Everything I Thought It Was | ||||
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Studio album by | ||||
Released | March 15, 2024 | |||
Genre | ||||
Length | 76:54 | |||
Label | RCA | |||
Producer |
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Justin Timberlake chronology | ||||
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Alternate cover | ||||
Singles from Everything I Thought It Was | ||||
Everything I Thought It Was is the sixth studio album by American singer-songwriter Justin Timberlake. It was released through RCA Records on March 15,2024. The album serves as the follow-up to his previous album, Man of the Woods (2018),and features guest appearances from Fireboy DML,Tobe Nwigwe,and Timberlake's band,NSYNC. Production was handled by Timberlake himself,Danja,Federico Vindver,Calvin Harris,Timbaland,Louis Bell,Cirkut,Ryan Tedder,Rob Knox,and others. The album was preceded by two singles,"Selfish" and "No Angels",as well as the promotional single "Drown".
Everything I Thought It Was debuted at number four on the US Billboard 200,giving Timberlake his sixth consecutive top five album in the country,while the lead single "Selfish" reached the top 20 on the Billboard Hot 100. The album also reached the top five in several other countries,including Belgium,Germany,the Netherlands,Poland,Switzerland,and the United Kingdom. To promote the album,Timberlake embarked on his seventh concert tour,The Forget Tomorrow World Tour in April 2024. [4] [5]
In 2023,Timberlake reunited with his former band members of NSYNC and released the single "Better Place" in support of the Trolls Band Together soundtrack,as well as a collaboration with Timbaland and Nelly Furtado titled "Keep Going Up." [6] In addition to "Keep Going Up," Timberlake had also collaborated with Romeo Santos on the song "Sin Fin," [7] with Jack Harlow on his album Come Home the Kids Miss You ,on the song "Parent Trap;" a remix of Coco Jones' "ICU," [8] and a further remix of the song "3D" by Jungkook. [9] Timberlake had also worked with Calvin Harris,producer of "Fuckin' Up the Disco" and "No Angels," on his song "Stay with Me," alongside Pharrell Williams and Halsey. [10]
A few months after the release of the singles,the singer-songwriter unveiled a trailer for an upcoming project titled Everything I Thought It Was on January 19,2024,narrated by actor and Reptile co-star,Benicio del Toro. [11] He announced the album on January 25,alongside the release of the lead single "Selfish." [12] About the album,Timberlake revealed that it has "incredibly honest" moments but is also "a lot of fucking fun." [13] He would call it his "most straightforward" record to date,referring to it as "complex within its simplicity." [14] While in an interview with Zane Lowe for Apple Music's New Music Daily promotion,Timberlake said that the album title was inspired from when a friend,after listening to the album,told him,"This sounds like everything I thought I wanted from you." [15] The title appears at the end of the opening track "Memphis". [16]
On January 19,2024,Timberlake performed a free one-night-only concert at the Orpheum in Memphis where he live-debuted his new single "Selfish" after teasing a new project on social media in previous days. [11] On January 25,2024,Timberlake appeared on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon ;he announced the release of "Selfish" and revealed that the album had taken four years to produce. [17] Timberlake appeared as a musical guest on the January 27,2024,episode of Saturday Night Live ,singing "Selfish" and "Sanctified". On January 30,he appeared on The Kelly Clarkson Show [18] [19] and held a concert at Irving Plaza in New York City on January 31,his 43rd birthday. [20]
Timberlake appeared as a musical guest on The Graham Norton Show where he performed "Selfish" on February 22,2024, [21] the night before he cancelled AOne Night Only concert,to be held at the Roundhouse,London,on February 23,2024. He was recovering from an illness. [22] [23] Timberlake then appeared on Complex Networks Sneaker Shopping on March 11,2024,and mentioned the release of his new album at the end of the video. [24] On March 13,2024,Timberlake performed a one-off concert at The Wiltern in Los Angeles. The show featured a surprise reunion with his NSYNC bandmates,with the group playing a medley of hits and the new album track "Paradise." Timberlake then performed on NPR Music's Tiny Desk series on March 15 for a half-hour-long concert. [25] He also announced the release of a documentary showing the album's creation process. [26]
