Hits 21 - 2006 (5): McFly, Beyonce & Jay Z, Justin Timberlake & Timbaland

Episode Date: December 22, 2023

Hello again, everyone, and welcome back to Hits 21, the show that's taking a look back at every UK #1 hit single of the 21st century - from January 2000, right through to the present day. Twitter: @Hits21UK Email: [e-mail] Vault: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5O5MHJUIQIUuf0Jv0Peb3C?si=e4057fb450f648b0 Piehole: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2FmWkwasjtq5UkjKqZLcl4

🎵 Hi there everyone and welcome back to Hits 21 where me, Rob, me, Andy, and me, Lizzie, all look back at every single UK number one of the 21st century from January 2000 right through to the present day. If you want to get in touch with us, you can find us on Twitter. We are at Hits21UK. That is at Hits21UK. And you can email us too. Just send it on over to H hits21podcast at gmail dot com. Thank you so much

for joining us again, we are currently looking back at the year 2006 this week we'll be covering the period between the 23rd of July and the 9th of September last week's poll winner was fairly tight

between Nelly and Lily but it was Lily Allen's smile that managed to emerge victorious last week so well done to Lily and on to this week's episode and as always it is time for some news headlines from around the time the songs we're covering in this episode

were at number 1 in the UK in Mumbai 209 people are killed and 700 people are injured when 7 bombs are detonated on 7 commuter trains over the course of 11 minutes. It took until 2015 for 12 attackers to be convicted of their involvement in the bombings. In Austria, 18 year old Natascha Kampusch escapes from her kidnapper Wolfgang Prickloppel after being held captive in his house for eight years. Later that same day, Prickloppel committed suicide

in order to avoid being captured by police. And in Australia, zookeeper, environmentalist and TV personality Steve Irwin dies aged 44 while filming an underwater documentary in the Great Barrier Reef. Irwin died after contracting serious injuries from an attack by a stingray. I can't believe that was that long ago. 17 years. I know. It feels like yesterday that.

Yeah. I did think it was more recent than that too. The films to hit the top of the UK box office during this period were as follows pirates of the caribbean dead man's chest finishes a three-week run before cars goes to number one for one week miami vice for one week cars again for one more week snakes on a plane for one week and you me and dupree for two weeks. My words, snakes on a plane. That broke my film rating system in half. That whole list you've just given there, that was a vintage period for cinema, wasn't it?

Say that again. Oh, dear. Meanwhile, The One Show broadcasts its first episode on BBC One with Adrian Childs and Nadia Savala presenting and Freema Anjuman the first guest. Bit of trivia there didn't know that. Meanwhile

Pete Bennett wins the seventh series of Big Brother with his girlfriend Nikki Graham finishing in fifth place. As one BBC show starts another ends

as the Kumars broadcasts its final episode but at least they got a number one out of it. With Chris Tarrant among the guests on the final night. And speaking ofris tarrant among the guests on the

final night and speaking of chris tarrant ingram wilcox becomes the fifth person to win the one million pound prize on who wants to be a millionaire which i can't believe was still going in 2006 i also can't believe that they had a genuine winner with the name ingram given that charles ingram oh yeah i had exactly the same thought that is like some destined name go down in uh who wants to be a millionaire folklore andy the uk album charts how are they doing well i have four or five to talk to you about this week um a few pretty big hits here so we open this period with razororlight by Razorlight which went to number one for two weeks and went five times platinum and just to mention you know that's more than

Black Holes and Revelations by Muse more than Stadium Arcadium Razorlight had a big old hit there very very big and also at five times platinum and also having two weeks at number one following that was undiscovered by james morrison which i think given that it was number one for two weeks i think we can rename that album discovered but anyway and then christina aguilera has one week at number one with back to basics which went single platinum that was then toppled after just one week by the highest selling album of the year, which we've already covered on the show, Eyes Open by Snow Patrol,

which returns to number one for one week. And then finally, we close out this period with another indie classic here. It's Empire by Kasabian, which went double platinum and was at number one for one week. So quite a big week on the sort of mid-naughties indie front we've got razor light james morrison snow patrol and kasabian

all this week but a genre is reaching its peak here if you ignore christina aculera but yeah thank you very much and lizzie how are things in the states so just in terms of singles in america promiscuous by nelly vertado which i mentioned last week was still at number one for most of july and the first half of august we do have a couple of new singles to discuss so first up fergie scored her first solo number one hit with london bridge it stayed at number one for three weeks and was eventually certified double platinum in the us back in the uk it narrowly missed out on number one for three weeks and was eventually certified double platinum in the US. Back in the UK it narrowly missed out on number one, peaking at number three in mid-September.

After that, in early September, Justin Timberlake claimed his first solo number one single with Sexyback. It stayed at number one for eight weeks in America, where it was also certified double platinum weirdly it also got to number one in the UK and we'll be discussing that very soon so stay tuned for that over to albums and it's as busy as ever so let's just get going shall we uh first up we've got Now 22 which spent three non-consecutive weeks at number one but failed to chart in the UK because Ours was released in 1992. Next up we have LaToya by LaToya stayed at number one for one week

failed to chart in the UK. Next up we have Port of Miami by Rick Ross stayed at number one for one week also failed to chart in the UK. Next up is Back to Basics by christina aguilera which spent one week at number one and as andy had mentioned also got to number one in the uk and finally this week we have danity cane by danity cane which spent one week at number one and failed to chart in the uk i've no idea what's going on only christina aguilera can break through this month apparently

danity cane sounds like her drag name i think i think it's quite a good one yeah it really does yeah it sounds a bit like um charity case it's probably what i'm thinking of yeah vanity um vanity milan yeah there you go yeah always relying your knowledge andy of that um thank you very much to both of you for those reports and we are gonna swiftly get ahead with this week's episode and the first song up this week or should i say really first songs up this week is this tonight i'm gonna have myself a real good time i feel alive And the world

