It's Britney's (Inner) Bitch

I so, so wanted to get this post up yesterday on Halloween because, really, what's scarier than the above image and all that it throws in your face? The bad wig, the bedazzled hat, the recycled picture with a bad hypnosis-meets-downward-spiral symbol, the title's threat (promise?) of a mental, physical or sonic blackout - it all screams "Boo!"

You know what's scarier than all of the above? The fact that I bought my first Britney album at the exact same moment that I could not be more sick of hearing her name. Embracing my inner trash-pop afficionado is one thing, giving money to an artist who will only spend it on Funions and sequined thongs is another.

I've been hesitant...no, completely uninterested, really, in buying Britney's earlier albums. The first 3 were clearly just crappy platforms for 1 or 2 good singles. In the Zone, however, seemed more grown-up and more in touch with what people who aren't 13-year-old girls actually want to listen to. But I couldn't get over the feeling that her newly-explicit sexuality was just a tired choice by an unimaginative singer unable to find any road for herself other than Madonna's well-worn sex-parade route.

But now, here she is, with bad wigs and no custody of her kids, plus what seems like a complete lack of interest in actually putting any effort into her music (hence the spacey VMA performance and lazy "Gimme More" video). After years of working her ass off to make sure everyone loved her - tweens, old men and every record-company-approved demographic in-between - the fact that Britney now doesn't give a shit could have produced a cringe-worthy album. It's what her fans dreaded and her critics (and, hey, everyone else) expected.

Instead, miraculously, the opposite happened: Britney's bad-girl, I-don't-care, I-don't-need-Timbaland-or-Timberlake attitude has produced a hot, balls-out album that's sometimes weird (in a good way), sometimes generic (also in a good way - more on that below) and almost always eager to shake its ass (obviously good).
There's nothing she could say that would shut up her critics or disperse the papparazi, so why not just get her dance on?

Most of the songs feature lyrics about how some Hot Guy has turned her on. Cool, fine, whatever - that's pretty standard. But within the typical girl-gets-boy, girl-rides-boy-like-Bronco scenarios is a pretty bold Britney who's obviously not interested in restraint for her critics' sake. Despite attacks on her weight, she's confident ("Get Naked (I Got a Plan)": "I'm not ashamed of my beauty"). Despite constant attacks on her thin voice, she's co-opting black gospel culture even though it highlights how reedy her instrument is ("Hot as Ice": "Can I get a witness?/"Preacher, preacher, I'm a teacher you can learn"). And even her porn-star growls are tempered with some sweet sentimentality, such as in "Heaven on Earth" when, for the first time, her naked, unmanipulated, unmultiplied voice declares "I'm in love with you."

But a pop star is only as good as her producers, and Blackout's crew (Timbaland protogé Danja, Bloodyshy & Avant, The Neptunes, etc.) seems to enjoy surrounding Britney's breathy moans with fat synths and unexpected extras. A Spanish acoustic guitar scaling up and down the rollicking "Ooh Ooh Baby" literally makes Britney giggle. "Break the Ice," otherwise a perfectly good club banger, never bothers recovering after its break-it-down bridge. And the baroque male vocal dominating "Get Naked" turns the song into a creepy, almost haunting ode to - duh - stripping.

The apex of the album is "Freakshow," a song that lives up to its title. First: Britney raps! And it's not awful - how freaky! Second, for a song about Britney's freak factor, there's something strangely musical theater about it all. It's like if J.J. Fad wrote a song for the "Rocky Horror" soundtrack. This is a perfect example of a song walking the fine line (if Britney didn't snort it) between so-bad-it's-great and just genuinely great pop.

All this outside-the-box thinking would reek of a post-Gwen/Fergie, weird-just-because-she-can viewpoint if Blackout wasn't rooted so firmly in pure dance music. "Radar," "Gimme More" and "Toy Solider" are all sassy, sexy, perfectly crafted club anthems. The only misfire is "Perfect Lover." It's a throwaway track that Britney - and Danja - seemed to forget about.

There's only two songs that showcase self-awareness and reflection and, as it has been pointed out by everyone, Britney didn't even co-write them. (She, in fact, co-wrote very little this time around) "Piece of Me"'s lyrics brilliantly wrap up everything Britney (and we, the audience) think of herself: "Don't matter if I step on the scene or sneak away to the Phillipines/they're still gon' take pictures of my derriere in the magazine." There's a point here: what is she supposed to do to protect herself at this point? Even if she cleaned up and reverted to her old, perky, bubbly self or escaped to a country cabin somewhere, we'd still find her and follow her every move. Closing the album is the only midtempo song in the bunch, the melancholy "Why Should I Be Sad" (too...easy...must...resist...so...many...answers). It's like 11 straight songs of dance music wore down her guard. Now all of a sudden we're getting lyrics like "my friends said you would play me, but I just said they're crazy." Britney's that much cooler for only devoting a single song to her ex, and it's a fairly gorgeous ballad at that.