In the weeks leading up to release,Timberlake also revealed the vinyl LP's "deluxe edition",which included a limited edition merchandise,as well as a look at the LP's exclusive artwork,influenced by Federico Fellini's 8½ [ failed verification ],as well as the album's back cover,which was inspired by Mel Stuart's 1971 film Willy Wonka &the Chocolate Factory ,an adaptation of Roald Dahl's novel, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory . [27] In April 2024,Timberlake opened the iHeartRadio Music Awards,performing "Selfish" and "No Angels". [28]
"Selfish" was released as the album's first single on January 25,2024. The song's official music video premiered on the same day. [29] It debuted at number 19 on the US Billboard Hot 100,marking Timberlake's highest debut in six years on the chart. It became his 39th career solo entry on the Hot 100,and his 29th to reach the top 40. [30] In Canada,the track debuted and peaked at number 22 on the Canadian Hot 100. [31]
"No Angels" was released as the second single;an official music video,directed by Ti West,was released on March 15,2024. [32] He performed the single live on Jimmy Kimmel Live! . [33] [34] "Drown" was teased by Timberlake in an Instagram post on February 19,2024, [35] [36] and released as a promotional single on February 23. [37] [38] The song later impacted on Italian radio as the album's third single. [39]
Timberlake promoted the album on The Forget Tomorrow World Tour,which began on April 29,2024,in Vancouver,Canada. [40] In March 2024,prior to the tour launching,Trace William Cowen of Complex reported that The Forget Tomorrow World Tour had become Timberlake's fastest selling tour to date. They stated that the tour had amassed over $140 million globally in initial ticket sales from over 70 dates and that more than one million attendees are expected. Cowen concluded that "Justin Timberlake's Forget Tomorrow World Tour Is Set to Become His Biggest Yet." [41] On February 23,2024,Timberlake announced summer 2024 Europe tour dates. [42] On May 20,2024, Pollstar announced that nine additional shows were added due to "overwhelming demand" and reported that over 1 million tickets were already sold,becoming Timberlake's fastest selling tour to date. [43] The Forget Tomorrow World Tour received generally positive reviews. [44]
Aggregate scores | |
---|---|
Source | Rating |
AnyDecentMusic? | 4.6/10 [45] |
Metacritic | 51/100 [46] |
Review scores | |
Source | Rating |
AllMusic | [47] |
Evening Standard | [48] |
The Guardian | [49] |
Hot Press | 8/10 [50] |
The Independent | [51] |
La Presse | 4.5/10 [52] |
MusicOMH | [53] |
NME | [3] |
Pitchfork | 4.9/10 [54] |
The Telegraph | [55] |
At Metacritic,which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics,the album received an average score of 51 based on 17 reviews,indicating "mixed or average reviews". [46] The review aggregator site AnyDecentMusic? compiled 13 reviews and gave Everything I Thought It Was an average of 4.6 out of 10,based on their assessment of the critical consensus. [45]
Frazier Tharpe of GQ gave the album a positive review. He found that "Timberlake brings grown-and-sexy back on Everything I Thought It Was. The NSYNC reunion will make headlines,but as usual,it's Timberlake and Timbaland for the win." [56] Chuck Arnold of The New York Post also gave the album a positive review,writing:"Timberlake gets his groove back and reunites with NSYNC on [his] comeback album." He concluded that "on Everything I Thought It Was,Timberlake,now 43,is back to being a Man of the Dance Floor,a Man of the Bedroom and even,once again,a Man of the Boy Band." [57] Associated Press critic Maria Sherman stated,"In its better tracks [...] Everything I Thought It Was,is a return to form for the musician. In the moments when his immediately recognizable falsetto eases into a familiar kind of future funk,it works. In others,it feels like poorly timed nostalgia." [58]
