Justin Timberlake Reveals ‘Drown’ Vocals Were the Original Demo Recording

Justin Timberlake is just two weeks away from unveiling his highly anticipated sixth studio album, Everything I Thought It Was, and the star took to Instagram on Thursday (Feb. 29) to share the behind-the-scenes of making the album’s most recent single, “Drown.”

“‘Drown’ happened very quickly,” Timberlake is seen telling his fans in a casual video sitting at the piano. “Myself, Kenyon Dixon, Amy Allen along with Cirkut and and Louis Bell. It’s the first one I actually wrote with Lou Bell and Cirkut. The song wrote itself so quickly. It kind of annoyed me, because sometimes you have this thing like, ‘Oh, if you didn’t struggle to write the song, maybe it’s not worth it.’”

He continued, “The more I listened back to it and the more I played it for people, the more it was like, ‘No, this sounds like you.’ When I think back to songs like that, where I kind of underestimated that ability to have that familiarity or catch on with people, the last time was ‘Mirrors.’ I sat on that song for, like, five years.”

Timberlake added another “fun fact” to the mix, sharing, “The vocal that you hear is the demo vocal. I recorded it line by line as we were writing it, just to demo it out. The most we listened back to it, the more it had this honesty to it that I didn’t want to change anything.”

“Drown” serves as JT’s official follow-up to “Selfish,” which debuted at No. 19 on the Billboard Hot 100, earning Timberlake his highest debut in six years on Billboard’s marquee singles chart. The lead single from Everything I Thought It Was also marked Timberlake’s 29th top 40 hit as a soloist.

In support of his new LP, Timberlake is set to embark on a headlining North American arena tour. The tour will kick off April 29 at Rogers Arena in Vancouver, B.C., and visit major cities such as Las Vegas (May 10-11), New York (Jun. 25-26) and Atlanta (Nov. 16), before concluding Nov. 20 at KFC Yum Center in Louisville, Ky.

Watch his rundown of “Drown” below. Everything I Thought It Was is out March 15.