Timbaland offers apology to Chris Brown

Timbaland is apologizing for comments he made about Chris Brown’s recent collaboration with the late Aaliyah.

In a recent interview with Diddy’s new network, Revolt TV, Timbaland said the posthumous collaborations and any further planned productions “won’t work.”

“People always say, ‘I’m going to do a song with Aaliyah.’ It will never work,” he said during the interview. “Chris Brown got a record, it won’t work. Drake can go do a record with Aaliyah, it ain’t gonna work. ’Cause Aaliyah music only work with its soulmate, which is me.”

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The multiplatinum, Grammy-winning hitmaker took to Twitter on Thursday to extend a public olive branch toward Brown, who he’s produced for in the past.

“i actually like the song wit him n [sic] Aaliyah, its just when you are talking about babygirl its a very sensitive subject with me. so the people who not only worked with her but grew a bond so tight we are like family so im very over protective over her,” he tweeted, saying he had “mad love” for the singer.

“a mother lost a daughter. a brother lost a sister. that is still grieving over her passing. it just a very sensitive subject. i just want the family to be respected,” he added.

Brown issued his latest single, “Don’t Think They Know,” in June that featured outtakes of a previously heard vocal from the late singer, and she appears in the video in the form of holograms taken from her videos.

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Timbaland, along with longtime collaborator-friend Missy Elliott, are undoubtedly synonymous with the singer’s music, having helped her define and reinvent the sound of ’90s urban music and in turn helped launch their careers.

Typically tight-lipped when it comes to discussing his late muse — she and eight others perished in a plane crash in 2001 after a music video shoot — fans of the singer were miffed when reports surfaced that Drake, and not Timbaland, would serve as the executive producer of a posthumous album from the singer (the first since 2002’s compilation “I Care 4 U”).

Last year Drake issued “Enough Said,” which featured a previously unheard Aaliyah vocal over the low-end sounds of the rapper’s longtime producer Noah “40” Shebib. Timbaland and Elliott have had no involvement in either of the posthumous releases.

Although he offered an apology for potentially offending Brown, that branch wasn’t quite extended toward Drake, who he’s also produced for in the past.