Page 7 - Pop History: Britney Spears Pt I

Episode Date: July 21, 2020

We kick off our series on the one, the only, the Princess of Pop, Britney Spears.Want even more Page 7 goodness? Support the show on Patreon and get weekly bonus episodes and more! Patreon.com/Page7PodcastKevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0 Subscribe to SiriusXM Podcasts+ to listen to new episodes of Page 7 ad-free.Start a free trial now on Apple Podcasts or by visiting siriusxm.com/podcastsplus. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

She's so lucky She's a star But she cry, cry, cries In a lonely heart Tears coming out Too early to start the tears I'm ready to start crying already Let's make it sexier

Let's go I'm never Good Badly woman That's the song we're choosing Will you make me a woman Mr? More baby voice

Baby or the voice Smith, will you make real real? I feel like that's where Audrey from Little Shabahars, but that just makes me feel like Natalie needs to audition for the part of Audrey from Little Shabahars because you kill that. You would do a great job in it, but that's not what we're talking about today.

Yes, guys, this is the beginning. Welcome to the wild ride that is Britney Spears' life. So I've been excited about doing these episodes for a while. Yes, I am saying episodes. We are definitely diving deep into how has Britney's, come from a child star and turned into a hashtag Free Britney movement where every social media post you watch of her is even more upsetting than the last. And I will say that most of this story is upsetting. And I didn't really know how upsetting the story was going to be until we started researching.

It's rough, dude. It's a little criminal. Yeah. Seriously. A lot of criminal. Yeah, a lot of criminal. And I am really blown away. And it really does, you know, obviously for all of us,

her stardom, I mean, pop music, popular music completely changed. We went from grunge to boy bands and Britney Spears. We changed the face of music. It changed MTV. It turned in TV into like the TRL. We got Carson Daly out of this. We got Carson Daly out of this whole situation.

And, and, but, but it tells the story of a, America in the early 2000s, it tells the story of the fame explosion. I mean, I saw it go down. I remember seeing this young girl become popular. I didn't even realize she was one year older than me when she, you know, this whole time. I didn't even realize that. She looked so much younger than you. Yeah.

Well, no, I mean, when I was young, I felt like a little kid, though. And she seemed a little older than me because she was on the TV, singing the songs and being sexy. And then it's like, whoa. And I always thought she was. my age in watching her come up because you got to think so she really hit it big in 1998 I was 11 years old I assumed she was pretty much my age when I was obsessed with her at that time period well they definitely infantilized her that's for sure and that's what so scary so we're dealing with the sexualization and the infantalization of this person

guys I would love to know what your relationship was to her when like I am just going to assume Holden, there was a lot of masturbation involved because there always is in these stories. I mean, especially when it comes to this time in MTV and this type of icon. I will say, I think there were other ones in the old SB. And that means spank bank is what that stands for. Not Starbucks, but who knows what happens. Anytime you start jerking in a Starbucks, they'd never like it.

A little harder than Brinpet, but I do remember, I was even just watching the music videos, which makes me feel so gross because I'm watching a little girl. And I'm like, oh, I remember being way more like pretty horned up about this. And that makes me feel gross. But that's also the thing is that she wasn't a little girl. Technically, she was 17, 18 years old when all this stuff started happening. That's still like too young. Because of what they forced her to do, it seemed like she was 14 because that's what they were looking for.

But that's all gross. First off, 17, 18 is still a child. Still too young and still too gross. And imagine the people who are producing these videos were probably older than we are right now. And they were like, and all men. Make her belly button show more. Yes. I want to see them socks.

It's totally, I love those socks. It's totally also making a teenage girl live out the Jackie O. Marilyn Monroe fantasy, duality fantasy. Yeah, virgin horror. For a bunch of grown men and a bunch of teens. and it's so confusing. It's like she's this sex symbol icon from day one with Hit Me Baby one more time. And at the same time, they're making her say that she's going to save herself for marriage.

It's so weird. It's so gross. It doesn't make no sense because I just explained it. It is exactly the Virgin Horror thing. Jackie, were you a big fan as a kid? Were you like to do it? See, my thing was that I was a huge Backs Your Boys and InSink fan. So in turn, you also.

