My Journey With Britney Spears Part 4: In the Zone

As I was saying in my last post Britney's career seemed over by the start of 2003. Her third album Britney had fizzled out by the end of its cycle and newer and supposedly more 'authentic" pop stars had replaced her. If you needed any more proof that the media and music industry insiders no longer cared for Britney just watch her 2003 VMA performance with Madonna, Christina Aguilera and Missy Elliot. Yes that kiss became one of the most shocking and iconic moments of Britney's career but if I may I'd like to direct your attention to the very start of this performance.

Now I had stopped watching MTV and the VMAs by 2003 mostly because MTV was phasing out music around that time and the music they did play had little appeal for me. I was not planning on watching the 2003 VMAs, but for some reason I was in my brother's bedroom flipping through the channels and I caught the very start of the 2003 VMAs. I could hear the synth to Like a Virgin playing, which made me stop the clicker and then I saw Britney rise out of the cake in a wedding dress much like Madonna had done at the very first VMAs in 1984. Britney was by herself at the start of this performance and no one knew what was coming next. Now let me tell you, if looks could kill Britney would have been lying there dead on that cake within 30 seconds. The reaction shots from the audience are very are cold and judgmental. Eminem, Avril Lavigne and Mary J Blige are not impressed with Britney at all! In fact, the only people in the audience who seem to be enjoying this performance are the fab five from Queer Eye For the Straight Guy because obviously! For me those opening moments of this performance validated my feelings that people, especially those in the media and fellow musicians, were over Britney and had absolutely no respect for her as an artist or as a person. It's honestly quite sad and hard for me to watch the start of this performance at times.

Christina comes out pretty quickly afterward and the tone of the audience doesn't change that much though some people in the pit are blown away by her voice. Then Like a Virgin stops, the wedding march by Wagner begins and Madonna rises up on the birthday cake in a groom's outfit. At this point people start standing up including Madonna’s then husband Guy Ritchie. People could sit there unfeeling for Britney but when Madonna, The Queen of Pop and the VMAs, arrives you best believe everyone needs to stand up and show some fucking respect. Madonna's album at that time America Life, much Like Britney's last album, debuted at # 1 before tumbling down the charts and it didn't spin off any huge hits. At this point it was becoming clear to me that this performance was masterminded by Madonna herself. She starts singing the second single off American Life called Hollywood probably hoping this performance would help the single's chances on the charts (it didn't). Still Madonna had been around a lot longer than Britney at that point and as a result Madonna was afforded a lot more respect and appreciation from the audience than Britney was just given a few minutes earlier. Madonna was basically a living legend by 2003 so having an under-performing album wasn't tarnishing her reputation at that juncture like it had been for Britney.

And then the kiss happens!

A few important details need to be addressed here. First Madonna kisses both Britney and Christina but we only ever see her kiss Britney. Instead of seeing Madonna kissing Christina the camera goes straight to Justin Timberlake who gives a raised eyebrow of judgement (Something he obviously got over 5 years later when he did Hard Candy with Madge.) Madonna kisses both of them, but the camera only cares about the Britney kiss and it's all that is reported the next day. Right after that moment Missy Elliott comes out and anyone who was still acting like a sour puss finally gets into the performance. By the time it ends the whole audience gives a standing ovation, which is very much the opposite of how most of them were feeling just 5 minutes earlier.

The kiss seen round the world was on every newspaper and magazine the next day and it was declared one of the most iconic performances in MTV history. Madonna had once again manufactured a perfect storm of controversy and publicity thus proving yet again why she is the Queen of pop, but it was Britney who ended up benefiting the most from that performance. All of a sudden no one remembered the beginning when everyone was giving Britney the cold shoulder. The media may have declared she was over, but they also couldn't get enough of Britney either. This performance put Britney back on the map and her team knew this. They were quick to capitalize on it by getting Madonna to rush into the studio and add vocals to Me Against the Music the song that was set to be the first single off Britney's upcoming album In the Zone.

Now in 2003 I was deep into my all rock and no pop phase. Grunge was my music of choice and identity at this point. I was acting like I was beyond pop by that point, but the fact that my 2 favorite pop divas were going to release a song together was too much for me to ignore. Try as I might I couldn't resist the siren call of a Britney and Madonna collaboration. I remember actually turning on the pop radio station every now and then to see if I could catch the song playing. Me Against the Music wasn't a huge smash, but it got Britney back on radio and into the billboard top 20 again and that was a good first step back into the spotlight for her. Still I wasn't convinced I was going to buy In the Zone until I saw 2 specials on MTV called Britney Spears: In the Zone and Out all Night and All Eyes on Britney Spears.

