Album Review: ‘The 20/20 Experience’

The sexy has been slowly fading away over the past seven years. Nowadays, no one remembers what it looks like, or is sure where it might have gone. But with “The 20/20 Experience,” it’s back once more, and as clear to the eye as the dapper on Justin Timberlake’s black-and-white suit.

If his last outing, “FutureSex/LoveSounds,” was a fittingly futuristic vision of pop that would conquer the airwaves, Timberlake’s triumphant return to a platform of towering expectations is the opposite.

Putting his multitude of talents up for reinterpretation, he acts out stunning reinventions of styles from Marvin Gaye’s sensual R&B to Queen’s lengthy experimental anthems. The extensive amount of new range he covers, in addition to the post-*NSYNC charm that justified him as Michael Jackson’s heir, go to show that since his 2006 album, Timberlake hasn’t once lost his way.

Each song orients itself as a dazzlingly fashioned surprise in multiple forms. Highlights of producer Timbaland’s exceptional work include the tricky synthesizing overlay in “Strawberry Bubblegum” and the soulfully trumpeting beat of “Suit & Tie.” Nearly every composition presents itself like a play, with multiple acts of carefully created rhythms, each as infectious as the next.

If the beginning tribal connotations of “Don’t Hold the Wall” strike an oddly compelling note, its conversion into a bass-heavy melody reminiscent of the Eurodance scene does so even more. The album’s songs, none as immediately accessible as past chart toppers, were not individually constructed with the radio in mind, but rather with the fun of aspiring modern pop to reach great new heights.

Timberlake leaves the bigger transformations to the flow of his album as a whole. Two of the more memorable tracks, “That Girl” and “Let the Groove Get In,” piece back-to-back like extraordinarily different paintings by the same artist, while still recognizably portraying that artist’s overall development. The former is a spirited ode to the stirring love of a younger Timberlake backed by the jazzy style of his band, the Tennessee Kids. The latter is a mash-up of the Latin flair from his early hit “Señorita” thrown together with an R&B beat sure to make even the unintoxicated go crazy on the dance floor. Together, they are two of the most successfully concurrent arrangements of his varied composition.

As might be expected, the album is occasionally too silly for its own good. Within the softly constructed melody of introduction “Pusher Love Girl” is an eight-minute allusion to shooting drugs. The odd modernistic trail that the buzzing electronics and echoing instrumentals of “Spaceship Coupe” follow is that of an alien love story.

Any light mistakes that might be made are quickly recovered using the masterful execution Timberlake can now utilize either onstage or behind a microphone. Regrettably so, it may even be too radical to think of a problem he can’t solve using piercing falsetto harmonies.

“The 20/20 Experience” shows a different Justin Timberlake, a molded performer who relies on layering on the advancement of older techniques instead of his usual new ones with varying success, than was to be expected over his extended hiatus. But what remains even more exceptional about his third creation is the care and thought put into it.

The penultimate song, “Mirrors,” is a tenderly energetic love song for the ages that reflects upon his recent marriage and newfound maturity. The closer, “Blue Ocean Floor,” is a remarkably experimental ballad of deeply heartfelt emotion. Each complements an album that, despite its familiar smooth tones and playfully written lyrics, reminds the listener of a comfortably proficient artist, content with how far he’s come.

Regardless, expect a baby boom in nine months.