Neil Z. Yeung of AllMusic gave the album three out of five stars. He felt that Everything I Thought It Was "is at least better executed than the uneven Man of the Woods and on par with The 20/20 Experience . Some focus and editing would have really helped because there's a great album buried somewhere in here." [47] Meanwhile,writing for the Evening Standard ,El Hunt was more critical of the album,criticizing the sex-focused lyrics and writing,"At 18 tracks long,Everything I Thought It Was certainly has stamina,but to heavily paraphrase an ancient adage,it's not the size of your album that really matters." [48] Pitchfork editor Owen Myers noted that the album "is less of a faceplant than a comfortable rehash of past glories. [Timberlake] scales his stuttering electro and squelchy '80s funk into hollow,expensive-sounding maximalism." [54]
Everything I Thought It Was debuted at number four on the US Billboard 200,earning 67,000 album-equivalent units,calculated from 31.13 million on-demand streams and 41,000 pure album copies. This marks Timberlake's sixth consecutive top five album in the country. [4]
In Germany,the album debuted at number five; [59] at number three in the Netherlands, [60] In the UK,Everything I Thought It Was debuted at number five on the UK Albums Chart. [61] Additionally,the album debuted at number one on the Album Downloads Chart, [62] and at number 15 on the UK Vinyl Albums Chart. [63] In Australia,the album charted at number 23,becoming Timberlake's first album to not reach the top ten in the country. [64]
No. | Title | Writer(s) | Producer(s) | Length |
---|---|---|---|---|
1. | "Memphis" |
| 4:29 | |
2. | "Fuckin' Up the Disco" |
|
| 4:22 |
3. | "No Angels" |
|
| 3:28 |
4. | "Play" |
|
| 2:51 |
5. | "Technicolor" |
|
| 7:17 |
6. | "Drown" |
|
| 4:20 |
7. | "Liar" (featuring Fireboy DML) |
|
| 3:26 |
8. | "Infinity Sex" |
|
| 3:49 |
9. | "Love & War" |
|
| 3:34 |
10. | "Sanctified" (featuring Tobe Nwigwe) |
|
| 5:11 |
11. | "My Favorite Drug" |
|
| 5:01 |
12. | "Flame" |
|
| 5:41 |
13. | "Imagination" |
|
| 3:16 |
14. | "What Lovers Do" |
|
| 3:42 |
15. | "Selfish" |
|
| 3:49 |
16. | "Alone" |
|
| 3:36 |
17. | "Paradise" (featuring *NSYNC) |
|
| 4:26 |
18. | "Conditions" |
|
| 4:36 |
Total length: | 76:54 |
Notes
Musicians
Technical
Chart (2024) | Peak position |
---|---|
Australian Albums (ARIA) [64] | 23 |
Austrian Albums (Ö3 Austria) [65] | 7 |
Belgian Albums (Ultratop Flanders) [66] | 3 |
Belgian Albums (Ultratop Wallonia) [67] | 6 |
Canadian Albums (Billboard) [68] | 17 |
Danish Albums (Hitlisten) [69] | 13 |
Dutch Albums (Album Top 100) [60] | 3 |
French Albums (SNEP) [70] | 19 |
German Albums (Offizielle Top 100) [59] | 5 |
Hungarian Physical Albums (MAHASZ) [71] | 20 |
Irish Albums (OCC) [72] | 48 |
Italian Albums (FIMI) [73] | 41 |
Japanese Digital Albums (Oricon) [74] | 16 |
Japanese Hot Albums ( Billboard Japan ) [75] | 47 |
New Zealand Albums (RMNZ) [76] | 25 |
Polish Albums (ZPAV) [77] | 2 |
Portuguese Albums (AFP) [78] | 23 |
Scottish Albums (OCC) [79] | 12 |
Spanish Albums (PROMUSICAE) [80] | 24 |
Swedish Albums (Sverigetopplistan) [81] | 37 |
Swiss Albums (Schweizer Hitparade) [82] | 5 |
UK Albums (OCC) [61] | 5 |
US Billboard 200 [83] | 4 |
Justin Randall Timberlake is an American singer, songwriter, record producer, actor, and dancer. Dubbed the "Prince of Pop", Billboard honored him as the best performing solo act on Pop Airplay and one of the greatest pop stars of the 21st century. Timberlake remains among the best-selling recording artists of all time, with sales of over 117 million records worldwide. His awards include ten Grammy Awards, four Primetime Emmy Awards, three Brit Awards, nine Billboard Music Awards, the Contemporary Icon Award by the Songwriters Hall of Fame, and MTV's Michael Jackson Video Vanguard Award.
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Justified is the debut solo studio album by American singer-songwriter Justin Timberlake. It was released on November 5, 2002, by Jive Records. The album was written and recorded in a six-week period as Timberlake's boy band NSYNC was on hiatus. For his solo album, he began to adopt a more mature image as an R&B artist opposed to the previous pop music recorded by the group. The majority of the album was produced by the Neptunes and Timbaland, and features guest appearances by Janet Jackson, Clipse, and Bubba Sparxxx. It primarily is an R&B album that also contains influences of dance-pop, funk, and soul music.
'NSYNC is the debut studio album by American boy band NSYNC, initially released in Germany on May 26, 1997, by Trans Continental Records and internationally on March 24, 1998, by RCA Records. The album reached number one on the Offizielle Top 100 and includes the singles "I Want You Back" and "Tearin' Up My Heart".