Is turning inside out Yeah I'm floating around In ecstasy So don't stop me now Don't stop me now Don't stop me Cause I'm having a good time I'm having a good time

I'm a shooting star leaping through the skies Like a tiger defying the laws of gravity A racing car passing by Like Lady Godiva I'm gonna go, go, go There's no stopping me I'm burning through the skies, yeah 200 degrees, that's why they call me Mr. Fahrenheit

I'm traveling at the speed of light I'm gonna make a ship of Sonic Man out of you Okay, this is Don't Stop Me Now, AA side with Please Please by McFly. Released as the lead single from the band's third studio album titled Motion in the Ocean, Don't Stop Me Now, AA side with Please Please is McFly's ninth single overall to be released in the UK and their fifth to reach number one. And it's not the last time that we'll be coming to McFly on this podcast either. The song was officially chosen as the companion single for

Sport Relief in 2006. Don't Stop Me Now Please Please went straight in at number one as a brand new entry knocking Lily Allen off the top of the charts. It stayed at number one for one week. In its first and only week atop the charts, it sold 36,000 copies, beating competition from Unfaithful by Rihanna, which got to number two, You Give Me Something by James Morrison, which climbed to number five, and Smiley Faces by Niles Barkley, which climbed to number ten. When it was knocked off the top of the charts, Don't Stop Me Now, please, please,

fell five places to number six. That's a McFly classic, that. By the time it was done on the charts, it had been inside the top 100 for eight weeks. The song has never received any official certification from the Britishish phonographic industry i tell you that is this is like a mcfly classic this dropping like a huge number of places for number one out the charts in less than three months never any certification from the bpi that's

like not the only time this happens to McFly. Lizzie, you can kick the show off. I don't know if you want to start with Please Please first or Don't Stop Me Now. It's up to you. I may as well start with Don't Stop Me Now since it is, I guess, I know it's a double A side, but I'm guessing this was the one that was played on the radio. Yeah.

And we've had a couple of cases like this on the show where an artist has covered an already popular song in a way that sounds very similar to the original like this is very much the same it's a good performance and some nice harmonies on there but it does very little to separate itself from the original i think if not for the sport relief campaign I suspect the sides would have been flipped here. Like Please Please is decent enough but maybe not one of their best songs overall. The production sounds a lot fuller and more expensive and you can definitely hear the jellyfish influence on their sound for motion in the ocean. There are some problems here though.

Please Please in particular has a problem that you've both mentioned in recent weeks. Like the mids sound quite dull and the mix is very like treble-y in general I found. On top of that there's some weirdly clunky lyrics here. Worst of all, in the chorus, when Tom Fletcher shouts, you've got me thinking of England, which does not mean what I think Tom Fletcher thinks it means. Nope. Overall, though, I don't think either of these songs are bad, per se. One of them is inessential,

but the other is just kind of a taster of better things to come. Feeling kind of similar, Liz of better things to come feeling kind of similar uh lizzy to be honest um only a short word for don't stop me now i think for me which has like the air of a charity single as soon as it starts and oh yeah is mostly just like a perfunctory cover of a song that is so well known that like ruffling any feathers would just be a mistake it's one of those songs that you can't really cover unless you're just doing it straight but it feels weird that this is the a side because you know normally i have nothing to say about like the second a side only this time the script has kind of flipped a bit because i think everything you need to know

about don't stop me now this version of it is contained within danny jones's kind of first appearance in the song specifically when he says gravity because that's all you need to know because it's just a straight cover but with what like corporate speak would describe as a 21st century twist and that just means that they're a bit less formal with their diction like that's basically it like there's even um a moment where instead of going like a racing car passing by he just goes a racing car passing by i don't know why um but yeah it's fine it's just one of those where it's like fun enough for like a charity thing i'm like oh it's mcfly on sport relief doing queen good for

you guys wonderful you know but i think that's probably why it left the charts pretty fast um i think please please is the at least in my book is that is the better more exciting cut from the double a side it's not vault worthy or anything like that and it feels slightly less colorful and essential than like quite a lot of mcfly stuff around this time like all about you and one that we have coming up because it feels like it's i noticed this too lizzie it's very flat in terms of dynamics and mixing it's like claustrophobic a little bit. The guitars and the bass are just a bit too swollen and compressed

for the other parts of the mix to come in and add, like, clarity and variety and all the things that are, like, important in pop. But with that being said, I think this is still a good example of McFly, like, knowing how to knock out, like, you know, a good kind of power pop track even when they're not quite in their a game i always think that like the best power pop songs are about like they capture the experience of feeling something for the first time and it's about everything in your head and heart kind of rushing and your conscious your conscious trying to like tie all the loose threads together before the opportunity goes away i forget who said it um there's this great quote about power pop that i

read recently i should probably find a citation uh but he sort of makes the point that like all the best power pop songs like in all the best power pop songs it is always friday night and i get that feeling from this um and yeah the uh the use of thinking of england i can sort of forgive it because like yeah it doesn't it doesn't mean what like you were saying it doesn't mean what tom fletcher thinks it means like it isn't just about, like, thinking of England isn't a euphemism for having sex. It's a euphemism for basically putting up with sex that you don't want. Yeah. Hmm.

Quite a loaded term. Yes, it is. But I can sort of forgive it because I guess this is about the first moment that you see a kind of like a celebrity I guess if you want to go really specific into the details of the lyrics um it's about a celebrity who is like untouchable and the fact that they are untouchable just makes them like easier to fancy because like having a crush is a stupid thing that makes you do and say even stupider things a crush is a stupid thing that makes you do and say even stupider things so like i get the whole you know the misuse of thinking of england but i guess it's just like one of those things where like okay your brain just goes to a strange place you think this means one thing and another i think

it does kind of catch that kind of frantic you know hormonal kind of like you know like everything's changing sort of thing um i do i do get that feeling i think i feel a bit icky on behalf of lindsey lohan because it's essentially two blokes or four blokes fantasizing about her in public and there's no real way for her to respond to this like i kind of feel like yeah they should have maybe anonymized it but at the same time the kind of unrequited nature of it all makes it kind of thrilling to be a part of because there's no end point or conclusion really like if all you can do is dream about being with a person the dream never has to be brought to reality or change so the dreaming can just continue unabated um i guess and this thing is loaded with hooks and memorable passages that stick around after the song is over um i don't think it would have got to number one without the assistance of don't stop me now being the double a side uh or you know the sport relief

thing but you know it's it's fun it's not like an essential McFly thing, but it's not near the bottom of their stuff either. I feel like they've actually filled their quota of shit songs like after this point. Like the stuff that they do when they're kind of fading a little bit and they go, Oh, yeah. We need to do some stuff with cool producers.