So you were listening to New Metal, right? Oh, yeah. I mean, this was all on the inside. No one really knew about these things. But when it came to Britney Spears, I enjoyed her music. And I also saw Britney open up for InSync during those touring years. Yes. Oh, girl.

So she put on a great show. Oh, wow. And so that's when I started listening to her more because I was like, at first, I was immediately like, oh, great, another hot girl. But even though in doing this research and learning, I was way more of an ex-Tina. And I think it's because of the rivalry that was created where X-Tina was the fun bad girl. And Britney was the wholesome girl next door.

And what I find now so desperately fascinating about this story of Britney Spears is how it really kind of hurts my mind where she was the one that was a more sexual person and wanted to include that in what she was doing. And it was the gross old white dudes that were like, no, no, no, you need to be a baby girl. You need to do baby girl stuff for daddies. And so you see as her career goes on of how her way of trying to break against that mold

is actually the opposite way that we've seen in many other pop stars uprising where they are told to be sexier and they are told to show. their tits more and they are told to do those things. And it's the opposite when they don't really feel comfortable doing those things. Right. Well, yeah. And I think that you just said something that was really relevant in the late 90s, which is why I consider the late 90s to be one of the cesspools, one of the black holes of music and culture was like it was really run by people who were just

manufacturing bands and singers. But it also doesn't mean that Britney Spears was not naturally talented. Oh, of course not. No, I mean, you have like, as a little kid for her to even get on Star Search and stuff, which we'll talk about, I'm sure. You have to be good at what you do, but it was all of these people who were, it was such a corporate middle management time in the history of pop culture and it was horrible for most music. And I despised it when it came out. It was like the antithesis of like what I liked. But I grew into liking her later songs. Yeah. But yeah, at this onset of it, I even, Even as a teenager, I was, I'm pretty close to her age.

And I remember just being like, is this okay? I feel uncomfortable about watching it. I feel weird. And it's even weirder in hindsight for sure. And I feel like I was the same as you back then. I think I've come more back around to pop music in general. And like, as I've gone later on. But of course, because this, this exactly though, Natalie, when you asked me about my,

how I felt about Britney Spears as much as I was like, yowalza, Malau. Wow, what are those? What's she? But besides that, she also was the symbol along with the Backstreet Boys and Sync and those types of things as the killers of my favorite music, like at the time, Grunge. And I'm actually now, in hindsight, glad they killed Grunge, because Grunge actually just put me in a really bad mood a lot.

And as much as I appreciate it, I can't listen to Nirvana all day anymore because it really does make you, I think, depressed a little bit if you do that. It is kind of fun, though, that these are the very imperative years. we're like same with Spice Girls and also with Brittany Spears where our age differences are very rarely noticeable because we're not that much of an age difference but this specific time period it was a very different life that the three of us live. I was much older than you in this specific time like that for sure. With pop music too it's usually very specific to like three years of an age who are the people

who are the target market for those pop singers. So like that really show. But music, stuff like that in like pop culture is definitely a like a time marker for people. Yeah, dude, for sure. Like we'd be like if we were teenage right now, I'd be fucking like mumble rap, which is, you know what I mean? Like so outside of. I mean, that's true. You just sound, you, we sound like 79 years old.

Whoa, Pete. You're the mumbling. I'm down a little P. I do like, I like the emo rap a lot, actually. Yeah, I'm not against it. It's just so foreign from. The grunge music and the... I mean, I guess Lil peep, kind of you could see the grunge in that, though.

Like, that he's talking about his... Definitely. He's up in his feelings. And he's, you know, he's messed up. And that was a lot of grunge. And then pop was this, like, shiny... The pop at the time of the boy bands and Brit, Brit, and Christina, it was like... It was just this shiny, glossy thing.

It was the opposite of grudge. Yes, because there are no real feelings involved in this music. Not... Except for the few ones of when she was told she's allowed to emote just a little bit. But even you think about the songs like Lucky... where you listen to the lyrics of it and it's actually very sad and probably hits close to home for her.

I never really thought about that song until we did this and I watched her perform in like, oh my God, this is her desperately trying to get out of this. Really wants to get out of this. It's probably my favorite Britney song actually. Maybe that may be toxic, but... I do love toxic.

