Britney Spears: Circus

Recovering from the darkness of Black Out, Britney Spears takes a surprising turn to parade the Circus of her life, with power ballads, go-go pop and a little bit of fluff.

Editorial Review

Release date: 29 November 2008 (Sony)
How creepy was Britney: For The Record? From Brit's father leering at his daughter's 'hooker shoes' (Joe Simpson, your position as pop's most inappropriate parent has been usurped), to Spears comparing her life to an endless prison, the documentary cast a shadow over all the peppy 'Britney's back, with her knickers, hair and sanity intact!' coverage surrounding her new album.

Much of Circus seems to be concerned with re-establishing Britney as a perky popette after last year's relentlessly dark, robotic Blackout. Because of this, the album is more uneven than its predecessor, cursed as it is with Britney Ballads. She's only really nailed a ballad once, with the fragile Everytime from In The Zone. Wisely, Everytime producer, Guy Sigsworth, is brought back on board, but his contributions are surprisingly flat: Out From Under is a dull power ballad that revisits the naffness of I'm Not A Girl, Not Yet A Woman, while album closer My Baby is a sickly sweet lullaby to Spears's sons, which should've never left their nursery. Get through the ballads, though, and there are a lot of great Britney pop tracks here.

The Max Martin-produced If You Seek Amy ("All of the boys and all of the girls are begging to if you seek Amy" - geddit?) is like Katy Perry's I Kissed A Girl on steroids, meanwhile, with its go-go melody and bizarre lyrics, Mmm Papi sounds like some wonderful, lost Girls Aloud track.

Best of all is Blur, a dark, Danja-produced track. Some have suggested it's about date rape, and while that's debatable, it's still a deeply unsettling song - one that seems to best sum up the Britney we've witnessed over the last couple of years. "Can't remember what I did last night/everything, everything is still a blur", she mumbles, before addressing the person she's woken up next to: "What's your name, man? Can you come and hand me all my things?" It's a sobering counterpoint to the fluff that makes up much of the album, and tellingly, it's where Britney sounds most at home.

Tracks:
1. Womanizer
2. Circus
3. Out from Under
4. Kill the Lights
5. Shattered Glass
6. If U Seek Amy
7. Unusual You
8. Blur
9. Mmm Papi
10. Mannequin
11. Lace and Leather
12. My Baby
13. Radar

Nick Bond, December 2008

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