No, guys, you don't. We're still cool yeah just accept your race is run it's fine come back yeah but this is this is okay this is fine um andy how about you yeah i pretty much agree with both of you about both songs to be honest just a few points of order first um first of all this is a week for bad album titles i think or album titles that perhaps don't come off in the way that they're supposed to we've got one coming up with the song after this, but also

Motion in the Ocean, to me sounds a little bit like, you know when you're at the beach and you go into the sea to have a wee it kind of sounds like you've gone in but you've gone further it just makes me think of Hairspray personally yeah you can't stop the motion in the ocean.

And another point of order is that on the whole think of England debate, there is another usage of that, which is perhaps what they're going for. It's a more rare usage, but it can kind of mean when you're trying to keep the wolf from the door, so to speak, that you think of trying to list the England squad in your head or something like that. Right, okay. this is like the weirdest dictionary corner ever um but if anyone wants to write in about this um but anyway to the songs to the songs so don't stop me now i completely agree with both of you um that this is nondescript to say the least um

and i'm a big mcfly fan and you know we we put them on in the car quite a lot but i always skip this one because it's just it's just the same like it's the same it's got a few little touches here and there and it's got more nominally more modern production by which i just mean they literally just use more modern equipment to record it there isn't really anything done to it in terms of imagination in production. And there's nothing wrong with that per se, but there's also just no point of interest there. And I can't quite fathom why anyone would

ever choose this as the version of Don't Stop Me Now that they would listen to, because there isn't anything really that this one does that the original doesn't do, unless you just want to listen to McFly do everything. You know, which there will be a lot of fangirls out there and fanboys out there as well who will just want to listen to McFly sing the phone book, and that's why this kind of stuff sells at this point. They're

kind of in a period where anything they release has a good chance of getting to number one. They're at their peak right now. So fair enough, like, and yes, it sounds like they knocked it together in five minutes because they didn't do anything with it at all. But, you know, it's fine. I can kind of forgive that, to be honest. Another problem I have with it, though, is the problem I have with Don't Stop Me Now in the first instance, the original, is that I think it's a little overrated, to be honest.

It's good, but it's so overplayed. And I just, you know, whenever anyone says, oh, this is the best Queen song, I'm like, is it though? Is it really? I think it's got that kind of Hotel California kind of quality where it's so overplayed that I stop seeing the good in it at all. So, yeah, I'm not hugely hot on the original to begin with, but this doesn't do anything with it at all so I'm equally meh, if not more meh on this than the original

we look at the other side of the spectrum in terms of Queen covers and we had five with their absolute desecration of We Will Rock You and that was certainly worse than this so perhaps it is better to play it safe perhaps they had a good idea there but anyway, yeah as for Please Please my main observation with that is that's the most they've

ever sounded like busted which is interesting because they you know obviously emerged in busted's shadow and they formed their own sound and their own identity their own fan base their own image you know over the last couple of years they've done a lot to break away from that and then please please i think really sounds like it could easily have been busted um which is a backward step for them so i'm not surprised that that's kind of a little glazed over in the canon of theirs that's not as well known really as a lot of their bigger singles but yeah this is fine like i say this is mcfly in their moment where they can kind of put anything out and ride the crest of that wave and if they're doing it for charity, then all the better, to be honest.

There's not really any problem with that. But it's not the most exciting thing that I've ever heard. And I'm just looking forward to their next number one, because that is exciting. Oh, yes. All right, then. So we would ordinarily be jumping along to our second song this week, but we have to take a slight detour first.

That's because Hips Don't Lie by Shakira and Wycliffe Jean went back to the top. So, after dropping off top spot for three weeks, Hips Don't Lie, it went back to number one during its eighth week on the chart. This time it stayed at number one for four weeks. the chart this time it stayed at number one for four weeks in its first week back at the top it sold 29 000 copies beating competition from ain't no other man by christina and valera which climbed to number two get together by madonna which climbed to number seven and empire by kasabian which got to number nine in week week 2, it sold 33,000 copies, beating competition from Unfaithful by Rihanna,

which climbed back to number 2. Every Time We Touch by Cascada, which climbed to number 4. And Stars Are Blind by Paris Hilton, which climbed to number 5. In week 3, it sold 29,000 copies again,

beating competition from Every Time We Touch by Cascada, which climbed up to number two, and Chasing Cars by Snow Patrol, which climbed to number ten. In week four, it sold 30,000 copies, beating competition from Riding by Chameleon Air, which climbed to number two, Love Don't Let Me Go byameleon air which climbed to number two love don't let me go by david guetta which climbed to number three and leave before the lights come

on by arctic monkeys which got to number four when it was knocked off the top of the charts hips don't lie dropped one place to number two by the time it was done on the charts it had been inside the top 100 for 48 weeks. The song is currently officially certified 3 times platinum. So triple platinum in the UK as of 2023. We have already said everything about it that we were going to say. So we're just going to move on to our second song this week. Which is this. Ready? Uh-huh. Let's go get them. Uh-huh. Come on. I used to run bass like Juan Pierre.

Now I run the bass, hi-hat, and a snare. I used to bag girls like turk and bags. Now bag me. Boy, you hurting that. Brooklyn Bay, where they birth me at. Now be everywhere, the nerve will rap. The audacity to have me with them curtains back. Me and B, she about to sting, stand back.

