BRITNEY SPEARS: BLACKOUT (2007)
1) Gimme More; 2) Piece Of Me;
3) Radar; 4) Break The Ice; 5) Heaven On Earth; 6) Get Naked (I Got A Plan); 7)
Freakshow; 8) Toy Soldier; 9) Hot As Ice; 10) Ooh Ooh Baby; 11) Perfect Lover;
12) Why Should I Be Sad.
It is hard not to admit that the «Britney
team», no matter how cheap, crass, or cynical it may get (and standards are
constantly rising), at least has a sense of crude (exploitative) humor: Blackout is probably the perfect title for a new Britney Spears
album in 2007, in the light of — or, should we say, «in the blackout of...»? —
everything that we know of Britney's public, and not-so-public, life over the
preceding three years. As the demon that she had foolishly let her mentors unleash
on her during the In The Zone sessions
predictably entered her offstage life as well, I remember the whole thing almost
beginning to take on the shape of a medieval moral tale — sell your soul to
you-know-who, and here comes the retribution.
Blackout came right in the middle of the turmoil, recorded
in the midst of drug-related scandals, broken marriages, trials, psych wards
and what-not. For some people, these situations actually act as creative
catalysts — great art coming out of great suffering and all that — problem is, since
«creativity» and «Britney Spears» never belonged in the same sentence, all we
could hope for is somebody else
getting catalyzed by Britney's ordeal and creating something to match. Clearly,
certain such efforts had been made. The results, however, are somewhat puzzling.
Blackout is very different from In The Zone. This is a much darker, colder, sterner album — in
certain respects, more mature, and definitely more cynical. As a cohesive
atmospheric piece, it actually succeeds — where In The Zone was the sound of a wild, no-holds-barred, try-everything-once
party, Blackout is the hangover
effect, and even though the party as such is over, the effect is every bit as
disturbing because it seems irreversible. With all the icy, IDM-inspired synthesizers,
techno beats, and processed vocals, Blackout
opens the «robo-phase» of Britney's career, and, coming straight off the heels
of In The Zone, there is no getting
rid of the implied feeling — this is
where too much sexploitation actually gets you. In other words, «one fuck too
much» and the senses start shutting down. (Isn't that what happens to porn
stars?)
On the level of individual songs, Blackout does not work one tiniest bit.
Its opening single, ʽGimme Moreʼ, forever tied to a disastrous «live» MTV performance
that introduced the «new-look Britney», is hardly memorable for anything other
than the opening "it's Britney, bitch" — and only in the function of
«least convincing line in a Britney Spears song ever». The rest is a mess of synthesizer sirens, morose Gregorian
chant-inspired vocal harmonies, and atmospheric attempts to turn the message of
ʽMe Against The Musicʼ on its head — give it a cynical edge, let the mind show
some condescension towards the body — but there is no hook, and dark atmosphere
alone does not suffice, since, after all, this is still dance-oriented electropop
for the masses, not a Dead Can Dance record or anything.
Then there is the obligatory anti-media rant —
ʽPiece Of Meʼ is probably one of the few «sticky» bits on the album, and also
one on which the heavy use of Auto-Tune is fully justified: the very idea is
that, on this song, the listener who wants a «piece of her» will have to deal
with the robotic casing, installed by the security system. If it only weren't so predictable, or so hypocritical (don't say they didn't warn you, Brit!), I could
almost say that it works: there is something vaguely Kraftwerk-ian about it,
reminding of the good old days of Man
Machine. In any case, it clearly stands out from the rest of the tracks,
be it in a good or a bad way.
Because the rest is... well, even compared to
the production values of In The Zone,
everything is pretty bland. Auto-Tune, electro beats, processed background
vocals, no curious or even vaguely interesting overdubs, and an atmosphere of
total robo-stupor — depressing and
boring at the same time. It is not even quite clear to me how the album could
appeal to Britney's established fanbase, what with its near-total lack of the
«let's have fun» message. As you slide down to the promises of the track called
ʽGet Naked (I Got A Plan)ʼ — a title that should presume some giddy Prince-like
bawdiness — you find that, in its essence, the song is more like a dirge than a sex anthem, and that its
repetitive message of "get naked, get naked, get naked, take it off, take
it off" sounds more like something you'd expect to hear in a doctor's
office rather than in a strip club. So much for all the sex symbolism.
ʽToy Soldierʼ, masterminded by hip-hop producer
Sean Garrett, is probably the closest that this amorphous mass ever gets to a
bit of chaotic crazy fun — martial rhythms, burlesque mood, and a
«drunk-off-my-head» vocal part that has Britney coming out of her robot shell
for once (or, perhaps, more like borrowing a hyperactive emotional chip for
three seconds). But even on that song the «fun» in question is not real fun — merely the side effect of a
mechanical spring failure in the orgasmatron, with unpredictable results (for
once).
Overall, the only reason why this is called Blackout and not Meltdown is that the latter excludes the possibility of recovery —
here, it was immediately implied in the title that Britney's suffering is deemed
temporary. It is also implied that Britney's career as such had nothing to do
with it: it's all about the over-demanding fans (ʽGimme Moreʼ), the evil media
(ʽPiece Of Meʼ), and that shithead of a husband (ʽWhy Should I Be Sadʼ,
closing the album on a «touchingly» personal note). It is also a nice preventive
cop-out in case the album were to become panned — give the lady a break, after
all, she clearly isn't in a state to produce her masterpiece. But who are we
fooling? As usual, the album has very little to do with Britney herself — and
this time around, they did not even bother about raising the enthusiasm bar in
the studio: In The Zone might have
been state-of-the-art dance-pop when it came out, but Blackout seems to be slacking in that respect. As an attempt to
save a bit of face, it isn't that
awful — but to say that Britney is «way past her prime» here would be a gross
understatement. On the other side, she probably should have been grateful to
still have a record contract under
the circumstances.
Check "Blackout" (MP3) on Amazon
I agree. Nothing really works here. 'Piece of Me' is the definite highlight, and even that is just so-so by Britney's low standard.
ReplyDeleteTHIS is supposed to be the state-of-the-art dance record. While the team behind Blackout does bring in new electropop sounds into popular consciousness (e.g. the wobbling bass in 'Freakshow' is still the first appearance of dubstep in mainstream music + some other tracks are definitely somewhat 'unusual' for pop music), it already sounds dated and incredibly boring.
Next album is a return-to-pop Britney, but it's a borefest just like this one. I do like the title track, though.
George stop this at once, you're actually make Britney interesting.
ReplyDeleteThis is a good one. Really good. Sounds as modern and refreshing as in 2007. Britney's best by miles.
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