Every time. Oh my God, that damn song which we will talk about, but I think that we need to just, jump in. This is the beginning. Strap in because we are going to have a three-week ride talking about Brittany, really getting deep in, but we

got to start somewhere, and yes, we are starting in Britney's very upsetting childhood. Born in December of 1981 in McComb, Mississippi, in the Bible Belt. She was baptized Southern Baptist. She has two siblings, Brian James, and of course

Jamie Lynn, also hitting the fame game pretty hard in her early years. She grew up in a small town called Kentwood, Louisiana. Her mother was a second grade teacher and her father was a contractor who traveled a lot for work and drank a lot on weekends at home. It's interesting that it only says on weekends, but because I'm pretty sure he was drinking any second he was away. There are lots of interviews of the people that still live in Kentwood, Louisiana, where Britney Spears is the mecca of Kentwood, Louisiana. which makes a lot of sense. It's a very small town. And she is, and what they created her to be,

was the rags to riches American dream, which I think really goes hand in hand of why she had to be Little Miss Sparkle and Little Miss Perfect, as opposed to Christina Aguilera. So she even says, but then this is what is so interesting. Holden and I were talking about her childhood and how it was difficult to actually find real stuff about her childhood because everything that she says is for a reason. Every interview she does is manufactured for a reason. Everything that she's allowed to put into the public is on purpose. So there's only so much you can read between the lines. And I don't want to get into conspiracy theory here. There are definitely some that I am intrigued by that I've lost a lot of time this week into getting into the nitty-gritty of this because we are as a public and looking at a very public figure

and trying to figure out what is real and what is it. Yes. It's mostly her, I do think that there is some validity and her crying out for help in different ways because she is not permitted to speak how she feels ever, including as a child. It is like cult mentality where you are forced to put on this facade 24-7. And so that makes sense to me that there are things, and I've watched these interviews too,

where I feel like when they ask her certain questions, she starts to almost get teary-eyed the way she answers it, and they misinterpret why. And I really feel it's because she wants to scream, but she can't. Right. Yeah, did you guys see the primetime one was the most uncomfortable one I saw this week? With Diane Sawyer? Yeah, I was trying to watch like some of the,

try to stick with the earlier stuff, because obviously we have so much more ground to cover in episodes two and three, but the prime time one, you know, there's these moments where she's like, you know, I know this year was a tough year for you. You had these issues at these concerts. You had these issues in your home life. And she's literally just like, ah, like she's just, as soon as she starts crying, she's almost like a young man is trained in a lot of ways where when the tears start to appear,

it's like, no, no, no, push it down. She immediately asked for the cameras to stop. She immediately wants it to stop. She is not, doesn't want to show. And that's why you read these lines like, ever since I was seven, or eight years old, my mom would have company over, and I was always performing for everybody in front of the TV. Even when I went to school, I was always the weird child. I would go outside, and instead of playing, I wanted to have star search competitions. So from a very young age, Britney's father is a true blue

addict. He is, it seems, as time will go on, we'll see he's a nefarious human being. He is someone that has always controlled her life and has never been a good influence for her. Not that I'm even making light. As someone that is also in debt, they went bankrupt multiple times. And her father, you know, they were down to hunting rabbits and squirrels to feed the family. You're only in debt to yourself. And that's not, this is not what the issue is. And that apparently he's had many different ways of putting in money and having failed businesses.

He tried to start a gym. He tried to start his own restaurant and these things just kept not going well and he kept taking the family's money and putting it back. He was almost being irresponsible and I certainly am not downing anybody who's in debt. I'm still currently in debt. Totally understandable.

It's more that he just didn't really take any responsibility in what he was doing. And what was the main problem that was wrong is they both of her parents are at fault for everything that happened. I agree. Because her mother, which don't even get me started on Lynn Spears

who has written multiple books talking about how she is the perfect mother. What they did, they had no money. And they put it, they realized that Brittany was talented, started with the beauty pageants and that they saw that that was a way

for them to start making money. And even Britney's mother Lynn wrote in her book heart to heart. I remember we had this little family meeting and we decided that no matter what it took, we'd get Britney the lessons she needed. We all believed in her that much. There was this clinical psychologist that wrote a book on Britney Spears and looking through her childhood.

And she said, Britney was targeted as the one that might be able to get the family out of their financial whole. And so by giving her that impression, now she's got a lot of guilt if she doesn't rise to the occasion. So she started pointing, this is starting at four years old. It's four. Jesus. Yeah, she's doing dance lessons and stuff. I have at three years old. Yes.

