The Singles Jukebox

Yet another reason not to feed the trolls.

[Video][Website]
[4.69]

Jer Fairall: Three years after releasing the Use Your Illusions I & II of arrogantly directionless pop-funk, JT goes for the safest possible comeback: a compact “Happy”-lite(r) with a meme-aspiring video for the soundtrack of the latest DreamWorks Animation product. I can already confirm that it sounds decent enough on the radio, where it’ll do just fine until the actual Summer Jam ’16 comes along.
[6]

Leonel Manzanares de la Rosa: In which Justin went into the studio completely unconscious of how half the world hates “Happy” now. It gets some extra points ’cause that bassline is really hard to resist. 
[4]

Alfred Soto: He can feel the soul in his feet and hears Adam Levine in his head, which is funny because Adam Levine’s electropop evolution in the last five years owed something to an idea about futuresexxsounds a decade (!) ago. Co-written and co-produced by Max Martin, “Can’t Stop the Feeling!” is fluff, but Timberlake works like Matisse and his colored cutouts, arranging the familiar horns and bass guitar thwacks with a master’s sense of play. But I imagine getting bored quick when this dominates radio in a couple weeks.
[7]

Edward Okulicz: Justin Timberlake’s metamorphosis into a 21st century Leo Sayer continues apace, and I don’t just say that because he has curly hair. Bright, empty and eager to please, it seems churlish to not be moved — if not bowled over, I’m at least swaying gently and nodding my head. It goes about 60% of the way towards the enthusiasm necessary to earn an exclamation mark, so:
[6]

Thomas Inskeep: Max Martin has created an impressive imitation of JT’s usual pop-funk, and it feels like the Song of the Summer race is now officially over before it’s even begun. Sunny, disco-splashed, solid if not spectacular, and a sibling to “Uptown Funk!” in that it’s such a fine amalgam of elements of great songs that it’s almost great by association. And goddamn, this sounds great on the radio.
[7]

Madeleine Lee: The first time I heard this song was a 20-second snippet of the chorus, and without any other context I thought the singer was just some desperate Jason Derulo wannabe. I’m not sure that I was wrong.
[5]

Anthony Easton: How did something so expensive-sounding manage to sound both soulless and vapid? I know how much money went into this, but I don’t quite know why. 
[3]

Katherine St Asaph: After a year of feebly-yet-successfully persuading the world that his contractual cram job was high art, it’s at least a theoretical relief to hear Justin Timberlake release something with few aspirations beyond an early Austin Mahone single. It’s even more theoretically relieving that he isn’t trying to imitate The Weeknd’s recent imitation of himself. But after almost a decade of such imitations, Timberlake’s reedy falsetto doesn’t sound so great in comparison; nor does the over-transparent targeting of every pop radio format from the curse-averse to the rhythmic. (Listening to this it’s hard to imagine Timberlake as someone who once un-bustiered a nipple, or who has even seen one.) It’s less an event single than an event by decree, and among his peers making more and more publicly and rewardingly interesting music, it’s a puzzling regression.
[2]

Will Adams: Like him or not, Timberlake has always tended toward the cutting edge when compared to his peers, from Justified severing the boy band ties with dark chords and icy production to Timbaland’s bonkers take on dancepop on FutureSex/LoveSounds to the expense and grandeur of the 20/20 saga. Why he feels the need to regress to sleepwalking through a serviceable but numb disco number and shilling for a fucking Trolls movie is beyond me; why this will probably buzz around summer radio like flies to hot, flat soda is not.
[5]

Brad Shoup: Wished-for joy can do it for me. The wanting to be ecstatic is more universal than ecstasy, and even if that’s a little sad, it’s also the way it is. Pharrell’s “Happy” has been the go-to comparison: both are danceable cuts from kids’ films with music videos in which the A-list singer compels people to dance. But “Happy” had the existential sinewave of the chorus’s backing vox: Williams was confident, but not certain. Timberlake is not Pharrell’s match as a songwriter, not even close. When his song’s vocal takes an interesting dip, it’s not into some inner process. It’s into the Bee Gees’ catalog. He’s not trying to buck himself up; he’s not even trying to buck you up. Shellback and Martin fuse JT to a rollerdisco cut with a plodding second verse and a bassline that keeps winking out. It didn’t occur to either of them to ask Justin to lay off the vocal honk. Or maybe the recording session was like the video, and he was just pulling faces while everybody tries their best to step properly.
[5]

Cassy Gress: Timberlake tried to mix Earth Wind & Fire with the kids-soul success of “Happy” and ended up with a song that sounds dour-faced, underbaked and boring. It’s certainly not something he “couldn’t be more excited” about; maybe the exclamation point is supposed to be the exciting part.
[3]

Megan Harrington: Whether Timberlake is cashing in on wedding season or he’s going for a backdoor Oscar, “Can’t Stop the Feeling!” doesn’t remedy the problem he’s faced for a decade — irrelevancy. This is a retread of treacly sentiment, a retread of matrimonial melody, a retread of lifetimes of pop culture and tradition. It is utterly boring and predictable. 
[2]

Scott Mildenhall: Lither than “Love Never Felt So Good,” but less uplifting. It thinks it’s a gateau, but it’s really whipped cream. It’s nice, it’s sweet, it’s nothing. You don’t even get cans of whipped cream at weddings. “Uptown Funk!” arrives and the buffet crowd disperses.
[6]