Baby, seem like everywhere I go I see you. From your eyes, your smile, it's like I breathe you. Helplessly, I reminisce, don't want to compare nobody to you. Boy, I try to catch myself, but I'm out of control. Your sexiness is so appealing appealing I can't let it go Know that I can't get on for you Cause everything I see is you And I don't want no substitute

Baby I swear it's deja vu Know that I can't get on for you Cause everything I see is you And I don't want no substitute Baby I swear it's Deja Vu. Okay, this is Deja Vu by Beyoncé featuring Jay-Z. Released as the lead single from her second studio album, titled B-Day, Deja Vu is Beyoncé's seventh single overall to be released in the UK,

and her second to reach number one. And this is not the last time that we'll be coming to Beyonce, or Jay-Z for that matter, on this podcast. Deja Vu first entered the UK chart at number 21, reaching number one during its second week on the chart, knocking Shakira off the top spot. It stayed at number 1 for one week. In its first and only week atop the charts it sold 29,000 copies beating competition from...nope. In a week where there were no new climbers or new entries into the top 10. When it was knocked off the top of the charts Deja Vu fell two places to number 3. By the time it was knocked off the top of the charts, Deja Vu fell two places to number three. By the time it was done on the charts, it had been inside the top 100 for 20 weeks.

The song is currently officially certified gold in the UK as of 2023. Jesus, the charts are chaos at the moment. It's just like, what on earth? I feel like there's been a sudden shift. It's just like, what on earth? I feel like there's been a sudden shift. I mean, I know we noted over the last couple of episodes, and even over the last few episodes,

that more songs are climbing into the top ten as opposed to just jumping straight in, which, yeah, fine, great. It's nice to see songs developing a fandom before they get to number one. But bloody hell, just no new entries in the top 10 and no climb i have a theory i have a theory i think with that and hips don't lie getting back to number one i wonder if it's like a summer holiday thing yeah essentially yeah people are hearing it abroad and coming back and buying it in bulk again. Whereas stuff isn't getting released as much because yeah,

it's the summer holidays. It's typically a bit of a downtime. No. Yeah. Very good point. Um, Andy, you can,

uh, kick us off for deja vu. Well, thank you. Um, I have to come back to the point about bad album titles. Um, because here we've got B-Day, which is already rubbish,

because it's just a pun on birthday and Beyonce's day, whatever that means. So it's B-Day. But it's like, oh, B, have you... You can wash your bum with it. I was going to say, have you ever said it out loud, love? You know, do you really want this album to be associated with washing your bum with it i was gonna say i was gonna say have you ever said it out loud love you know it's do you really want this album to be associated with washing your bum um but okay there's nothing wrong with the bidet it's there tobias i'm just i'm really like kind of astonished that it made

it all the way through to release that title without that ever being rejected because it's just it's weird that's really strange it's really like not the vibe she's going for at all anyway so with this yes um this is fine and that's that's kind of as far as i would go um i'm very surprised that this got number one and some of her other singles from around this time or these couple of years didn't get number one because, funnily enough, we don't really encounter Beyoncé very often on this podcast. We've had Crazy in Love, we've had a couple of Destiny's Child songs,

and I believe that's it up to this point. I don't think I've forgotten anything there. No. There's been quite a few that we've missed that really should have been big, and there's a few in the a few that we've missed that really should have been big and there's a few in the future of sasha fierce that won't make it as well um i think quite a lot of people listening will probably be very surprised that this got number one whereas halo only got number four um which very much surprised me um i was stunned by that to be honest so yeah

um i don't really know what it is about this perhaps it's the beyonce and jay-z factor perhaps it's the fact that it's a lead single um but i like to think it's the fact that it's a bit different and it is quite different for beyonce that it's um it's kind of going for that crazy in love vibe a little bit with the um sort of excitement and the sense of tension like musical tension tension, I mean, that's there. A lot of kind of unresolved chords and a lot of kind of unresolved lines that it sort of keeps the adrenaline pumping all the way through, which I like. But it's just not really very catchy, to be honest. It's not particularly memorable. And it starts on a bit of a sour note for me with that really cringe intro, where Beyonce is like queuing in the instruments,

which is fine. But like in between each instrument she queues in, Jay-Z just makes this kind of, uh. It's like bass drum. Uh. Snare. Uh. And I was listening and thinking, you're getting paid for this Jay-Z come on

give it a little bit of something something don't just go like and yeah that really made me laugh so it starts on a bit of a sour note but yeah this is fine I did like this I do like that chorus and I certainly like the way the hook goes with the déjà vu, that it kind of weaves in and out of a couple of different lines there.

Do-do, déjà vu. I just think that it's not quite the full recipe being cooked here. And I'll tell you why it is, to a large extent. Like Lizzie said, it's the... I know Lizzie said this for the previous song, but it's the mids again. It is. There's just an issue here with songs feeling a little bit empty. I'm going to use the phrase again, all crust and no pie. And it's becoming quite clear to me now,

after having listened to the three songs last week and this week, that that is just the production style of the time, which I really don't remember that, to be honest. It's not something that jumped out to me before. But having listened to songs from this era over and over again now it's becoming quite clear to me that that is kind of the style is to go high and low and leave your mids out um and it's something that i really don't like i'm just not i'm just not enjoying this production era of pop music to be honest um i wonder if maybe it's because they've been designed for kind of shitty headphones

that can only do treble and bass um because that is kind of what most teenagers and most young adults are listening to music on at this time is those gummy headphones i don't know if that's got something to do with it that everything is being deliberately made to sound tinny because it's going to sound tinny anyway so you might as well embrace it um but i just yeah i just don't like that's just not to my taste but um other than that this is fine i just don't think it's a beyonce classic i really wish we were talking about halo or talking about sweet dreams i don't know but um it is what it is this is fine yeah solid solid beyonce hits but honestly i don't really think i'm gonna listen to it very often again yeah it's fine yeah

