Is Justin's meteoric success all down to a haircut? ... (left) Timberlake in his *NSYNC days in 2002 and promoting his second solo album in 2006. Photograph: Reed Saxon/AP and Bob Edme/AP
Britney Spears must have spent the last four years kicking herself. But when she ended her relationship with Justin Timberlake, she was the famous one, and couldn't have known that he would divest himself of both his risible perm and the boy band *NSYNC, and become a highly successful and esteemed solo act.
Meanwhile, she cast her lot with former dancer Kevin Federline, who's attempting to launch a rap career under the name K-Fed. Fed-X would have been snappier, but the Fed-Ex delivery service might have objected when they heard the meagre talent exhibited on his first single, America's Most Hated. Hear it here .
And Timberlake, a former Mickey Mouse Club Mouseketeer, goes from strength to strength. His first album, Justified, sold 7m copies, and much is expected of this autumn's follow-up, FutureSex/LoveSounds, which was produced by Rick Rubin and Timbaland. Timberlake will preview it tonight at a one-off "club night" at London's Hammersmith Palais. The Palais isn't a "club" as most people understand the word, but for the likes of Timberlake, anything smaller than 10,000 seats counts as intimate. Despite the £50 ticket price, it sold out in four minutes.
His huge success, as both a pop singer and a love god (women inevitably react to him as a cat does to a can of tuna) needs to be countered by one question: why? Why did he escape the boy-band stigma when his *NSYNC colleague JC Chasez, who also went solo, didn't? Why did the Neptunes decide Timberlake's first album was worthy of their highly sought-after production and songwriting services? Why did Snoop Dogg make him guest vocalist on the 2005 single Signs - which, obligingly, became Dogg's biggest British hit? Why did Cameron Diaz choose him as a partner rather than some Hollywood Romeo? Why has Macy Gray enlisted him to produce her new album?
I'm genuinely stumped. The quality of his music since going solo has been consistently high, but that alone doesn't account for his extraordinary reinvention. If any of you Vultures out there, particularly female ones, can explain, I'd be most grateful.
