Admittedly I'm a Justin Timberlake fan, I don't care if that's meant to be embarrassing because he holds a place in pop music that can't really be matched. He takes his time with his music and he actually holds quite a lot of talent. The 20/20 Experience Part 1 is one of my favourite albums of the past 10 years with such beautiful Timbaland production along with so many influences like Jazz and Swing thrown into the arena, it culminated into a near-perfect project. Unfortunately Part 2 fell short of the mark and just came off like a tacky remake of Part 1. Nonetheless, I was excited for Man of The Woods to the extent where I didn't listen to the singles because I wanted to hear the album as a whole.
I heard that the singles were quite polarising for some people, with a lot of people saying that they felt it was utter rubbish and that it wasn't really anything 'experimental' or 'progressive' and I have to say, to an extent, I do agree. 'Filthy' is a fun tune for the most part, but after more than one listen it just... drags on for too long. And I hate to say that because I love the production on the album, which makes it a shame that I'm already bored of it.
The actual song 'Man of The Woods' is one of the better cuts on the albums, with a real bounce to the production and a catchy chorus it's everything we've all grown to love about JT. Even with the breakdown of the song at the end, the structure of the song almost acts as a call back to those N-Sync days with the noodle hair. But it's better than that, thank god. But this song has a problem that is constantly recurring throughout the album. It's TOO long! Every song on this album feels like it drags on for half a minute to a minute too long. And I'm not one to moan about the lengths of songs, one of my favourite songs of all time is over 9 minutes long, it's just that these songs feel like they outlive their welcome.
Overall, the album feels like it was made to be edgy and progressive. And it's not. And while there are songs on the album that are a pleasure, I just think they're too few and far inbetween and for the most part they just go on for too long... even when they're not that long.
5/10