Despite that, the Grammy winner still insists that their split wasn't big news to the band as saying, 'At that time, I think everybody had aspirations of doing other things and we had talked about it.'
- Oct 6, 2020
AceShowbiz - It's been years since NSYNC shocked the world with their split announcement. While people all around the world were surprised and disbelief over it, the band didn't think it was that shocking considering that they had been thinking of going their own way, according to Justin Timberlake.
Justin recently stopped by Zane Lowe's Apple Music Essentials podcast, on which the latter recalled the hype around the boyband's split at the time. When the "Can't Stop the Feeling!" singer tried to downplay how big the news had been, he got called out by Zane, who pointed out that he might think so because he was working on his solo music at the time. "You were too busy hanging out either in Miami or wherever Pharrell was," he said, mentioning Pharrell Williams.
Despite that, Justin still insisted that his former group mates were thinking the same thing. He told the podcast host, "At that time, I think everybody had aspirations of doing other things and we had talked about it. For me it was always--I mean, when I was 10 years old, my dream was to have my own record."
Elsewhere in the interview, Justin opened up about how his team was initially against the idea of making "SexyBack" the first single off his album "FutureSex/LoveSounds". "When I brought the album in, I said, 'This is the first single,' " he recalled. "Everybody told me I was crazy. They're like, 'It's too fast.' I'm like, 'OK.' Like, 'It doesn't sound like you.' I'm like, 'OK.' They're like, 'It doesn't have your signature falsetto.' I'm like, 'OK.' And I say, 'Every reason why you think that that's why it's wrong, I think it's right.' "
Justin was right in the end. "SexyBack" became his first No. 1 single on Billboard's Hot 100, keeping the spot for seven weeks straight. In addition to that, it won Best Dance Recording at the 2007 Grammy Awards.