feel kind of similar um but you know but like by this point you know beyonce herself is one of the biggest names in pop her and jay-z are one of the so-called you know hollywood power couples so any song that they work on together especially with crazy and love in their history you know it's going to seem like a massive deal uh and this kind of was a massive deal but at the time you know i i just think in hindsight having something like crazy in love like right next to this you know it makes it such an easy comparison and i don't think it helps deja vu's case um which i mean i guess is a bit of a shame but you know i do like this a fair bit i love like beyonce's you know i'm fine with like you know beyonce calling in all the instruments i

totally agree about jay-z's just like oh she says anything um jay-z still produces a pretty decent verse even though he sounds half asleep um the whole thing basically being constructive from the ground up on top of that bass line you know i i like it towards the end as well where beyonce is really allowed to let go and almost like overwhelms the whole thing actually you know she's really showing off how much she's progressed vocally from crazy in love and destiny's child and stuff like that the whole thing is fun and loud and boisterous you know it's two creative people working well together starting a musical relationship that will go on to define at least a decade in show business but then you know crazy in love is right there and it's all of the things that this is but like way better you know like i don't know it's just

when i was knocking all these players together years ago before we started the podcast and i had the idea i was a bit shocked that this got to number one like in my head it always got to like number four and like cascada was number one instead or rihanna or something you know something like that i feel i feel basically the same towards this as funnily enough as i do um please please by mcfly which is a good example of like you know master crafter songwriter types working at a good level but not really recording something with like significantly alter their place in the world if it had never been made like i just like you know if please please gets taken

out of mcfly's discography and this deja vu gets taken out of beyonce's it's like is anything really that different you know like if you take all about you or five colors in her hair away from mcfly or if you take crazy in love away from beyonce it's just a bit like you know that their place in the world has changed whereas with this it's just like yeah you know it's just kind of inessential like it's fun and nice in the moment but i yeah i i kind of struggle with it a little bit in terms of like you know loving it like i feel like i'm always nearly there but never quite in you know it's never quite there for me uh blizzy how do you feel about deja vu yeah i think you've both summed up really well first i do just want to say yeah i can't

believe that this got number one and like irreplaceable got to number four halo got to number four yeah like all these songs that felt like they were everywhere just didn't quite make it and this which i don't really remember got to number one again maybe it's just a summer thing but i don't know um i agree that um like the production on this isn't quite as world beating as on crazy in love but it is a vast improvement from the last time we encountered the producer of this song, who is Rodney Jerkins, a.k.a. Dark Child. Can either of you remember which song that was? I remember the name, but not the song, no.

It was Hollow by the Spice Girls. Oh, wow. I love how we had exactly the same reaction there, Andy, by the way. Yeah, I mean, like, well, other than the mids thing that you've already mentioned andy i think the production on this could have been great like um rodney jerkins he pointed out on who sampled i think um the decision to use mostly live instruments for this and it really works i think it's got a properly slick bass line you got all those like brass swells and stabs and it makes it sound

a lot fuller and richer but I think again it's just kind of let down by the production that was the style at the time which is all highs and lows and no mids I think also comparing it to Crazy in Love okay maybe it might be a bit unfair because crazy in love is this unstoppable juggernaut of a song but with this i find the chorus in comparison to be a bit flat and i also think jay-z's two verses are both pretty middling and they take up too much of the runtime so it's a huge relief when, as you say, Rob, she comes back in after the second verse, and her voice soars over everything that came before it.

You could also argue that maybe déjà vu doesn't mean what I think Beyonce Knowles thinks it means. This sounds more like Bader Meinhof effect, but that might have been a bit more awkward to cram into the chorus. Baby, it's way too much. It's badder than mine. Mine have effects. I think just one last thing on this. I will say that the best version of this song is the Homecoming version.

Have you heard that? No. Yes. Yeah. I mean, that movie is great. Yeah, and this live version is great as well it's got like a longer brass band intro the bass line's a lot more prominent it doesn't have a problem with the mids that this one has um jay-z for some reason sounds like he's out of breath but you can't hold that

against it because beyonce sounds impeccable so i'd say yeah that version's on spotify go and check that out if you've not heard it and obviously watch the film if that's your thing all right then we will move on now to our third and final song this week which is this I'm bringing sexy back Them other boys don't know how to act I'm thinking special, what's behind your back So turn around and I'll pick up the slack Dirty babe your back. So turn around and I'll pick up the slack.

Take them to the bar, bitch. Dirty babe. You see these shackles, baby? I'm your slave. I'll let you whip me if I misbehave. It's just that no one makes me feel this way. Take them to the course.

Come here, girl. Go ahead, be gone with it. Go ahead, be gone We'll see you next time. Okay, this is Sexy Back by Justin Timberlake featuring Timbaland. Released as the lead single from his second studio album titled Future Sex Love Sounds, Sexy Back is Justin Timberlake's fifth single overall to be released in the UK and his first to reach number one and it's not the last time we'll be coming to Justin Timberlake on this podcast. Sexy Back first entered the UK chart at number 13, reaching number 1 during its second week on the chart, knocking Beyonce off the top spot. It stayed at number 1 for one week. In its first and only week atop the charts, it sold 50,000 copies beating competition

from I Don't Feel Like Dancing by Scissor Sisters, which got to number 4, and Chelsea Dagger by The Fatellis, which climbed to number four and Chelsea Dagger by the Fatellis which climbed to number five. When it was knocked off the top of the charts, Sexy Back dropped one place to number two. By the time it was done on the charts, it had been inside the top 100 for 40 weeks. The song is currently officially certified two times platinum, so double platinum in the UK as of 2023. Andy, Justin Timberlake is back. In fact, he's sexy back. And how do you feel about that? So this, this is really interesting this because it's one of those songs that I have come at it from a completely different perspective with this. Basically just a child versus an adult. Because at the time, I mean, Justin Tim timberlake back in 2002 and 2003 was the king of

of pop music of that era you know just the undisputed king really where everything he did was setting the zeitgeist was setting the tone you know all of his songs were absolutely everywhere and this is not that this is something really odd and different and experimental that it's got that kind of abrasive synth that is discordant and is sort of at a counterpoint with the melody. It's very, very odd. The lyrics as well, I mean, they've got that kind of, they've got that factor with those other boys don't know how to act, you know know which is kind of a little bit meme worthy but everything else is sort of a little bit impenetrable and i think justin timberlake has this tendency sometimes which came out on the album tracks um from justified but it's here coming out on the actual singles here that he sometimes gets a bit of an

idea in his head and doesn't really know how to commodify it how to commercialize it that he sometimes gets a bit of an idea in his head and doesn't really know how to commodify it, how to commercialise it, that he just thinks, oh, this sounds cool, let's do this in the studio and let's do it for like several minutes and then never really quite gets turned into a finished product. And up to this point, he's not done that with his singles, that they've been pretty much all absolute bangers.

