Britney Spears – Circus

Mmm, time to say goodbye to yesteryear’s knickers-deprived, self-scalping Crazy Britney. In this post-Blackout era, the entertainer commandeers the equally apropos-titled Circus like the club-thumping ringleader she is, was, will be. Folks, this one will never be Joni Mitchell. Not in 50 years.

Self-labeled now as the Queen of Pop (hey, MJ called…), Britney’s game and toned and slick again, taunting the rest of today’s box of pop tarts to pretend she hasn’t owned the airwaves since pre-millennial days, whether she was always on ‘em or not. Truly, who’s to argue? Circus sold more in week 1 than either Beyoncé or Kanye managed this year.

But forget sales. Look, about the music, as it is: The song truly worth having of this lot, no matter who you are, is “Unusual You.” It’s “Toxic” 2.0 in terms of its accessibility and melody, damn catchy if not … brooding? Egad. A month now into her 28th year on Earth, she’s all groweds up. No shock that this track comes via the knob-turning hands of “Toxic” fathers Bloodshy and Avant. The lyric’s got-to-praise-you sentiment is touching, and in light of this historically troubled lass’s station in life; the music’s as restrained as a still-jouncy, semi-cerebral Britney track gets. It’s just lush. Dare to dig it.

But first overrated, brainless first single “Womanizer” kick-starts a furious foursome of bangers that climaxes (don’t forgive me) with the Danja-produced “Kill the Lights,” a sort-of sequel to 2007’s “Piece of Me” with its papa-razzing wink. Muscular synths overriding everything but the polished beats, Circus fast becomes Britney’s own Confessions on a Dance Floor, which was easily Madonna’s second-best album, top to bottom.

“Kill the Lights” actually segues grandly into “Shattered Glass.” The title track pumps similarly, and frankly the listener’s saved from epileptic seizures by saccharine slow-churner “Out From Under,” itself drowned in the club love and yet Britney Jean’s best ballad (as they go) in ages (as pop-teen years go).

Unfortunately for the Brit-ish, Circus is not all fan-tastic. The Max Martin-penned “If U Seek Amy” sports some awful titular phonetics and a surprisingly annoying hook of sorts. Then “Mmm Papi” is Creepfest 2K8 pressed to disc. It’s simply no good when you wonder if the fella in question is her real-life papa and estate conservator or any paparazzo who’ll do. (To note, Rolling Stone reported this year that the paparazzi estimate Spears is responsible for about 20 percent of their coverage.) Likewise to be mourned are “My Baby” as hackneyed tribute to her boys that shouldn’t have been, and “Blur,” with a repeated “Where the hell am I?” line that unconsciously serves as a contraception PSA. (If Britney doesn’t presently have custody of her boys, why grant it anytime soon?) Other not-so-cuddly profanities on the track and elsewhere have the Brit yet again alternately inviting and daring her younger fans to grow up with her (or die?).

Good news here is our girl, America’s sort-of forever teen, is largely back in form with this Circus. At the least she’s actually appearing in a studio to record and sounding genuinely lively. No doubt the live shows will still titillate fans and their fathers, and that’s all right. It’s what the public wants, yea, demands from its Brit. She’s hardly a supreme vocalist in the (tiny) frame of ‘Tina Aguilera; she’s a not-so-private dancer in Madge and Janet’s vein.

Accessibility (read: sanity) seems key to Britney’s handlers now. An album-cover sticker and her MySpace page both beckon fans to ring her on the “B-line” (digits provided), and her website invited them to vote on her upcoming set lists and wardrobe. “It’s not the way I planned it,” she sang on her virginal single seemingly eons ago. We all nodded along then, and certainly now. And we all feign attempts at not caring how life goes for her. She knows this.

Tagged as: Pop

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