FutureSex / LoveSounds

The enjoyable, forgettable FutureSex/LoveSounds may be a just-okay Timberlake album, but it's a great Timbaland demo reel.

By its closer... FutureSex/LoveSounds feels like an entirely different and far less interesting album than the one you started listening to.

Although his best new tracks are thrilling... some of the up-tempo stuff flirts with mechanical muscle-flexing. [21 Sep 2006, p.86]

Timberlake's second solo record is dark and dirty to begin and smooth and sexy to finish. With only a few awkward cameo tracks to damage its reputation, this is going to be the soundtrack of the next few months.

How well do Mr. Timberlake and Timbaland work together? So well that they can make even the world’s most irritating percussion instrument, the human beatbox, sound pretty good.

"FutureSex/LoveSounds" isn't an easy listen at first. Its crazy layers meld together into a sticky bit of a mess, and the lyrics are mostly standard love stuff. But repeated listening helps the tunes unravel. [11 Sep 2006]

There's going to be a coronation very soon, and anyone who cares to invest will be handsomely rewarded by the future king.

Although the mix of dance beats, pounding basslines and palatable vocals is occasionally marred by mundane R&B tracks like "Until the End of Time," there are far more pop gems than slow jams.

Graceless he may be, but Timberlake is nevertheless kind of fascinating on FutureSex/LoveSounds since his fuses a clear musical vision -- misguided, yes, but clear all the same -- with a hammyness that only a child entertainer turned omnipresent 21st century celebrity can be.

FutureSex/LoveSounds isn't nearly as good as its slinky predecessor.

No dispute: Usher, Beyonce, Christina, Britney were just keeping the seat warm: The King’s back on his throne.

Timberlake and Timbaland... write frustratingly awkward songs. [Oct 2006, p.142]

No modern-day male artist beats him when it comes to single-minded self assurance or suavity.

It is this excess of ambition over achievement, as opposed to any real consistency, which makes FutureSex/LoveSounds more of an album than Justified was. Songs which sound puzzlingly self-indulgent in isolation-- most obviously, the smirking, tenuously tuneful first single "SexyBack"-- are cloaked in a compelling intensity and purposefulness when played in succession.

The Sexyback single makes wise use of filtered vocals to artificially deepen his tone and support his macho pose, but only so much can be done with studio gimmicry. He's soon back to tweeting his game in a prepubescent chirp; the more suggestive his come-ons, the funnier it gets.

If he hasn’t yet invented a persona intriguing enough to live up to his music, give him credit for being one of the few white men still brave enough to make black music.

While it’s nowhere near Thriller or Purple Rain, it does manage a healthy attempt at a reinterpretation of both.

Even the lesser efforts are superior to typical chart fare.

Whereas his 2002 solo debut shot a glance back to Michael Jackson's 'Off The Wall', this is more indebted to 'Smooth Criminal', early '80s Prince and on its ballads, Stevie Wonder. [9 Sep 2006, p.37]

While FutureSex/LoveSounds is not a masterpiece, it’s damn good.

A set of forward-thinking pop reminiscent of Sign O' The Times-era Prince. [Oct 2006, p.115]

The vibe is all infectious, feverish build-up. [Nov 2006, p.155]

Laudable, but overreaching. [Nov 2006, p.130]