But this one, I think, is a little bit more of a grower, that you have to get into this song like i don't think it helps that you it's really quite hard to understand the lyrics in the chorus because they're being said so quickly against that really abrasive synth and then it there's just not that much to hook onto on first listen as well so it's taken me quite a few years to get into this but i am into this now um i like how different this is that he could so easily do frankly what mcfly just did a few weeks ago and just rest on his laurels and do something that's basically more of the same but this is uh you know very very different to the stuff he was doing at the start of this millennium you know this is kind of almost like he's trying to be Prince really, you know, leaning into a lot of those kind of experimental sounds of the 80s. And

I do actually like this. I do really like this. I think that it's still got a problem with the production. I just don't like the sounds of this era. I just don't. I just think it's all a bit raspy and it's all a bit kind of I don't want to say tacky because that's harsh but it all just sounds a little bit cheap I think, which obviously wasn't what he was going for, he was going for something that's supposed to be boundary pushing here

and I admire Taking the Swing and I do think this is way more interesting than anything else we've covered over the past few weeks and this is easily my my favorite song of the week but it's quite a low bar to be honest um yeah you can probably tell from from what i'm saying here that i still don't really know what to make of it sometimes that it's um it's it's challenging deliberately and it's it's odd that someone who really was in such a commercial

position who could have released anything and got a huge amount of attention, does something that is really quite different and strange like this. But overall, yeah, I do really like it. And one more thing I have to say is, three out of three for album tracks I don't like, sorry, for album titles I don't like this week, Future Sex Love Sounds. It's just a bit naff, that, future sex love sounds it's just a bit naff that isn't it it's just a bit this is what this is exactly what I mean about him getting an idea

and not not distilling it down into something more commercial like either one of those would be fine future sex or love sounds either one of those would be fine doesn't need to be both it's like johnson in peep show with consultio consultius but it just doesn't need to be both it's like Johnson in Peep Show with consultio consultius it just doesn't need that at all so yeah on the whole this gets a thumbs up because I always like something that's trying to forge new sounds and is trying to set the model for the era but it doesn't really do that to be honest and and so it just comes across as a bit of a cure-a-teg of a song that falls in between bigger hits for him. And, well, maybe not bigger hits,

but it falls in between kind of more solid, more classic hits for him. So I like it, but I don't love it. Yes, he may be bringing sexy back, but he's not bringing the vault back for me. Sorry. Well, I think the whole thing with Future Sex Love Sounds was like, isn't it like

the idea was it wasn't a double album but it was like a not a not like a concept album but like there was a side a and a side b there was a future sex side and a love sound side yeah but you don't need to actually give them two titles no i know it's all got a bit yeah we get it you like outcast we all do yeah it felt a little bit this way with the 2020 experience as well where like you did the 2020 experience which was like you know it was decent but all the songs were like four minutes longer than they needed to be and then it was and then we all thought well you know it's pretty good anyway we got mirror out of it well done and then it was like oh by the way there's a 2020 experience part two coming and it's like well we didn't really want that to be honest i mean what's it got on it take back the night cool

great thanks justin and it just i don't know it just it felt a little bit this way with future sex love sounds where like the i don't know i think my favorite of his looking back is justified definitely yeah yeah yeah I just think he gets too hoity-toity highfalutin sort of thing with his ideas and they're not that, I don't know I just feel like he's got pretensions beyond himself. It is all a bit clever clever, isn't it?

And including in this song it just feels a little bit like he's trying to operate on a higher plane and I just don't like that. Yeah, you're a hit factory Justin, just stay to that and you'll do fine, I think. I mean, he's done fine anyway, but you know what I mean. Lizzie, how is Sexy Back for you?

Yeah, I'm in two minds about this as well. Credit where it's due, as you say, Andy, this is a bold track. For Justin Timberlake's big comeback, they've taken his best asset and they've made it distorted and robotic, almost unrecognisable in parts. As well as that, the track itself is cold, it's sparse, it's mechanical. At the time, I don't think I really appreciated how much of a departure this was from the old Timberlake.

Usually that sort of radical departure for a successful artist is a disaster waiting to happen. But maybe the sheer weirdness of this song is what compelled people to it even more. It's closer to something like Where's Your Head At? by Basement Jacks and Loneliness by Tom Craft than it is to Senorita or you know like i love you like the track itself is very minimal so it's up to justin and timbaland to provide the hooks by

way of the vocals and like many to before it this is chock full of them so yeah it's very easy to see why this was such a hit why people might have not liked it at first but that it would worm its way into your head and sort of keep luring you back into its weird sort of sparse austere world but purely on a personal level this song gives me a stinking headache every time i listen to it oh wow okay yeah the closeness of the production the layers of distortion on both the vocals and the instruments and the amount of repetition overall make this quite fatiguing to listen to maybe this is meant for clubs more than headphones or maybe i'm just getting old i don't know but it did something to me where every time i listened to it i just thought oh god i want i want this to end i want this to finish and a lot of times i did reach for

the skip button i hate to say it because i recognize this as a good song, but it just doesn't agree with me. And like with Nelly Furtado last time, I also find myself wishing we were talking about the follow-up single. Like, this is good, but the next single, My Love, is easily the best single from Future Sex Love Sounds, in my opinion. Yeah, by Miles. Agreed.