And performing a solo artist at the annual recital. At five, she's saying, what child is this? At her kindergarten graduation. And that was, I think, her first live singing debut. And then it's voice lessons, gymnastics, state level competitions, and children's talent shows. Spears said... Which you would think in any other family that this is a good thing that they're giving their daughter this opportunity. But you look at the outside of it.

And that is not the case. Also, her father, brutally abusive to not only her and her siblings, but also to her mother throughout all of this and wasting all of the family's money by going back into not only his addictions, but also his many business ideas. No, I mean, as somebody who grew up in dance, I hear those things and it's all triggering because I don't have a stage mom personally, but I was around a lot of stage moms. and you didn't really see the passion coming from the kids. They might have had a nice time,

but it was the parents who were really kind of like barreling these kids through these. And like you just said, she was already put upon at that age. She had to take care of her family, so she better be good at this. She's like basically learned that if she's not talented enough, her family's not going to be eating. Right.

And she even says, and she had such horrible self-esteem that she says, I stopped having bangs in the third grade. And I remember it like it was yesterday. It was such a big deal to expose my forehead. All the beauty pageant girls did it, but I never felt beauty pageants were my thing. She also said I had bad teeth and felt like an ugly duckling.

But she said she likes having bangs now because they help her feel like she's protected. Oh, God. And she said almost like I'm in third grade again. Oh, there's so much. And you're going to see so much that repeat of her trying to go back to childhood so desperately. This, I think, is really telling too. Her mother takes her at eight years old to Atlanta

and auditions her for a 1990s revival of the Mickey Mouse Club tries to fake her age, tries to sneak her in as older than she is, and she doesn't get the audition because, of course, she's way too young. She was eight, right? I think she was eight at that time. Maybe 10 is the youngest you would join the Mickey Mouse Club at.

So she was introduced to New York talent agent Nancy Carson who got Spears' mother to move with her daughters to a sublet apartment in New York so she could attend the professional performing art school. Again, so much pressure. Now we've moved to New York. You have to do this. And the whole time this is going on, the family has just declared bankruptcy for, I don't even know, maybe not the first time at this point. So, I mean, real pressure here to perform at such, such a brutally young age. And yet still, in that Diane Sawyer interview you were talking about, Diane Sawyer had asked, you said at one point that your

biggest fear would be to lose everything and go back to Louisiana and back to selling crawfish in your grandma's store. And she said, I probably did at one point, but it's really weird. I enjoy my life and I love what I do. But at the same time, even though we didn't have that much, I was happy then. Like, I'm looking back at it now and just the simplicity of life. It was very nice. And this is what she's talking about. She's made up a childhood in her head. Yeah. That was wonderful and simple. Meanwhile, Hell no, girl, you have been hit in the pavement since you were four years old. There was no, so you weren't allowed to be a child. Probably those times in selling crawfish or whatever were the only glimpses into a normal childhood she saw,

even though she was just working still. Damn, I want some crawfish right now. Every time, oh man, I was watching that little clip of her teaching people. She goes back to Louisiana in the Mickey Mouse Club to teach people how to eat crawfish. I should suck out the heads. Oh, Daddy is hungry. Did she have to do it like all sexy and get it like on her shirt

and then she had to open her shirt up? Everything she did had to be in some way weirdly sexy, Natalie. I don't know why. Even the way she was described on Star Search when they're like, look at that little sexy dress you got on. I was like, she's completely covered. She's six years.

I see that part. I saw that Star Search at least her performance. It's very not sexual. And but then everyone's like, but you see how her sexuality comes to play. Ew, I don't. Gross. That's just more of, I blame, again, I blame her father for that.

That's disgusting. So her first professional gig was as an understudy in the off-Broadway musical Ruthless. I do want to talk about this because Ruthless, I love the musical Ruthless, and it actually makes a lot of sense because Ruthless is about a girl who literally kills for the lead in her school play. Oh, wow. Why it does make sense almost to the point that Joel Paley, who's the lyricist of the show, said that she was a delight to work with when she immediately came in

and he said although she was a nice kid we saw a chillingly accurate understanding of the drive and passion and ruthlessness that was needed to play Tina which because like the song I was born I was born to entertain she even took it up a full tone before belt like she's belting this song at the age of what she's nine nine maybe 10 at this point because she gets Mickey Mouse Club at 11. Yes. At the end of 1992.

