Justin Timberlake News

It was well before my time, but Beatlemania was the first thing that came to mind Wednesday night as thousands of girls around me shrieked and shook their hair with the excitement of seeing their current-day idol.

Justin Timberlake barely had to crack his boyish smile or tap his white-sneakered foot during his polished show at GM Place to work the girls into a frenzy of a degree I had never before witnessed in the flesh.

Then again, Timberlake is regularly referred to these days as the King of Pop. He draws comparisons to Prince and Michael Jackson -- when they were in their prime. He has musicians clamouring to work with him. And he has an army of devoted fans who have grown up with him, from his awkward adolescent days in the boy band N' Sync.

Add to that the fact that this was the first time Timberlake had performed as a solo artist in Vancouver and you had a highly charged audience watching a super-powered show that lasted more than 21/2 hours.

It was a sight to behold (even if it was a bit long-winded at times).

Timberlake travels with an accomplished eight-piece band, four backup singers and nine dancers. And even though he is technically a solo artist, the 26-year-old owes at least some of his current success to the talents of super-producer Timbaland, who rose up out of the stage about an hour into Wednesday's sold-out show to screams and cheers equal to those for Timberlake.

Instead of being pushed to one end of the stadium, the stage rose up from the middle of the arena floor with various levels and wings to it, allowing Timberlake and his large crew to dance and strut right up to awestruck fans leaning on the stage platform. With fluorescent-lit bars -- reminiscent of the movie Cocktail --tucked into four corners of the stage and bartenders serving drinks throughout the show, it was clear the intention was to make the arena feel like one massive club.

Transparent screens that occasionally draped the stage were a clever replacement for the standard JumboTrons, while the live and recorded images projected onto them at times made the show seem more like a music video than a live concert.

But before you could forget where you were, the chorus of 13,000 screams would begin again as Timberlake either launched into a dance solo or took a seat at the piano, as he did for several slow, R&B-influenced songs.

The show was almost as much about the choreography and Timberlake's own skilled brand of signature moves as it was about the music -- much of which is better described as R&B or soul, rather than pop. His nine dancers -- including five women who actually looked like women -- weren't on stage the entire time, but were highly entertaining when they were. And his four backup singers, who must be given credit for wonderfully fleshing out the soul side of the vocals, had their own choreographed moves for the show.

The night started with a fast-moving, fast-tempo set of songs including the title track to Timberlake's most recent album, FutureSex/ LoveSounds. He played some speedy guitar a la Prince for Like I Love You, off 2002's Justified, and then quickly launched into the recognizable falsetto from My Love, one of the many hit singles off his 2006 album.

He caught his breath after the high-energy intro with a lengthy greeting to the audience that included a toast -- with tequila shots for him and his band -- to celebrate his first show in Vancouver.

From there, the show was paced to hit a few full-force crescendos -- perhaps the best one coming with the angry epic hit What Goes Around -- and mellow out to slower ballads that showcased Timberlake's impressive range and tone.

Maybe it was because the speakers were lumped above the middle of the arena, but the acoustics were poor at times, garbling songs almost to the point of being unrecognizable with heavy bass and echoey guitar.

And while Timbaland's appearance on stage was novel to begin with, his 20-minute club-DJ medley -- which weirdly included samples of songs from the Fray, Kelly Clarkson, Michael Jackson, Missy Elliott and Coldplay -- went on too long. Part of the problem was that he remained darkly lit behind one of the screens, reminding me of the mysterious Wizard of Oz, for his entire set while an unidentified DJ stood out in the spotlight.

For a few minutes, after Timbaland had promoted his CD and upcoming video game and left the stage, the audience sat in their seats waiting for something to happen, undoubtedly wondering if JT had left the building.

But he returned to perform for another full hour, giving the audience their money's worth with Rock Your Body, Summer Love, Cry Me a River (a song reportedly written about ex-girlfriend and current mess, Britney Spears) and, finally, SexyBack. The dancers dressed as strippers for Damn Girl, while an orchestra and gospel choir appeared projected on the screens for Losing My Way.

Timbaland re-appeared to contribute his bit to SexyBack, which got nearly everyone screaming, and then, at 11:20 p.m. JT disappeared on a sinking platform into the middle of the stage.

But he returned once more, in a sweat-free T-shirt, to sit at the piano and give a heartfelt thank you to the audience and to perform a laid-back version of (Another Song) All Over Again.

By 11:35 p.m., as JT took a grand final bow with the entire cast of the show, several seats were already empty. But rather than being a sign of a bad show, it was further indication that Timberlake had gone above and beyond what's expected of an arena show.

My guess is that those folks who left early simply couldn't digest any more entertainment.