Justin Timberlake Denies ‘What Goes Around... Comes Around’ is About Britney Spears After Decades-Long Rumor

Justin Timberlake has finally revealed that his hit 2006 song, "What Goes Around… Comes Around," was not written about ex-girlfriend Britney Spears.

via: Rolling Stone

Nearly 20 years after the FutureSex/LoveSounds single was released, Timberlake addressed the rumors about the song’s inspiration in a new video interview with Complex, At the time of the “What Goes Around… Comes Around” release, listeners believed the song was a sequel of sorts to “Cry Me a River,” a 2002 track that was about Spears, right down to a lookalike in the music video.

“Maybe I should dispel a rumor at this point, which has gone around forever, which is like, it’s not a personal story from mine,” Timberlake told Complex of “What Goes Around… Comes Around.” “It’s actually a personal story from a friend’s. I asked permission.”

Timberlake didn’t elaborate who the friend was but added that the friend was going through their own breakup, and that the track was modeled after Timberlake’s own public split. “He was just going through it and he was telling me what had happened and I said, ‘Do you mind if I write about this?’ And I quote, my friend said, ‘Yeah, torch that bitch. What goes around comes around.’ And I was like, ‘I have to go. Thank you,’” Timberlake said.

“This song was written in, I mean, damn near 20 minutes. Like, it was just flowing. The interlude that goes with it, like it’s just, and then you put the video with it, there’s a 10-minute video we shot for it, like this just hit on all cylinders for me.”

Timberlake will continue to take a retrospective look at his career in a newly announced docuseries, which will also feature Timberlake and Janet Jackson revisiting the infamous Super Bowl “wardrobe malfunction.”

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You couldn't have dispeled this rumor 20 years ago when the single was released? I guess because FutureSex/LoveSounds was such a big hit, and you were in your cool guy era, and the media were busy cooking Britney that you didn't care enough to defend your ex.

Now that your career is on life support, and no one is talking about JT the way the media is still taking about Chris Brown and Usher, now he thinks we give a damn about him putting old rumors we weren't thinking about to rest.