Justin Timberlake Defends Miley Cyrus, Says He May Not Abandon Us For So Long After ’20/20′

Justin Timberlake hit up New York’s Hot 97 Tuesday (August 27) to chat about his new album and his music plans following 20/20…oh, and he gave his take on the fallout from Miley Cyrus‘ 2013 MTV VMAs performance, adding to her list of pop defenders. “It’s the VMAs. It’s not the Grammys,” JT said about the Miley uproar. “We’re talking about Madonna in a wedding dress humping the stage, we’re talking about Britney [Spears] doing a striptease. This cycle is not uncommon.” He added, “I’m saying she’s young, take it easy on her…To me, it’s almost like if something like that doesn’t happen at the VMAs, then I feel like it was boring.”

And now for his post-20/20 Experience plans. We were bracing ourselves for a never-ending Timberlake-less pop wasteland, considering he took a six year break from music in order to be inspired enough to release new material. But perhaps things won’t be so bleak! “I have a lot of ideas about even beyond this double album where a sound could go from the songs we’ve just done, and funny enough, had conversations with Tim and Pharrell about it,” Timberlake said.

“I don’t know that I would take as big a break this time because it really comes down to, do you have something to say with music? And if you don’t, wait until you have something to say.” Say anything, Justin. Say anything.

So not only do we get the exciting news that Timberlake may not take such a lengthy hiatus from music this time, but we also get the prospect that he’ll again work with Pharrell, who of course had several production credits (as part of The Neptunes) on hits like “Rock Your Body” and “Like I Love You” from JT’s solo debut. After their success, though, JT left Pharrell off his subsequent albums and instead teamed up with Timbaland for all of his post-Justified LPs.

[via Variance]