Justin Timberlake Quotes

1. (on *NSYNC's height of fame) Man, I could tell you a thousand stories. I remember girls running after the buses in the hundreds. We'd do an open-air festival in Germany and there'd be 60,000 people there. We'd finish playing, the band would be putting the gear up, and we would be trying to do a quick out, which is what they call it when you leave the stage before the band stops playing. We'd get on the bus and there would be 250 to 400 girls waiting to run after us. I distinctly remember Joey Fatone singing the theme song from The Goonies while this particular pack of girls was running. It was just crazy…I hate to disappoint you, but I was the youngest one in the group, so the other guys were getting more of that action, and they were protective of me. I think I was the one who cared about what we were doing onstage. My role was, we'd come offstage every night and get a DVD of the show, just like an athlete watching tape from a game. We'd get on the bus, and I'd go: "Okay, here's what we did right; here's what we did wrong," and we'd fix it for the next day. But yeah, the girl stuff definitely was a heavy part of it, and it would play with your mind. I remember looking down once-we were playing Madison Square Garden for an HBO special-and this girl put her arm out. She had a mural of me tattooed along her whole arm. I just remember looking at it and thinking: "Holy shit, that's never going to come off".

2. I'm a perfectionist. I can't help it, I get really upset with myself if I fail in the least.

3. Honestly, when you're making a movie, you never say: "Oh, this one's going to suck and go straight to video". When you're in it, you think you're doing the best work you can do. You're surrounded by people who are working hard. Everybody's hopeful. It's only a year later when you realize: "Wait, what was that exactly?" If anything shifted for me, though, it was the realization of how important it is to work with smart people. That takes a lot of the guesswork out. Just being in the room with David Fincher and Aaron Sorkin for my first reading for "The Social Network", I knew things would be different - even though I felt I had totally botched the audition. I botch a lot of auditions. But, the next thing I knew, I was on the set. It was surreal. This may sound strange, but I don't have aspirations to be a movie star. I make movies because I enjoy the creative process. Just to work with people like Fincher and ­Sorkin or to trade lines with great actors has been more surreal than anything I've accomplished in my music career.

4. (interview in Rolling Stone magazine about Britney Spears) I may not ever get over her. I really do still love that girl.

5. I feel like a rookie in the movie business, that's for sure. Maybe a little bit of an outsider, too, since I came to it from music. But I think that's fair. I don't know that I've done a huge body of work that would warrant my not feeling like that. Then again, this past year has certainly opened up a new chapter as far as acting, and I'm grateful for that.

6. I know what it takes to put on a good show for the fans.

7. (on his work ethic) I think people sometimes don't pay enough attention to what they do. I've done well, but the reason is pretty simple: I've worked my ass off. Anything I've done well has taken many, many hours of preparation. And then the trick, of course, is making that work look invisible. The toughest thing a performer can do is make it look as if it comes easy. You have to devote yourself 100 percent when you're figuring stuff out, whether it's with sports or music-or movies, which has been the main focus for me lately.

8. England is the first country that I've had a #1 album in, so it is now officially my home away from home.

9. (on "Friends with Benefits") I did go on a diet for that movie, which mostly came down to not drinking as much beer. And you know, beer is good, so that was hard. I'm pretty thin anyway, but I didn't want to look like a meathead. I was like, I'm about to be 30, and I'm going to be naked on camera. If I'm going to do this, I'm going to train pretty hard. In the end, I just did more cardio, and I pumped up the stuff I already do throughout the year, such as playing sports. I like basketball and golf and snowboarding, and I do them pretty fucking intensely.

10. The best part about being alone is that you really don't have to answer to anybody. You do what you want.

11. (on what he would do if he got 100 percent anonymity for one day) Oh God, probably just go for a walk somewhere. I'd go walk around Paris or Rome. Or if I was really anonymous, maybe I'd do something outrageous like commit arson or rob someone or find all those fuckers who wait outside my house and go outside their houses and stalk them. A day of anonymity would be cool, though. Just to go to a store and not be hassled.

12. (on the Super Bowl "wardrobe malfunction" incident) I am sorry if anyone was offended by the wardrobe malfunction during the halftime performance.

13. (on if he smokes marijuana) Absolutely...The only thing pot does for me is it gets me to stop thinking. Sometimes I have a brain that needs to be turned off. Some people are just better high.

14. I like simple things. I like to sneak in the theatre and watch movies. I'm a movie buff.

15. I have 20,000 girlfriends, all around the world.

16. I grew up in a small town, and because I started working when I was 10, I was kind of looked at as more of an oddity. I would sing at the talent shows at schools and go around town doing different things, but it was more like: "That kid's a freak." You hear a lot of stories about child prodigies, child actors or ­people whose parents pushed them really hard. But I was the one begging for the stage. That made me kind of stand out in good ways and in weird ways. Not a lot of 10-year-old Caucasian kids were running around Millington, Tennessee, singing Stevie Wonder and Al Green songs, which were the songs I felt most connected to.