She's aware, she's vulnerable, but, as she (or the songwriters) says, it's time for her to move along. Luckily, the attitude she's bringing with her - the attitude that has failed her so much in the media - works so well on record.

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Gimme More, Britney. Please. I Beg You.

Even though it leaked early, the "official" video for Britney Spears' latest single, "Gimme More," debuted today on MTV's TRL. First of all, unlike what so many fans predicted/hoped/prayed, the official version is the same (read: just as bad) as the leaked version. Second, who the hell debuts their videos on TRL anymore? What is this, 1999?

In case you haven't heard, the video primarily consists of Britney in a long brunette wig and ripped fishnets circling around a stripper pole in a club for about 3 minutes. Her body, after having 2 kids? Amazing. She's not exactly the impossibly taut, ripped 19-year-old she used to be, and you know what? That's just fine. If one of our most-watched sex-symbols, just by adding a few pounds, expands our notion of what's physically acceptable for young women (even if she's one of the many female celebrities who perpetuated the unattainable female body to begin with), I'll take it. And that's the only "amazing" I'll use in a positive sense in this whole post.

Look, Britney is 25 years old. She's an adult. If she wants to fantasize about being a stripper, that's her choice. And this time, unlike her previous music video costumes, I have no doubt that this was her choice, not her record company's (whether or not they agreed to it is beside the point). Critics have always been saying that Britney needs to grow up with her audience. I'm not sure this is what they had in mind, but it seems inevitable after her carefully calculated Lolita routine eventually added pseudo-bondage lyrics ("I'm a Slave 4 U"), performances with phallic snakes wrapped around her (the 2001 MTV Music Video Awards) and songs about masturbation (2003's "Touch of My Hand").

So if she wants to be a stripper, that's her right. My only request is that she be a good stripper. Britney was always a dancer/performer instead of a singer, and other pop stars have made that work for much longer careers than Britney's so far (Madonna, Janet, etc.). So, if she can't belt it out, at least she can put her back into it. All she does in this video for three minutes is walk around the pole over and over, flipping her natty hair and occasionally dropping her butt to her heels and bouncing back up.

There's nothing wrong with going through a Bad Girl phase. Hey, Madonna had her Sex book/"Body of Evidence" movie/Erotica album phase. And kicking off her latest single with "It's Britney, bitch" was inspired. What's inexcusable is being a boring Bad Girl. If she wants to distract the public from her personal life, if even for 3 minutes at a time, then she should give us something else to look at/talk about, and crappy lip-syncing does not count. She should remind us that she at least used to know how to put on a show, from flashy music videos to pristinely executed awards show performances.

I know, I know. She's distracted, probably depressed, hitting the clubs and hyped up on coffee. But music and performing is what she supposedly loves, right? That's why she used to sing to no one in malls across the country just to get a record deal, right? So if she wants to be angry, sad, irritated, depressed, or rebellious? Fine! Then she should be like every other artist, including shiny pop idols like Madonna and Janet, and exploit her feelings for artistic expression! Then commit to that exploitation by creating a dizzily-edited music video which only peripherally relates to the song but distracts us with dazzling choreography. See? Easy.

It's too bad, really, because "Gimme More" is a surprisingly solid song (the remix with Lil' Mama, while fun, is not even necessary), and is well on its way to becoming her most successful since 1998's "...Baby One More Time." Like any pop star, she's at the mercy of her producers and her voice is often used as one easily-manipulated layer in well-crafted sonic nuggets. "Gimme More" is no exception, with wide swaths of synths overlapping plink-plunk bubbles in the background. Britney commits herself merely competently, but the song doesn't really soar until the bridge where a possessed-sounding male singer trills over minimal beats.

Unfortunately, 11 other new songs leaked today (and then were taken down after 24 hours!) and they don't come anywhere close to "Gimme More." Listening to the sloppy, uninspired productions makes 2003's "In the Zone" sound downright classic. Her voice is so weak and breathy, the producers have to layer it and manipulate it to the point of losing it all together. She might as well as not have shown up at all. She actually raps on "When You Gon' Pull It?", a song where she compliments her lover "getting pretty good with that thing." Is she singing to her Starbucks barista about the milk steamer? Probably not. The only song even close to a "highlight" is a simple, almost torchy piano ballad that caters to Britney's lower, stronger register. Just to add a curious element, there's something almost like a whirring fan throughout the whole song, as if they rolled a piano and mic into a Dairy Queen to record Britney's vocals between Blizzards. But, while nothing special in any other context, the stripped-down ballad actually works among the 10 other messes.

The title? "Let Go."

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