Providing two discs of hits, 'The Essential *Nsync' is the first major hits collection that digs much deeper than 2005's Greatest Hits. The album contains a total of thirty-four tracks, including hit singles, album tracks, B-sides, rare recordings and soundtrack features. The Essential features all their biggest hits, including "Bye Bye Bye," "It's Gonna Be Me," "Pop," and "Girlfriend”. It also features album tracks, soundtrack contributions, and duets, ranging from "God Must Have Spent a Little More Time on You" performed with Alabama, to "Trashin' the Camp," a Phil Collins collaboration from the Tarzan soundtrack. Despite only being a compilation release, the album received wide press coverage, as it was revealed none of the band members were told about its release. Lance Bass said of the album, "There's a lot of these songs I don't think I've ever heard, I remember recording them but I've never heard them before, so I'm interested in just hearing them." JC Chasez tweeted about the album's release, stating: "I had the strangest dream last night that some old friends and I had a top 10 record on iTunes. Crazy right..." Chris Kirkpatrick said of the album; "It's great to release some of the songs that had never made a record before! I'm glad our long time fans get some new music!" Joey Fatone also said; "Pretty interesting this album comes out, which I really had no idea, and it's in the top of Amazon and iTunes... we owe it to our fans. Thank you."