17. I kiss people with my soul. I don't kiss them with my mouth.

18. The first half of my 20s I felt I had to achieve, achieve, achieve. I think a lot of men do this. I'm not saying just because I turned 30 I don't battle with this. I still battle with it. But in my 20s I had to do everything. I needed everybody to understand me and respect what I was doing. I remember putting out my second album (2006's FutureSex/LoveSounds). When I put out the first song "SexyBack," radio thought I was a joke. I couldn't let that go, so I started calling radio program directors. I'm pretty tenacious like that. I was like: "This is my record. Give it a chance." There wasn't any of my signature falsetto or anything. I'd say: "I know it doesn't sound like me, but just please give the record a two-week period or even a one-week period. Just let the music get out there. If the callback is good, keep playing it." I was that relentless. During the second half of my 20s I started to ask myself: What am I doing? What have I built, and how do I continue that for the next 10 years? For some reason, in the past year I've done so much work I feel as though it's backfired. I'm looking around now and I'm like: Where am I running? I've been running so hard for so long. I've seen the inside of more arenas than your average basketball player. Like I said, I've had that experience on tour sometimes when I think, I don't feel like going onstage. I have no energy right now. I'm sick, I barely have a voice. But you do it anyway. You feel obligated to go out because all those ­people showed up. You end up performing. But at some point in my life I wish I had learned to say no. From the beginning of my career, I was a guy who said yes all the time to everything.

19. I like to play golf. I like to shoot hoops.

20. (on the height of boy bands) It was a time: the concerts, the fans, the music. Plus, it wasn't just us (N'Sync). It was that whole factory we came out of us, the Backstreet Boys and Britney-we were all together. It was bigger than any one of us and bigger than any of the groups. Everybody was selling a gazillion records at the same time. You couldn't keep what we were doing on the shelves. It was bigger than bubblegum. Sometimes I think back on the time we did five nights at Giants Stadium. That was the moment I just looked around and thought: "There's nowhere for this to go but down. It's never going to get bigger than this".

21. All you can do as an artist is do what you think is an extension of you. You put down on paper…who you are. That's what being an artist is all about. And when it gets done, you don't look back at it and say: "Oh, I could have done that better".

22. The most boring thing in the world? Silence.

23. A lot of girls have cheated on me in the past, so it's hard for me to trust. But once I fall, I fall hard.

24. Prince, who, to me, is the greatest musician who has ever lived. He keeps producing, keeps writing, keeps making unbelievable music-all because he's true to his passion…Everything he says, every note he sings, it's just like, man, that guy is so far ahead of the rest of us. One of my best experiences onstage was at his house during a party. Somebody came up to me and said: "Prince would love if you could sing something with the band." I said okay. I was kind of drunk, so I was like: "Let's do the Stones." Then we did "Miss You."

25. When I'm in the studio, there are no boundaries.

26. I know the movies I love, and I'd like to make movies like them. Ferris Bueller's Day Off, E.T., The Goonies, Reds, The Music Man. Seeing Fight Club changed the way I watch movies. It was so much smarter than anything I'd ever seen before, which is why working with David Fincher was such a bucket-list move. Making movies that can touch people the way any of those films did would be all I could hope for.

27. I think music will always be a big part of my life. I can't go five minutes without singing, sometimes unconsciously. And people stare at me, and I'm wondering why they're staring, and then I'm realizing that I'm belting out a tune.

28. (on Tony Scott) His movies made growing up more fun for me.

29. I needed freedom to really express myself. That's really what Justified is about.





30. I would never do anything just for spite.

31. (on marriage) I think the mistake is that people commit to who that person is right then and not the person they're going to become. The art of staying together is changing together.

32. I can give you my personal opinion: Love the music, hate the business. It's a screwball business and there are a lot of players who will straight-up lie to you.




33. (on appearing nude in "Friends with Benefits) It was fun, but I can't say I'm going to be butt-naked in a movie again. I only did it because I'm young now and everything's where its' supposed to be. I figured this is the time, before gravity gets the best of me.

34. I really didn't try to make an effort to make urban music, but I am a product of my inspirations.






35. Film is much more communal in both good and bad ways. Everyone talks about other people more, but then again no one in music gossips much because everyone's so incredibly narcissistic that they only want to talk about themselves.

36. True love, to me, is when she's the first thought that goes through your head when you wake up and the last thought that goes through your head before you go to sleep.

37. Jimmy Fallon just can't help himself. He's a brilliant comedian. A talented musician. A spot-on impersonator. Jimmy has redefined and recharged late-night television with a genuine excitement and energy that gets under your skin. That's probably because watching you laugh might be the thing that makes Jimmy most happy. His lightning wit - mixed with a kindness you don't normally find in comedy - is what makes you feel so comfortable having him in your home every night. And, no matter where the joke goes, the audience feels like they are in on it too. That's because Jimmy likes to share the moment. He can't help himself. And neither can we.

38. Gossip is called gossip because it's not always the truth.

39. (on the backlash surrounding his and Janet Jackson's wardrobe malfunction incident) I probably got ten percent of the blame. I think America's probably harsher on women, and I think America is, you know, unfairly harsh on ethnic people.

40. Pretty is cool, but it's not really about looks for me. It's more about personality. I like a girl with a good sense of humor, who's humble and sensitive.