In these specials there were segments where they interviewed Britney about her new album and then there was a camera crew following Britney going around New York City one night and doing surprise performances at 3 different clubs. What was fun about this was the reactions from the people in the audience. They were not only legitimately surprised but delighted to see Britney. This is when I realized that despite radio, media and fellow artists writing Britney off her fans still loved her. As I said at the start Britney had this girl next door charm that made her feel very relatable, which in turn endeared her to so many people. Those people were still rooting for her and that's when I thought a Britney comeback might be possible.

The second special All Eyes On Britney Spears is where they played clips from In the Zone and much like hearing Anticipating convinced me to buy her 3rd album, hearing Breathe On Me convinced me I needed to buy In the Zone. That song had this early 90s club vibe that reminded me a little of Madonna's Erotica album. I couldn't resist its seductive charms. Breathe On Me was pulsating, hypnotic and sexy as hell. Still if I was gonna buy In the Zone I had to be sneaky about it because at this point I had an image and reputation to hold up as the guy who now loved classic rock and grunge and didn't listen to pop stars like Britney anymore.

I remember as a family we went up to Boston for a weekend in the fall of 2003 and it was there when we went into a Borders that I bought In the Zone. I picked up the CD when I was alone and no one looking. I paid for it real quick and put it in my bag and just told my family I bought some rock album. As soon as we got back to the hotel I put the CD in my portable Walkman and listened to it on my headphones. A few songs jumped out quickly for me. The first was Brave New Girl because it was super POP, which is what I loved about Britney. She always delivered POP in all caps somewhere on all her albums.

Then there was Showdown which had a great vocal tic from Britney where she sings "Waaaaaaaa OOOOO." It's both sexy and ridiculous at the same time which made me laugh but in the best way. The way Britney could walk that fine line between sexy and not taking herself so seriously was a big part of her charm and we would get more moments like "Waaaaaaa OOOOOO" in the years to come.

Of course initially I listened to Breathe on Me the most. I loved it and like Sometimes I would blast the volume as we came off the bridge. It really is the best song she never released as a single which Britney herself knows. Britney always performs this song on all her tours as if it was just as big a hit as Stronger or You Drive Me Crazy. Her performance of Breathe On Me on an ABC special promoting In the Zone is still peak Britney. Then there was The Touch Of My Hand which was an ode to masturbation! Britney sure had come a long way from Sometimes and From the Bottom of my Broken Heart.

In fact with In the Zone it felt like Britney had graduated to being a genuine pop diva and was no longer a teen pop star. Still she wasn't quit cool yet so I kept the album to myself. For weeks In the Zone was my dirty little secret that I would blast in my stereo system when they family wasn't home or listen to on my headphones when they were around. In the Zone was the first time since Britney's 3rd album that I had enjoyed a modern pop album. Maybe I wasn't over pop like I thought I was, but I still didn’t want to tell anyone that yet.

Then Toxic was released as the second single and everything changed!

 Sure the VMA kiss and the Madonna duet had gotten people buzzing about Britney again, but she needed a genuine hit to get her back on top and Toxic was just what the doctor ordered. Originally Toxic was meant for Kylie Minogue as a follow up to her international smash Can't Get You Out Of My Mind. Kylie passed and it's fascinating to ponder what would have happened had she not because Kylie's American comeback pretty much ended after that while Britney's came roaring back. Toxic was an ingenious pop song with complex ear grabbing production that sounded like nothing else on the radio at that time. The music video made it even better as Britney played a sexy international spy where she served so many different looks and outfits throughout the video.

But here was the clincher for Toxic's popularity: Straight guys loved it! As we all know most things in pop culture don't get a full thumbs up until straight guys decide it’s cool. If they don't like it then it will never be considered as cool or as important as say Metallica or Linkin' Park for music or Star Wars or Lord of the Rings for movies or just sports in general. It kind of grinds my gears a little bit that women and gay men's opinions seem to always get steamrolled in pop culture discussions, but that's the way it is most of the time. Still this was a blessing that the men had decided that Toxic was great. I remember the jocks singing its praises and singing along and in the years since I have met a lot of dudes who are not big Britney fans or even pop fans, but will concede that Toxic is a great song that they enjoy. Even Local H, a 90s Grunge band I had just gotten into around 2004, did a rip roaring Grunge cover of Toxic. It’s one of the few times my love for pop divas and Grunge came together and made sweet sweet music!

