JC Chasez candidly describes his new single as being “about your girlfriend getting knocked up by another man.”
So just what inspired him and the song’s producer, Justin Timberlake, to write “Until Yesterday” ?
“It’s not autobiographical,” Chasez promptly noted. “We just wanted to push the limits. It just seems like everybody has heard a breakup song a hundred times or a thousand times. And they’ve heard, ‘I don’t like you anymore’ a thousand times, or ‘You make me sick, you used me, blah blah blah.’ So we thought we’d pepper it with some drama and it made it an interesting song.”
Although JC and Justin have remained close friends since the unofficial end of ‘NSYNC, this marks their first time collaborating since both went solo.
“We were just hanging out one night and he was like, ‘Why don’t we do a tune together?’ ” Chasez recalled. “And I was like, ‘Sure, man, why not?’ And it literally was that easy. And that’s actually the second song we wrote. The first song we wrote was called ‘God Bless America,’ which is a really cool record, and then we did [‘Until Yesterday’] and there was just so much magic in it. Between the drama in the story and the music itself, it just kind of stood out from the rest of the stuff we’ve been hearing lately.”
Chasez and Timberlake have since made one more track together, another relationship exposé called “It’s Over Before It Began.” “We just wanted to find interesting perspectives, and that is what I do with my songwriting – make sure the story is there,” Chasez said. “And you know Justin has got more groove than just about anybody out there, so there is a great combination when the two of us get together in the studio.”
Timbaland (Justin’s producer of choice) also worked with Chasez, as did Dallas Austin, who helmed a good portion of JC’s first solo LP, 2003’s Schizophrenic. There’s no title or exact release date yet for the album, but Chasez said to expect it in February or March.
Meanwhile, “Until Yesterday” is going to radio this month, with a tune called “Satellite” poised to be its potential follow-up. “I have to say I have put together a great record,” Chasez said. “That’s why I took my time with it, because I wanted to make sure that I came out with the best record that I possibly could.”
