From its opening line, “It’s Britney, bitch!”, Britney Spears’ first studio album in four years is yelling loud and clear that the pop superstar is back.
Many people have doubted whether Spears could make a successful comeback after her troubled personal life and disastrous performance at the VMAs, but those doubts can now be put to rest. “Blackout” is a successful – and often surprising – pop album that showcases a new sound for Spears and for pop music itself.
The album switches between layered electronic rhythms and strong dance beats, making an altogether upbeat, danceable album. But it’s not really what anyone might expect. Instead of a by-the-numbers pop album that follows all the rules, Spears breaks most of them in favor of new, experimental sounds.
Spears is at her self-referential best on “Piece of Me,” a track on which she acknowledges her status in the media, saying “I’m Mrs. ‘Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous’/I’m Mrs. Oh my God that Britney’s shameless,” interspersed with “You want a piece of me?” Her voice is distorted through a vocoder (as well as throughout “Radar”), and layered with electronic beats to create a thumping, sizzling, almost robotic-sounding challenge to anyone with a bone to pick with her.
“Piece of Me” is followed by “Radar,” another experimental, electronic track that has Spears singing in a higher register. It comes close to being obnoxious, but the song’s chorus is so catchy that it will get in your head and stay there long after the song is over.
After that, Spears is back to some slightly more traditional sounds produced by Timbaland protégé Nate “Danjahandz” Hills. On club-bangers like “Break the Ice” and “Get Naked (I Got a Plan),” Spears is back to her signature breathy vocals and overtly sexual lyrics that made such hits as “I’m a Slave 4 U.” “Break the Ice” is rumored to be the next single from the album, and if that’s the case it could end up performing better than “Gimme More.” It’s a strong, catchy tune that’s just begging for radio and club play.
The weakest song on the album is “Heaven on Earth,” a mid-tempo track that starts off strong, with Spears listing off her favorite attributes of a lover, but ends up as a sappy, bland love song when Spears declares “I’m in love with you and everything that you are…when you’re next to me it’s just like heaven on earth.” It’s too slow to dance to, but it’s also too fast to be a ballad.
In fact, something that might disappoint Spears’ biggest fans is that ballads are completely absent from “Blackout.” The closest thing to a ballad is the album’s last track, the Pharrell-produced “Why Should I Be Sad.” It’s the most personal song on the album, and Spears’ vocals sound much more natural. Here Spears sings about her failed marriage to Kevin Federline and declares that she has to move on, adding that she’s tired of singing sad songs.
It’s odd to hear from a woman who faces so many problems in her personal life right now. Perhaps the album title is fitting, then, because as Spears’ representatives have said, it’s about “blacking out negativity” and embracing life.
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