Pitchfork

If Timbaland's untouchable 2006 reign is any indication, those steroids worked. Bigtime. I'm not exactly sure how losing fat and gaining muscle equates to the finest moon man secretion funk the world's ever heard, but I wouldn't be surprised if Pharrell is ordering bulk quantities of True Mass Chocolate as you're reading this. In his renewed quest for the producer crown, Timbo saved his best for pop, not hip-hop. And, with rumored Tim records nowhere to be found on Kingdom Come or Doctor's Advocate, it looked like the Virginia visionary would finish his most astounding year without a true rap mega-monster. Then came this buzzer beater.

"3 A.M." expounds on the same mouth-percussion mindfuck technique that made "My Love" the most exciting No. 1 of 2006. Timbo recently put in recording time with Björk, and traces of her 2004 vox freakout Medulla shhh, pop phft and duga-duga-duga throughout the track. At a recent listening session for Jeezy's new disc, the MC expressed some anxiety about working with Tim given his out-there rep-- God knows what he thought when he first heard this thing. But the Atlanta slugger (also newly svelte) finds a pocket outside of his Southern synth comfort zone here, even if he's talking complete nonsense. No question, though, it's Timbo's show. They say it's lonely at the top, but this muscly guru seems more than happy to keep pissing off the ledge.