Timothy Timbaland must be worth his weight in gold to any floundering famous pop stars. I often have visions of him being doorstepped at his home by Jason Donovan or some other notable casualty of the gravy train (sometimes Right Said Fred), and though Nelly Furtado could never be considered as any kind of casualty herself, a Timbaland collaboration is undoubtedly an almighty tonic to her career.
After taking time out to give birth to her baby daughter, Furtado returned to the industry last year in the kind of commercial predicament of someone with a few hits who wants to be, well, something more like Kylie or Madonna. Sure, she's got the looks, you thought, but does she have the danger, the "X-Factor", like Ray Quinn?
Well, over to Timbaland with his magic liberation wand, and the transformation is profound. Nelly now struts like a demon and has hair that curls like a Vidal Sassoon mannequin, but what really makes her all the better for being the new global uber-sexy superstar is the fact that you still sense some kind of actual human trepidation underneath it all. It's there when she walks onto the underground platform to writhe with greased devils in the kick-ass Maneater, as it was there in the wide-eyed chorus of I'm Like a Bird, and if anything it's more accentuated here in a track of surprisingly dark allure.
While Britney Spears suffers privately and publicly for being part of a machine determined to paper over any signs of humanity, Timbaland's artists seem free to convey something tenfold more genuine under the hot lights. Perhaps it's the touch of an artist-producer rather than an airbrush tyrant, but whatever, long may commercial products continue to be as sultry and subversive.
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