Ladies and gentlemen J.T. was not lying when he said “I’m bringing sexy back.” It was obvious on Thursday, Feb. 22, 2007, during Justin Timberlake’s “Future Sex/Love Show” at the St. Pete Times Forum.
Tickets were only sold to people over 18. Justin made it clear that his latest album was for a more adult audience.
Any of the tickets in the Forum were worth more than face value to experience his jaw dropping performance. But the tickets that were worth killing for were the two VIP sections, “dance club” and “VIP lounge.”
The dance club consisted of the majority of the floor. Here you were closer to stage but packed in like sardines while standing for the entire show.
The VIP lounge, however, touched the stage, had their own bar and got an up close and personal view of Justin himself, with some guests even getting to touch him.
Justin’s strong voice, perfect dance moves and sex appeal rang so loud through the forum that every audience member, female, male, young or old, left seduced. Not only was Justin’s sex appeal above par, so were all of his dancers. Two dancers even went under the stage for a very quick wardrobe change; it was quick because, basically, they just had to take off their clothes. Stripping down into lacey boy shorts and a corset, one of the dancers proceeded to have one extremely intimate dance solo with Justin that was wrapped up with a passionate open mouth kiss, leaving all the ladies in the audience ready to strip down and get on stage along with this mysterious blonde dancer.
Justin’s show went above and beyond, he performed hits from his first solo album, “Justified” (2002) and his latest album, “Future Sex/ Love Sounds” (2006).He threw in an old crowd pleaser from his *NYSNC days by performing “Gone” while playing the piano.
Justin’s special guest was his friend, producer and collaborator Timbaland. The performing pair gave off the most energy of the night. They made sure to cover every inch of stage so no audience member was left upraised.
Justin even brought out a flashlight so he could see audience members’ faces. For the unlucky of the lucky who were at the show but were not in VIP, don’t worry. They could still see Justin’s face very well. Images of his face, around three stories tall, were projected through the Forum by white silk screens circling the stage.
After Justin and crew came out for their encore performance, it seemed like the sexual tension in the audience could not be any greater. Guess again. Justin came back out with all of his dancers and singers and took their final curtain call bow to the song “Bittersweet Symphony” by The Verve. There was no better way to conclude his show than by bowing out to this song.
It was bittersweet for everyone-bitter because that was the end of being able to drool over Justin in person, but sweet for others because the women left ready to party with any of the men in Tampa Bay.
Little did the men of Tampa Bay know, that night all the ladies were imagining their men were Justin Timberlake.