane Over the Sea, which no self-respecting indie rocker is allowed to dislike (and I still think the review is a crock of pretentious bullshit). Granted, the album wasn’t bad, but…it’s not the manifestation of amazingness it’s been made out to be. There is nothing revolutionary about it — it’s a well-crafted R&B/pop hybrid, but I wasn’t blown away the way I thought I’d be. Maybe it was a case of inflated anticipation, but there are other albums I’ve set high standards for without encountering later disappointment — Live It Out by Metric, The Crane Wife by the Decemberists. Et alli.
Still, I got one thing out of this experience — you see, I’m a great fan of mashups, otherwise known as “bastard pop” and “booty.” So while the download was going, I went onto The Hype Machine and searched for some SexyBooty, i.e. some swtass Timberlake mashups, and came across ThunderSexy, which is the most hilarious thing I’ve heard since that Blocalicious mix by DJ Schmolli.
This is turning into a music blog. How disturbing is that?
* If you aren’t familiar with Pitchfork (or you are and like getting a good laugh at them), this article from The Onion offers an excellent perspective on the notoriously anal music review site.
The only Justin Timberlake song I liked was “Cry Me A River”, hahaha. Oh dear :P
I’ve also never heard of mashups before, I think I’ll try it out later. I’ve been wanting to expand my musical selections, anyways. :3
Eina on October 6th, 2007 @ 3:26 am #
I actually really liked the album. I saw his first two singles on video clips, “SexyBack” and “My Love” and I knew that a lot of his future singles were going to be a huge hit. So I saved myself from downloading multiple songs from my Limewire and decided to buy the album. I loved most of the songs. I think they did really well. Timbaland is a legend. He’s ah-mazing.
Natasha on October 6th, 2007 @ 9:42 am #
I used to follow Pitchfork’s reviews too, until I realized they weren’t all that trustable so I switched to Rolling Stone reviews instead. Ha!
But JT’s album IS good, it almost hurts to say it because well, it’s Justin. Although it’s not an album I can stand listening in one sitting though, more like just one by one. Kind of get sick of the beats at one pont. :)
Juice on October 6th, 2007 @ 11:05 am #
At first, I didn’t really like most of his new songs, but they grew on me. And they were certainly different from the other popular music…
Kaylee on October 6th, 2007 @ 12:19 pm #
I used to hate Justin… but then I started listening to his music, and I love the songs on the album.
Now I’m kind of sick of him, due to overplay and I’m reminded again why I used to hate him… but yeah, it’s not bad stuff.
Rafia on October 6th, 2007 @ 5:37 pm #
No matter how good a Justin Timberlake album might be in a general masses sense, I refuse to believe it’s any better than ANY of NSync’s albums.
Justin is nothing with out JC… and the gay one!
Nellie on October 6th, 2007 @ 9:58 pm #
Got here through the “View all posts in love” link. I wonder if there are any tragic obstacles between the posts and their objects of affection.
doolz on October 7th, 2007 @ 11:32 pm #
Yeah, well. I’m too damn lazy to fix up the categories to make sense right now.
Goddamn Wordpress and its jokes for the taking.
Leila on October 7th, 2007 @ 11:38 pm #