This week,\u00a0Billboard\u00a0is publishing a series of lists and articles celebrating the music of 20 years ago. Our\u00a02006 Week<\/a>\u00a0continues here with a look back at the incredibly triumphant \u201906 from the guy who we originally named our Greatest Pop Star<\/a> for the entire year: Justin Timberlake.<\/p>\n By 2006, Justin Timberlake had already been at the center of the fastest-selling album, the most successful (male) solo-career launch, and the most public-scandalizing moment of the early 21st century in pop music. He didn\u2019t have a ton left to prove among his peers in 2006 \u2014\u00a0so instead, he set his sights on the all-time greats, with a reinvented sound and image and an album that intended to change a game that was in somewhat desperate need of being changed. And by just about any statistical or intangible measurement, he succeeded wildly.<\/p>\n More from Billboard<\/strong><\/p>\n On this\u00a0Vintage Pop Stardom episode<\/a>\u00a0of the Greatest Pop Stars podcast, 2006 Week continues with a tribute to the Greatest Pop Star of 2006. Host Andrew Unterberger is joined by\u00a0Billboard\u00a0executive digital editor and longtime JT superfan\u00a0Katie Atkinson\u00a0to discuss Timberlake\u2019s career year, where he topped the charts, defined cool in both music and celebrity, and gave both pop music and pop stardom a long-overdue push forward.<\/p>\n Along the way, we ask all the most pressing questions about 2006 Justin: Did \u201cSexyBack\u201d end up proving itself dated or timeless? Are we gonna give T.I. the benefit of the doubt on being called \u201cCandle Guy\u201d? How catastrophic was the \u201cWhat Goes Around\u201d music video? Was the stealth Prince beefing more funny or regrettable? How the hell did Black Snake Moan (or Southland Tales) get made? Is \u201cDick in a Box\u201d still as funny as it was 20 years ago? Does Justin still watch Grey\u2019s Anatomy? And perhaps most importantly: Was there any way that JT could have held on to his cool just a little while longer?<\/p>\n Check it out above, and subscribe to the\u00a0Greatest Pop Stars podcast<\/a>\u00a0on\u00a0Apple Music<\/a>\u00a0or\u00a0Spotify<\/a>\u00a0(or wherever you get your\u00a0podcasts<\/a>) for weekly discussions every Thursday about all things related to pop stardom!<\/p>\n Also, check out our editorial staff\u2019s 100 Best Songs of 2006<\/a> and 40 Best Deep Cuts of 2006<\/a> lists.<\/p>\n And as we say in every one of these GPS podcast posts \u2014 if you have the time and money to spare, please consider donating to any of these causes in the fight for trans rights:<\/p>\n Transgender Law Center<\/a><\/p>\n Trans Lifeline<\/a><\/p>\n Destination Tomorrow<\/a><\/p>\n Gender-Affirming Care Fundraising on GoFundMe<\/a><\/p>\n Human Rights Campaign \u2013 In Your Area<\/a><\/p>\n Best of Billboard<\/strong><\/p>\n Sign up for Billboard’s Newsletter<\/a>. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook<\/a>, Twitter<\/a>, and Instagram<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.yahoo.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" This week,\u00a0Billboard\u00a0is publishing a series of lists and articles celebrating the music of 20 years ago. Our\u00a02006 Week\u00a0continues here with a look back at the incredibly triumphant \u201906 from the guy who we originally named our Greatest Pop Star for the entire year: Justin Timberlake. By 2006, Justin Timberlake had already been at the center […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2355812,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25173],"tags":[29110,363050],"class_list":["post-2355811","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-artists","tag-billboard","tag-pop-stardom"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Did-Justin-Timberlakes-2006-Raise-the-Bar-for-Pop-Stardom.jpeg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2355811","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2355811"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2355811\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2355813,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2355811\/revisions\/2355813"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2355812"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2355811"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2355811"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2355811"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/span><\/div>\n