*NSYNC’er visits Richmond

I’m waiting in the lobby of the Omni Hotel to talk to perhaps the most famous person I’ll ever meet: JC Chasez of ’90s megaband *NSYNC.

A thin woman in heels is complaining about the odor in her room. After scanning the lobby, she elaborates to her crew that it smells like “12 Indians are cooking onions in there.” But she is pleased that the horse trade show she’s with is making money, even if she detests Richmond.

I surmise that Delta Airlines also hates Richmond, since JC’s flight from New York sat on the tarmac for an hour. I catch up with him waiting to scarf down dinner with his manager, Eric, and a guy named J.R. in the hotel’s cavernous dining room.

“I’m literally hand delivering the first single to everybody,” JC says of his new tune, “Until Yesterday.”

Chasez is “running up and down the East Coast,” he says, playing small gigs and doing radio station promos.

“The travel wears you down, but the good part is that I’m talking to people that live, eat, breath, sleep music everyday,” he says.

“The music industry has changed night and day, 180 degrees in the past five years,” he says. He’s reconnecting with the fans and the stations he hopes will pick up on “Until Yesterday” and his sophomore album.

We turn to working on the album with former bandmate Justin Timberlake.

“I’ve know him since he was 12,” he says as two waiters plop down the trio’s supper. “We brought a new kind of excitement and creativity to the table.” He likes that Timberlake took a chance with last year’s smash hit “FutureSex/LoveSounds.”

“He wanted to grow as a musician, and he absolutely did,” Chasez says.

The single, musing on breaking up with a girlfriend pregnant with another man’s baby, started with the tag line, “I loved you all the way until yesterday.”

“I gave him the line, and then Justin started playing some keyboard parts that seemed a bit campy, and we went with it,” JC says.

Timbaland is also playing a key role in the album. JC hadn’t heard about Timbaland’s alleged sample robbery from Finnish producer Janne Suni, but said he’s taking over the world.

“Everyone originally looked at him as just a hip-hop producer,” he says. “But he’s tackled an entirely different market. He’s a jack-of-all-trades.”

Chasez sums up his album as “intelligent.”

“It’s a thoughtful record,” he says of the tentatively titled “Kate,” named for his imaginary muse. “I put brain power into every aspect of the record.”

The Orlando resident, who’s been in Richmond all of half an hour, disagrees with some other Omni guests.

“My hotel room is great. I’m going to pop out tonight and have some fun.”