Britney Spears - Blackout

whh-NO I WILL NOT BE EXECUTIVE PRODUCED DAMN YOU PAPARAZZO

Someday, a real rain's gonna come and wash all this bullshit away.

I'm imagining the marketing team standing in the studio and looking at Britney passed out in one corner, saying "So, guys, what are we going to call this record?"

lol

after listening to freakshow and gimme more... doesn't every britney song follow the same formula?? the only difference with these songs is that britney is trying to be darker and more in tune with music trends of recent times (the hiphop beats remind me of every other song).

did Seripop do her cover art? that thing looks better suited to an AIDS Wolf sleeve.

also while this album is surprisingly good, it still takes a backseat to Rachel Stevens' last album in the "soullessly robotic white-girl buying an album's worth of unstoppably insane tracks from worldbeating producers" sweepstakes.

how is anyone liking this album? seriously. whats wrong with people today. I heard Radar and Piece of Me... Its terrible

I still love this. "Heaven on Earth" is unusually affecting. Sounds yearning, unrequited.

The album would have been even better if the hip-hop beats were replaced with Kylie-style 120 bpm 4/4-beats. But still a pleasant surprise.

Is there an emoticon for resigned exhasperation?

http://i7.tinypic.com/5z50gwk.gif

(a.k.a. "sigh.gif")

2 good songs (Piece of Me, Heaven on Earth), the other songs are mainly random electroclashfuturistictimbalandorgwenstefanistyle tracks. But where's Britney on the record?

Why does everyone else like Piece of Me? Jesus, that's no good. Heaven on Earth and Break The Ice are both better.

And Christ, HoE is asking for a remix.

"Gimme More" is still the best track. Good choice for 1st single. Shame about the VMAs fuck-up.

Agree on the "Heaven on Earth" love, even if the intro calls up "Hung Up" too explicitly.

"Hung Up"'s intro calls up "What You Waiting For?" a bit too explicitly.

xpost More like a very obvious Moroder reference.

First listen today, and I'm thinking "Toy Soldier" would be an awesome single.

heaven on earth was made by Freescha!

Why is everyone all over "Piece of Me"? It's terrible. sounds like a bad Fergie track.

The rest of it is pretty good though.

http://img233.imageshack.us/img233/1632/moqschq3.gif

no... i'm still not understanding that gif

anyway i like this now

it is fun

Radar is my new favourite. It's very tin pan alley you might notice maybe

It's been a long time since I knew an album before the singles were released. Since the last Britney one really. It will be weird to hear these on the radio.

heaven on earth was made by Freescha!

yeah this shocked me too

i love that gif, whatever it means

pop album of the year, fwiw

I'm starting to think it is my album of the year. And I've enjoyed a lot of albums this year.

I believe the gif is showing how a producer/engineer would cut-and-paste different bars from 4 different takes of a vocal (presumably Britney's) to cherry-pick the best possible performance of each line.

boring.gif

zing.gif

Not really a criticism in the case of this particular album then.

By the way I love the poptimist piece on this. It kind of brings together all the things people have been trying to say about this album. It is very articulate.

I let my girlfriend dissuade me from buying this album at the record store yesterday. :(

Maybe I will go back. It was used for $9.99.

it dropped out of the top 20 in its 3rd week, should be all over the cutout bins now or soon.

It is very much worth it. You will thank yourself. And so will your girlfriend.

save your money for the Kylie record.

thnx al! i see now that it says take 1/ take 2 and so on.

pop album of the year, fwiw

oh shut up

name a better one, fucko

yeah, like, that was mean.

I believe the gif is showing how a producer/engineer would cut-and-paste different bars from 4 different takes of a vocal (presumably Britney's) to cherry-pick the best possible performance of each line.

otm but it's a weird criticism - I don't know many indie bands who don't comp vocals all the time, and I don't know any who flat-out refuse to do so

"pop album of the year" is a hella annoying kind of statement to make

so no

yeah whatever. 'album of the year' thing is kind of bullshit for me in honesty but i've been throwing it out more than usual because this year i've found myself liking at least two thirds of a lot of albums (at least twice as many as last year) and Blackout is one of them for defying odds/expectations and being a well conceived, well executed return. may seem like empty plaudits but i think this is a great marriage of anorak-appeasing sonic ideas - Danja's work, obviously derivative as it may be, just sounds fresher and fuller than anything Timbaland has done in the last 3 years - and the usual important pop artist elements that i'm not as interested in personally i.e. i couldn't care less about much of what she's talking about and as per i don't look to Britney for stunning vocals or to actually relate duh. its just trashy sexy fun and i like the sound of it.

MAYBE I TRY THIS COCAINE SOME TIME

Nothing as good as Say it Right, but yes. Freakshow, Radar, Piece of Me, Gimme More, Heaven and Break the Ice are all as classic as you can get.

it is weirdly tricky to precisely nail the right median at play in enjoying this album - too much of either robodiva anonymizing or deadening biographical literalism and it all falls apart. (nor is it a case of switching either side on or off whenever you please, whatever context yr listening it to in.) ewing's piece is really great (as ever!) but i feel he, and the million other people who've said similar, betrays that balance with his disdain for the corny melo neptunes closer.

Can you rephrase that. I want to understand but don't.

incidentally that is also pretty much the reason i lash out at "pop album of the year" (and i am alright about other genre album of years) cos the pop bomb is somehow nearly always dropped by those with a shonky krazy noize production bias that does pop a disservice imo. it is just too slippery a term i'm ever comfy with using really.

heh saying that, britters probably really is the pop album of the year either way so w/ever!

That's not what I wanted clarity on. I really do love this album though.

Ha ha RTC your last post is pretty much why I'm gonna campaign to get "Is It You" as high up on the Pfork end of year singles chart as possible.