Yeah. Because it's the perfect combination of old and new Timberlake. He manages to switch effortlessly between sensitive and sensual. And the production is wonderful too. You've got those warm arpeggiated synths like swirling throughout the track. I appreciate Sexy Back for what it is, but I find that its starkness makes it

difficult to love but my love i genuinely do love and yeah it's a shame that that one misses out but yeah i really do see what you mean about the headache inducing thing i um i mean songs for me don't literally induce headaches but i get migraines quite a lot. And there are certain pieces of music that actually would really help and would probably distill it down and would probably help my head get level. But this, if I had a migraine, this would be the last thing on earth I would choose because there's just a lot of stimulus. It's almost like if you were to, you know,

when you sit in one of those kind of brainwashing rooms where they put the glasses on your eyes and they have the loud music playing? It kind of feels a little bit like that sometimes, where it's just sort of an assault on you, which isn't really the insult that it sounds like. I don't think it's an inherently bad thing. I agree with you that it's just personal taste, but... No, it's a choice.

Yeah, it is a choice. If it's not to your taste, I agree with you that it's just personal taste, but if it's not... No, it's a choice. Yeah, it is a choice. If it's not to your taste, it's never really going to be to your taste, and that's why it's taken me so long to kind of appreciate this with the headphones down quite a lot in a well-lit room. It feels much better

than it would do hearing it in a bar because it would be a bit much for the brain to handle. Yeah, I agree on that. With this, with this with sexy back much like deja vu um it's great to talk about this because there's very like there's a very conveniently placed song like right next to it to compare it against you know with deja vu it was obviously crazy in love and for this like man eater is right there like you know you know the another timberland uh production um coming into like what i mean i know it loose wasn't nelly vitado's second album but like in this country it sort of was you know you had whoa nelly and then you had loose and those were the two distinct eras of nelly vitado and so to borrow your term this kind of, like, unusually compelling thing that you said about Maneater,

this is similarly strange. I think, you know, Timberland's done his usual trick of using every single inch of the mix to stuff it with all sorts of throbbing and pulsating and fidgety little sections that, like, pop and fizz and, you know, move around the place. You know, he's remodeled Justin Timberlake into someone who's apparently, like, raunchier and sexier and you know move around the place you know he's remodeled justin timberlake into someone who's apparently like raunchier and sexier and whatnot i totally get the um the prince comparison andy by the way it's not something i would have picked up on at all but like i totally understand that um the the image of justin timberlake with like the shaved head the fine suit you know but singing about whips and chains and sex and whatever you know

it's a pretty convincing image i think to come back with but only pretty convincing because i think when nelly fatado kind of suited her new image quite well i just in temple like he's only pretty convincing to me in hindsight i think you looking back, the attempt to turn him from boy to man is a bit too obvious. I think it sort of ends up sounding a bit weird for the sake of it as well, this sexy back at points, like he's kind of cosplaying at being like a moody, sexy guy with a menacing edge and, ooh, watch out for him, etc, etc. I will say, though, love, love, love the chorus on this, the call and response, the curious little synth lines, this driving bass drum that does not let up, there's almost too much to focus on, because you've got the Justin Timberlake's vocals doing the,

and then you've got the vocals in the background that are like multi-layered of the just off in the distance somewhere and there's it's very very intense and dramatic um and it kind of teases the possibility of sensory overload while still restraining itself enough to stay enjoyable and i think this is inches from being great from being something a bit special but i'm not entirely convinced by justin himself here i totally agree lizzie that like the the distortion the distortion effect on the vocals all that says to me is that justin himself is not quite weird enough and so yeah just start his voice they distort his voice and fine, you can use the studio to do anything, that's, you know, you know, to use the studio to build a new image, etc, etc, people use autotune for similar reasons,

but, I don't know, I just think that I also look at things like My Love and Maneater that Justin Timberlake and Timberline were working on around this time and they're just better you know i also think as well the future sex love sounds it kind of lacks the it lacks the variety that justified had at least when it came to its singles because justified was kind of like if you will a battle between uh timberland and the neptunes because those four singles you know the senorita rocky body like i love you cry me a river like you know that they're spread across two different producers and it just that with this it's just timberland with some help from justin timberlake but it's will i am who's also on the production as well and i don't

know like it just doesn't quite have that same like i say it doesn't have that same level of variety or color or life i think and i think that if this is the big comeback single i mean you know obviously this is a big deal it got memed into oblivion um i still remember years later going on the weeble and bob website to find um i'm bringing pastry back was a big hit on that website um so you know it's not like he was it's not like this was a totally wasted endeavor you know it was a really successful album and as far as i'm aware it's you know it's very acclaimed i think it's one of the earlier examples of you know pop artists and critics kind of like getting on with each other again i think you know that the big shift comes in 2013 with like beyonce's self-titled album

and a couple of other ones from even actually no i think four from beyonce is probably the the proper start of it now that i think about it and 2016 is kind of like the peak where you get lemonade from beyonce and anti by rihanna and you know a few others but this does feel like a bit of a you know something that the critics can kind of look at and go oh well it's good that that's in the charts because that's serious pop you know serious you can see so much work has gone into this right it's so good so interesting timberland is producing sounds that haven't been heard on the radio before and you know so they can get all chin strokey about it and stuff and that's fine but i just find

future sect love sounds and the 2020 experience in particular to be a little too pretentious i think if you were to cut like if you were to divide each song of uh 2020 experience into like four quarters if you just cut the last quarter off all of them the album would be improved immeasurably because all of them go on for far far far too long we obviously we're going to come to mirrors in 2013 and the the single version of that is great i love the single version of that but then like the last five minutes of that song is just him going you are you are the love of my life you and it just goes on and on and on and on and it's all like these really nothingy soundscapes that don't mean anything, and just, you can just feel the little, like, canary in the coal mine with stuff like, um, uh, on Future Sex Love Sounds, I have a feeling that My Love is not a track in isolation, is it? It's, like, part of a larger, um, like,

a larger suite, shall we say, where you're just, like, taking all the fun out of it, you know, I think it's connected with Love Stoned on the album or something like taking all the fun out of it you know i think it's connected with love stoned on the album or something like that and like it's part of a a much larger like 11 minute thing and you're just like no i just want my love on its own it's great like just leave it alone it's one of the best singles of the year for yeah i think that's um a bit of a problem he has across his entire career, to be honest. I think it's one of my very few problems with Justified is that so many songs go on just a little bit too long or a lot too long.

