But if you're a 15-year-old boy clueless in the art of love, there's hope for you: Justin Timberlake. Don't roll your eyes — sure, he dances in his videos and hits high notes. But as a male role model, he's cooler than Brandon Flowers and less of a drama queen than Gerard Way. So many pop commodities today are either aggressively masculine or harmlessly neutered — Timberlake stands out by being suave, bitter, sensitive, sly, funny, and playful. He may work in a highly formulaic musical style, but he manages to exude a discernible, sexually healthy personality. He gets the girl without acting like a jerk or a pimp.
The first hints of the JT persona peeked through on Justified, his 2002 solo debut. It's easy to forget now, but Timberlake's post-*NSYNC stardom was far from assured back then. (Boy bands were done, and he and his girl, the mega-popular Britney Spears, had recently split up.) But helped by some of the best beats the Neptunes ever devised, Timberlake negotiated one of the freshest breakup records in recent pop history. Justified bounced with a swagger, but the album's center was the despondent "Cry Me a River," the sort of tart kiss-off that you know belies the singer's underlying sadness. Michael Jackson's showmanship was an obvious inspiration for Timberlake's craft, but Prince's fascination with women in their many forms — not just as lovers, but also as mothers, friends and soul mates — seemed to have rubbed off on him, too.
While the key word in the title to his follow-up, the Timbaland-produced FutureSex/LoveSounds, is undoubtedly sex, Timberlake's attitude toward carnality remains more nuanced than his contemporaries'. "SexyBack" inspired a lot of snarky comments about his boast to bring sexy back, but in a year when other popular white artists complained about their feelings or tried to channel Springsteen, Timberlake came across as debonair, like the one guy at the junior-high dance comfortable enough to talk to the girls.
Charming but rugged, dashing but horny. You don't need to have his moves or his voice (or even his producers) to appreciate how he makes most other men in the pop firmament look like boys.
