Let's be honest, "Dick In A Box" was better than half the music that hit pop radio last year, and that has made it really tough to hate Justin Timberlake. Not only can this guy shake up the radio status quo, or jump from hairy-period Britney, to Charlie's Angels era Cameron, to Scarlett, but he can also laugh at himself, and what made him, cloying pop records. Yeah, you remember "God Must Have Spent (A Little More Time On You)," no hypnotist in the world could make you forget that mess.Well, this is not that, in fact, it's as far away from it as you can get. "What Goes Around..." started its life as a proto-Justin, sleek, midtempo R&B/pop record. In a genre where only a few singles tend to stand out over the also-rans, Justin has managed to turn the trick three times in a row and in its original form, it's a great pop record, period. If you hate pop though, or the neighbors have threatened your life for having the original on perpetual loop, read on.
It seems Junkie XL (best known for helping Elvis spin in his grave thanks to his "A Little Less Conversation" remix) has remixed the R&B original into a first class, Bloc Party-etched dance/rock workout. Yeah, you read that right and we're almost as shocked as you are. The Dutch DJ/remixer slips JT's re-rubbed vocals into a bed of squirming synths and keyboard stabs that would make New Order proud. In short, the Junkie XL version is all but an entirely different song, and still a hot one.
Before FutureSex/LoveSounds was released, JT said he was thinking of recording a rock record. If mainstream pop's heaviest hitter goes that route and it sounds like this one, I doubt anyone's going to find much fault, except the haters, for giving them one more reason they'd need to move on.
Check out the JT What Goes Small Room Mix on Junkie XL's MySpace
