Trollheart

Celebrity - Nsync - 2001 (Jive)


More and more vocoders, god-damn them! (To be fair(ish), I think I've learned since that this is in fact the bane of the proper singer, thrice-cursed Autotune) “Pop” starts the final Nsync album off more or less in the same vein as the previous, and again it's been hailed as having much more of a hip-hop influence, but as I'm not all that familiar with that genre I can't really say. There are certainly a lot of synth, synth-bass and sampled vocals in use in at least this track, a dancer with funk elements, and what may be I believe what the kids these days call “scratching”? The title track has a little more of a swagger to it, and the lyric seems to tackle the problem of being liked/loved just because you're famous - aw, the poor darlings! It's got a Paula Abdul/Janet Jackson vibe to it, more scratching and bubbly synth with programmed drum patterns. Both of these tracks feature writing input from Justin Timberlake - make of that what you will. Personally, I don't think it's a great advertisement for his songwriting talent. Featuring some videogame sounds in the intro, “The Game is Over” (see what they did there?) is nothing that much different, and the videogame samples, which continue through the track, get very annoying. I'm waiting for a ballad, as they're the only way I can properly comment on Nsync, whose music otherwise seems all very generic and formulaic.

Timberlake has his hand again in the writing of “Girlfriend”, their last ever single and one that got into the very highest echelons in both the US and UK charts, narrowly missing the number one spot in the latter. It's more mid-pace dance stuff though, and nothing particularly different from anything that has gone before. “The Two of Us” is JC Chasez's second attempt at songwriting on the album, his first being a collaboration on “The Game is Over”, and here again he teams up with Alex Greggs and Brad Daymond, and the result, to be honest, is not that much better. Pass.

Not getting much love from this album so far, and I haven't even heard one ballad. But hold on: here's some lovely cello introduction to “Gone”, with a nice little soft acoustic guitar, and it seems like we may have our first ballad after all. With Timberlake again involved in the writing, this is a lot better, but we are now halfway through the album, so it'll take a lot to turn this around. Still, this is a good start to build upon. Unfortunately, “Tell Me, Tell Me Baby” shatters that hope, with a return to generic pop/dance, and the intentionally supposed-to-be-funny false start is not at all, just comes across (to me) as smug and annoying. Particularly when the song is absolutely nothing to write home about.

A nice sentiment, as far as I'm concerned, “Up Against the Wall” has me casting about for my gun, but I can't find it. Shame. The absolute genericity of this album of pap has my ire rising by the minute (and my ire really needs to stay on the ground, you know): there's nothing special about it, and again I have to compare Nsync to the Backstreet Boys, with the latter coming up trumps in every case. This album, and this band, epitomise and confirm all I despise about boybands. The lazy, careless songwriting, the willingness to exploit a formula to the nth degree, the lack of any interest in progressing their music or even improving it. Nsync, it would appear, were happy to put out the same rubbish over three albums, and the public ate it all up and asked for more. Thankfully, there was none.

“See Right Through You” is basically nothing more than a crude excuse for me to laugh at the band again and agree that yes, I do, then there's finally some relief in “Selfish”, the second ballad, and it's miles better than what passes for music on the vast majority of this album. It's nicely constructed, with a soul feel and some tasteful digital piano, some nice breathy synthesisers, and in fairness I have to give some sort of plaudits to Chasez, as he's involved in the writing of this, probably the only other decent track on the album. It of course doesn't last, and we're back to dancing with “Just Don't Tell Me That”, beeping keyboards and drum machines with sampled synth blasts: yeah, we've (YAWN!) heard it all before, guys, too many times.

The legendary Stevie Wonder does his best to pull things back onto some sort of even keel and the album struggles to finish on a high note as he plays harmonica on “Something Like You”, which thankfully is another ballad, and very nice, almost Stevie-like in its melody, and something of a triumph for Timberlake, who co-writes it. We close though on “Do Your Thing”, which is a bright, poppy, and annoying dance tune, and is unfortunately the last thing you're humming (if you're humming) when the album is over.

No, I don't see any signs of progression here: nothing that makes me think these guys could have gone on to change the music they were playing, stretch beyond the limited examples here, and in two other albums. Maybe they didn't want to. They'd made their money, they'd conquered the world. Why buck the winning formula by trying something else? Maybe I just don't understand the boyband ethic, and maybe I never will. All I can say is I'm glad there were only three albums from Nsync that I had to review, but it was three too many.

TRACKLISTING

1. Pop
2. Celebrity
3. The Game is Over
4. Two of Us
5. Gone
6. Girlfriend
7. Tell Me, Tell Me Baby
8. Up Against the Wall
9. See Right Through You
10. Selfish
11. Just Don't Tell Me That
12. Something Like You
13. Do Your Thing

Although they announced after this album that they were going on hiatus, ie taking a break, Nsync have never managed to get back together (awww!) since the departure of Justin Timberlake, who has of course carved himself out a very successful solo career, first in music and now in film, and with his heavy schedule it seems unlikely we'll be seeing any new material from the band in the foreseeable future.

I personally won't be losing any sleep over that.

Max picks me up at the library and drives me back to my hotel, where we shake hands and wish each other well. Tomorrow I board the train which will take me on a three-day journey south, to the region known as Tak'Thatten, where I will begin my research on probably the biggest and most successful boyband to come out of the United Kingdom, Take That. Max has been a great guide and will always be a friend, but the journey is far out of his legal jurisdiction, and anyway would cost me a fortune!

On the way south I will have plenty of time to ruminate upon what I have learned thus far, and compose my thoughts for the second part of this review. For now, I reiterate my findings that the music I encountered when listening to the Backstreet Boys' catalogue beats that of Nsync into a cocked hat.

If I had a cocked hat...

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Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018