41. I pick my nose and I'm not ashamed to admit it. If there's a bogey then just pick it, man.

42. I didn't put out this album because I wanted everybody to know I was grown up. I'm 21 and that's not grown up.

43. I don't feel guilty about success. You can't feel guilty about aspiring to be good at something.

44. I'm completely removed from any hype that comes my way.

45. Everyone wants to know about my spirituality, and it's like: "That's mine!"




46. The worst thing about being famous is the invasion of your privacy.

47. I sang in church growing up. Memphis is the blues capital of the world, we like to say.

48. Teen pop will never die as long as there are teens and popular music. It just takes a different head.

49. I had a teacher in seventh grade who told me I should have more realistic goals than songwriting and entertaining. My schoolwork suffered. She can suck it!

50. I will always come with something that's aesthetically pleasing.

51. When I'm not on stage, I'm kind of shy. If you see me and I don't say much, don't think I'm not taking in what you have to say. I'm just not a big talker.

52. I'm very thankful to be doing what I'm doing. I feel very blessed.

53. (about *NSYNC) I don't regret anything that I've done with this group. I think that when people find something that they love to do they make sacrifices to do it.

54. If I did any movies I'd have to take a break from singing, because I'd want it to be really good.

55. (on making "Bad Teacher") After the first week of rehearsal and the first orgy, it all came together.

56. There was a point in my teenage years, when we were starting to play bigger shows and females were running after tour buses and all that, and my mom - and I remember this like it was yesterday - said: "Look, I want you to know that I couldn't be prouder of you. You are extraordinary. You move people. But it doesn't make you better than them. You still put your pants on the same way as them, one leg at a time every morning." I thought about learning to jump right into them, just to mess with her. But what she said stuck with me, and I think it's true.

57. There's nothing wrong with shooting for the stars.

58. I think we created the only dry-humping scene in cinema history. There's nothing wrong with a good jean jam, but also the both of us felt collectively that we had a responsibility. It's really a public service announcement for safe sex.

59. I'm not trying to sound pretentious, but we did sell 12 million records on the first album, so we did get paid a little bit.

60. "Golf" is the only four-letter word I don't say when I'm playing it.


61. The fans have been great to me. I don't think it's asking too much to have me sign something for them.

62. (on "Friends with Benefits") The bedroom scenes were funny because we got to have conversations and banter while we were in the middle of the act. I think the audience can feel more comfortable because everyone has been in those situations, but no one talks about them. So seeing a couple who aren't a couple actually talking about (sex) as it is happening made for a lot of funny, situational humor.

63. I'm not in this for the money because if I was, I would have jumped out after our first album.


64. I have really great, great parents, and they were very supportive of me.

65. "Celebrity" is sort of an idea. I mean, I get to do something extraordinary, but I don't think it makes me extraordinary. That's my opinion. I like to be an artist, I like to do things that are involved in the arts, but I don't think it makes me more special than a doctor, for example. A doctor is an extraordinary person. Doctors should be celebrities. We just entertain people. They save lives.

66. You can say things a million times, but if you can't sing it, then it really isn't much of a song.

67. My favorite thing in the world was to make people sing - until I made people laugh. Then that became my favorite thing in the world.


68. If you asked me what pop is right now. I'd say hip hop.

69. I used to think I actually was Batman.

70. If you put out 150 percent, then you can always expect 100 percent back. That's what I was always told as a kid, and It's worked for me so far!

71. We've been in that situation where you're just so happy to be doing what you love to do that you get taken advantage of.

72. If there were something that I was going to endorse, it would probably be something like sneakers.

73. As time goes by people will see who I am for who I am.

74. Just writing and being in the studio was like therapy for me.

75. You have a lot of time on these tours. As Alice Cooper said, you can either drink all day or golf.

76. My career decisions have nothing to do with my personal life.

77. My teenage years were exactly what they were supposed to be. Everybody has their own path. It's laid out for you. It's just up to you to walk it.

78. My biggest challenge was to make sure that the songs I did were who I am.

79. I feel very fortunate to be compared to somebody so incredible. Michael Jackson's an icon.

80. My favorite moments in the show are when I stand by myself and sing.

81. Every time you do a project, you learn something new.

82. Senorita was fun to sing, but I don't really have a favorite. When you write a bunch of songs, they're like your babies. You don't pick favorites.

83. As far as the press is concerned, they're going to say what they want to say. Probably about 10-15 percent of the time It's accurate.

84. The best part about being with a group is that you don't have to do everything alone. You're with your friends.

85. Every relationship I've been in, I've overwhelmed the girl. They just can't handle all the love.

86. The many sounds of Memphis shaped my early musical career and continue to be an inspiration to this day.

87. I get way more nervous playing golf in front of 500 people than being on stage in front of 20,000 people.

88. The only thing I wasn't prepared for was being everywhere all at the same time.

89. I believe people can move things with their minds.

90. The way I grew up, I was always taught that it's uncouth to talk about money, and that's not what should inspire you.





91. I have really great, great parents, and they were very supportive of me.

92. This isn't about the money. This is just for me. I love music.


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