The upside to everyone loving Toxic and therefore Britney by Proxy again was that I didn't have to hide In the Zone anymore. I could like it openly and freely and not get looks of judgement or confusion. Also it was my senior year of high school and I went to all the expected events like Prom and the senior boat cruise. The music at these events was all modern and therefore mostly sucked because again I did not care for most of the modern pop music from around this time. Yet I could at least depend on hearing 2 great songs each time that would get me on the dance floor and that was Toxic and Hey Ya! by Outkast. So Britney at least gave me some good dance floor memories for my final year of high school.

Toxic to me is one of the most crucial moments of Britney's music career because it not only gave her a huge hit it generated a lot of goodwill. People were back on the Britney bandwagon again and I like to believe that the reason so many people didn't give up on her for the next several years is because we all hoped she had another Toxic in her. Yes Britney was never gonna have a voice like Kelly Clarkson or Whitney Houston, but she was finally being seen as the best vessel for modern pop music that was also cutting edge and different. She would cement her reputation as the greatest avatar of modern pop music on her next album.

In the meantime the next single off In the Zone was Everytime. For me this is the most artistic moment of her entire career. Everytime, which she had a hand in writing, is obviously about her break up with Justin and she is obviously heartbroken over the split and takes responsibility for the breakup too. This is where Britney's more limited vocals come to the rescue. The song sounds so sad and fragile it feels like Britney might break any minute. If someone like Celine Dion or Christina Aguilera sang this you wouldn't get the same amount of emotion or pathos that Britney conveys here. Her voice, like the song itself, feels weak and wounded and it hits me in the heart every time I hear it. It also felt like the first time Britney took off the pop star mask and showed us the women behind it and that woman had a lot more pain and sadness within her than I had realized.

Then there was the music video, which showed Britney being hounded so much by the paparazzi that it eventually kills her when a camera knocks her on the back of the head and she drowns in a bathtub. This was a dark but gripping video to watch as it felt like between the song and the visuals Britney was opening up a part of herself we had never seen before. The video also gave us a ringside seat to the media onslaught she was being subjected to 24 hours a day. Looking back I can't help but feel that Everytime was a foreshadowing of the darkness that was about to engulf Britney. It was her last hit before things really started to spiral and that has made both the song and the video even more emotionally resonate in the years since.

Britney also hit the road with the racy cabaret inspired Onyx Hotel Tour. It definitely took inspiration from Madonna's 1993 tour The Girli Show, which was also very cabaret and jazz themed and had pushed the limits of sex within a pop show. Make no mistake Britney is a student of Pop divas like Madonna and Janet Jackson and that came through more clearly than ever on The Onyx Hotel tour. Britney was no longer the girl in a school outfit on stage. Britney simulated masturbation, had kinky sex on stage with beds and stripper poles and sometimes she was just wearing lingerie! You could tell Britney wanted to get away from her earlier teen pop image as much as possible at that point and maybe it was because she was starting to feel trapped by it.

Then things started to go wrong.

Britney hurt her knee shooting the music video for Outrageous that never got released as a single as a result. Though seeing as how the song was set to be featured on The Catwoman soundtrack maybe this was a blessing in disguise. Either way the rest of the tour was cancelled and Britney met Kevin Federline whom she married a few months later. Britney than announced that after a greatest hits she was going to take a break from the music industry for a while. Little did she know that the press was never going to leave her alone at this point.

September of 2003 through September of 2004 was a rollercoaster ride for any fan of Britney Spears. She went from being the underdog again to nabbing headlines for kissing Madonna, to having a genuine across the board smash that put her back on top which also resulted in a Grammy award, a lucrative tour and Britney being the most popular pop star in the world again. Then just like that she wanted out and as a Britney fan I couldn't help but feel a certain amount of whiplash at the time. Still as I look back at this era I am reminded of how Britney got me to believe not only in her again but pop music as a whole. Maybe I still liked pop music I just didn't like a lot of the new pop stars at that time.

Still big changes were coming for both Britney and myself. I was about to go off to college and discover the person I really was as I finally came out of the closet and starting forming real friendships for the first time in years. Britney on the other hand was about to go through a storm that almost consumed her completely. It felt like as things got better and better for me they were getting worse and worse for Britney. All that and more next time.