He's not known for his brevity in general. He really needs an editor sometimes and I get the feeling he's not particularly surrounded by people willing to say no to him, which affects the end product in the end. And yeah, maybe that's why the critics love him because it's like, you know, it's a serious artist who's got genuine output here, but he did need a bit of an edit sometimes.

I'd choose Rocky Body over this any day, you know. Simple people with simple taste, but yeah. I also wanted to just pick up the thing you said about him sort of being turned from a boy into a man, which I do agree that that's there. That's obviously what they're trying to do here. But was that needed with Justin Timberlake? He was the coolest man in the world already with Justified. He was an actual idol in the traditional sense.

He was Mr. Cool. He really was. Why do you need to reinvent him for a new era? He's Justin Timberlake. He's like the modern day Michael Jackson at this point. Why do you need to do that? It's just very like, I just think it's ill-conceived. Why do you need to make him into some

sex guy? Because he's naturally very sexy. He's naturally very cool. Naturally very charismatic don't need to make a song and dance about that just let him be him i i feel like i missed a memo there to be honest it's like since when has justin not already been sexy and cool like he's he's justin timberlake for christ's sake i do think there's a how do how do we put this there's an element of maturity and coming into his own about future sex love sounds it's like yeah justified was the launch pad but you know it the album name was a silly pun and he had tight little curls and in

his hair on the front cover doesn't he look sweet whereas like this future sex look sounds it's like i'm not even gonna look at the camera i'm gonna kick this disco ball while wearing a suit and so much pent-up sexuality in me god and and i don't think anything on apart from my love i don't think anything sounds as should we say loins thrusty as the opening acoustic guitar strums on like i love you they did the immediate like oh you know like the hips you know like that sort of thing whereas like sexy back maybe but like why is it why is it called sexy back because like it's i'm bringing sexy back as if sexy's gone somewhere yeah like the song is one word and is there some kind of like you know because obviously back you know baby got back you know like i i don't know is there some kind of like you know because obviously back you know baby got back you know like

I don't know is there something in that I don't know no I think it's just a quirk for no reason at all I don't think there's any reason behind that I have a couple of problems with the lyrics I really got my goat this whole take it to the bridge thing he keeps saying that the bridge as he

defines it it's just another verse it's another verse there is no bridge in this song I was like what do you want about Justin just take it to the second verse that's what it is really there's no bridge I do love those little ad libs because we're still thankfully in the period of Timbaland's career where he's

a bit more creative with his ad libs instead of just going I mean he does do that on Say It Right to be fair um but we're still in the um the because we're not that far off ao technology where he does the the timberland voicemail classic where you say your hips your thighs you can't hypnotize and it's just oh i was listening as well to um uh apologize off shock value and again that's but that is one where he just goes at least in you know at least in

a crimey a river there's the sort of like the more meaningful like and then he's in the back going or whatever it is with his incredible beatbox beat collection this song needs this song needs jay-z going oh just a random interval just going oh yeah but yeah no the um the timberland

ad libs are quite funny in this i think just it's as if like he's overcome and he's going oh take it to the chorus you know like that he's like he it's the only way he can express how he feels and that's the the way that he's how he feels and that's the way that he's come about it but do we have anything more to say about Justin Timberlake and Sexy Back

nah nah cool Andy okay so don't stop me now please please Deja Vu

Sexy Back is anything going into the vault or the pie hole for you this week well they can say please please all they want but please is not good enough to get you into the vault or the pie hole for you this week? Well, they can say please, please all they want,

but please is not good enough to get you into the vault or the pie hole, so no to McFly. And as for Deja Vu, well, I'm not getting Deja Vu because previously I've put Beyonce in the vault and this week I'm not, so it's not Deja Vu. I'm breaking the cycle. And as for Sexy Back, like I said, he's not bringing the vault back or the pie hole back.

This Justin song don't know how to act. No. Do you know, it's funny that you said, please, please isn't good enough, because the third single off Motion in the Ocean is Sorry's Not Good Enough. Sorry's not good enough. Lizzie, how about you?

McFly, Beyonce, Justin Timberlake Have any of them convinced you Or pissed you off so much That you want to put them in the pie hole? No, no and no Yep, I'm also the same on that one That's a rarity isn't it? Where we've got

Nothing in the vault or the pie hole In the entire episode Wow They're all just kind of decent songs this week So the last time we didn't put anything in the entire episode. Wow. They're all just kind of decent songs this week. So the last time we didn't put anything in the vault or the piehole was way back in 2004, where we had Cha-Cha Slide, Yeah by Usher, and Five Colours in Her Hair.

So that's the level that we're at this week. Five Colours in Her Hair. That's pretty close, actually. Five Colours in Her Hair might have, maybe, but yeah. Not the most inspiring of company to be in, really. Well, that is it for this week's episode. Thank you very much for listening. When we come back, we'll be continuing our journey through 2006.

Obviously, in the real world, apologies if you're listening to this like three years after us recording this, but at the time of us recording this, it's the week before Christmas 2023. So we're all going to have a break, spend some time with our families, go away, stay at home, eat food, whatever. And then we'll be back in 2024

to carry on through 2006. So we will see you then and have a good Christmas, everyone. See ya. Merry Christmas.! See ya! Merry Christmas! Bye bye! Oh, my man sucks.