Celebrity is the fourth studio album by American boy band NSYNC. It was released by Jive Records on July 24, 2001. Due to constant criticism that they were not a "credible group", NSYNC began experimenting with genres such as hip hop and two-step. As with their previous studio album, No Strings Attached (2000), numerous producers, including BT, Rodney Jerkins, Brian McKnight, PAJAM, and the Neptunes, worked on the album. Justin Timberlake and JC Chasez also contributed to production, while they co-wrote 10 of 13 tracks in an attempt to develop a unique sound, which includes pop, R&B, and teen pop.
"Like I Love You" is the debut solo single of American singer-songwriter Justin Timberlake from his debut studio album, Justified (2002), which features American hip hop duo Clipse. It was co-written by Timberlake and the Neptunes, who also produced it. The song was released on September 16, 2002, as Timberlake's debut solo single, following the announced hiatus of NSYNC earlier that year. According to Williams, the song's drums were an ode to the funk era.
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"LoveStoned" is a song by American singer-songwriter Justin Timberlake from his second studio album, FutureSex/LoveSounds (2006). It was released on June 29, 2007. It was written and produced by Timberlake, Timothy "Timbaland" Mosley and Nate "Danja" Hills. In contrast to the album's theme about sexual innuendos with themes of love, "LoveStoned" contains sexually suggestive lyrics. Musically "LoveStoned" is an upbeat dance song, contrasting with the interlude of "I Think She Knows" which has a more slow, quiet, guitar-driven sound. The song won the Grammy Award for Best Dance Recording at the 2008 ceremony. The official remix by Justice, Tiësto and Kaskade was released later.
The American singer-songwriter Justin Timberlake has released six studio albums, two compilation albums, three extended plays, and 51 singles. Timberlake started his music career in 1995, as a member of boy band NSYNC. Following the group's hiatus in 2002, he released his solo debut studio album, Justified, in November that same year. The album was a commercial success and peaked at number two on the US Billboard 200 chart and additionally topped the charts in Ireland and the United Kingdom. Justified earned multiple multi-platinum certifications, including a triple platinum certification from the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and a sextuple platinum certification from the British Phonographic Industry (BPI). It produced four singles: "Like I Love You", "Cry Me a River", "Rock Your Body" and "Señorita"; all performed well commercially, with two of them becoming top 5 hits on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart and top two hits on the UK Singles Chart. "Rock Your Body" also reached number one in Australia.
NSYNC is an American vocal group and boy band that was formed by Chris Kirkpatrick in Orlando, Florida, in 1995 and launched in Germany by BMG Ariola Munich. The group consists of Kirkpatrick, Justin Timberlake, Joey Fatone, Lance Bass, and JC Chasez. Their self-titled debut album was successfully released to European countries in 1997, and later debuted in the U.S. market with the single "I Want You Back".
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"Say Something" is a song recorded by American singer-songwriter Justin Timberlake featuring vocals by fellow American singer-songwriter Chris Stapleton. It was released on January 25, 2018, as the third single from his fifth studio album Man of the Woods (2018) along with its music video. The song was written and produced by Timberlake, Larrance Dopson, Floyd Nathaniel Hills, and Timbaland, with additional songwriting by Stapleton. It debuted at number 9 on the US Billboard Hot 100, becoming Timberlake's 19th top 10 single as a solo artist and Stapleton's first. It also reached number one in Slovakia and Slovenia and the top 10 in Austria, Belgium, Canada, Czech Republic, Germany, Hungary, the Netherlands, Poland, Scotland, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom. It was serviced to contemporary hit radio on February 13, 2018. A live version of the song was released on March 31. "Say Something" received a nomination for Best Pop Duo/Group Performance at the 61st Annual Grammy Awards.
"Selfish" is a song by American singer-songwriter Justin Timberlake. Released on January 25, 2024, it is his first solo single release in almost six years, following his standalone July 2018 single "SoulMate". It is the lead single from his sixth studio album Everything I Thought It Was. It was followed shortly after by a promotional single, "Drown", in late February.
"No Angels" is a song by American singer-songwriter Justin Timberlake. It was released on March 15, 2024, as the second single from his sixth studio album, Everything I Thought It Was, which was released on the same day. The song was officially added to US radio on April 12, 2024.
"Drown" is a song by American singer-songwriter Justin Timberlake. It was released on February 23, 2024, as a promotional single from his sixth studio album, Everything I Thought It Was. It was made to be an instant gratification track for those who pre-ordered the album, but was also released for streaming. The song impacted on Italian radio on November 1, 2024, as the album's third single.
Pop star's sixth album dabbles in the club-ready sounds of modern R&B and hip-hop, with remarkably little to say