Yeah. She's just doing Ruthless, doing some commercial work, does some star search. 92, she gets Mickey Mouse Club. And this is along with Cassie. Can you imagine that at 9 doing all of that? I can barely remember, like, I remember taking gymnastics at 9. Right. And being like, that was a lot.

No, man, I was just in, I was slobberate on myself, eating a bunch of Oreos, staring at pictures of legless. That's what I was doing at the age of 9. So her castmates are Christina Aguilera, Justin Timberlake, Ryan Gosling, and Carrie Russell, which is completely crazy to me. And like one or two people who didn't make it, which is unfair. And then a couple of sads who didn't get to do anything after that, who didn't get to go to a bunch of fun, like, cocaine parties in their 20s and stuff. And you'll even see later on that this is the beginning of the Christina Aguilera and Britney Spears. This is how it all harkens back to they started putting them.

head to head back then because Christina Aguilera, if you listen to it, so this is part of the conspiracy theory and I'm going to keep slightly mentioning it, but it is very interesting that if you listen to her star search, Britney Spears is a very deep voice and it is believed that her baby voice and how she thinks is manufactured. But it harkens back to Mickey Mouse Club because Christina Aguilera had that deep, rich voice and they wanted to distinguish. between the two of them. So they've always been pitted against each other. Yeah, same.

I mean, even Jessica Simpson, too, who auditioned for Mickey Mouse Club at the time, she was the third blonde, and they were just like, maybe too many blondes. Too many. I say cut off her head. That's what I would say if I was a Lord. Now, talking about someone I had a J-2 back in the day. Either way, though.

Jessica Simpson. Well, see, she was the most accessible one because her weird Christian upbringing was they wouldn't like let her do too much sexy and they wanted her breast to be more covered so she wouldn't like wear the sexy outfits which is honestly sadly I think why she didn't get quite as far but then which is funny you say that though because I feel like she tripled down on being all

being risque and sexy in her videos like later on and like either way though oh wait sorry but I have to say that she still kept to the really conservative music so she doesn't do she has an incredible voice and she doesn't do belty stuff like Christina, she still does sort of like fluff songs, and she doesn't get that credit. No, but I definitely want to do a whole episode on her at some point. We'll definitely do a whole episode on Jessica Simpson for sure.

But either way, Mickey Mouse Club is canceled. Eventually, she moves back to Mississippi for high school. I also do want to say that at this point in time, that in the Mickey Mouse Club, it was also showed that around this time, her dancing skills were really what set her apart. And that eventually changes over time. that even Tony Luca, who was one of the older castmates at this time period, said that all the older kids would always ask Brittany how the dance combinations went because she was really great at committing them to memory.

And it's these little truffles that we find of people talking about how great she is, at memorizing how committed she is, that come back around to nowadays and the conspiratorship of the, I'm sorry, conservatorship of her father saying how, oh, she just can't remember anything. Oh, she's just like with the lip-sicking and everything. Like, oh, she's just not mentally sound. Which, yes, that can change over time, I guess, but she was always known for her diligence and her commitment. Well, that's why we're here because we're the little piggies. We're going to sniff out them truffles. You know, you can't hide them from us, James. So, I

I never know quite what to believe with any of this stuff. No. Talking about getting research done, just for example, like, her Wikipedia page says one thing, and then, like, a Rolling Stone article says the opposite. Another thing. But I will just say Spears, apparently, when she went back to high school, she compared it to, quote, the opening scene in Clueless with all the clicks. I was so bored.

I was the point guard on the basketball team. I had my boyfriend, and I went to Homecoming and Christmas formal, but I wanted more. It's also very interesting because it's very difficult to find out whether or not, Britney Spears graduated high school. It is another like unfortunate, which I don't think that that should be a shame thing, but I believe that that is a shame thing as part of her agents kept it so that it is not something that is known and or discussed and or thought about.

Well, that's not good for her image. Right. That's why they would care. Exactly, right. And the documentary, yeah, she had to be everything at once. And the documentary, I think you suggested to me, Natalie, the guy said she didn't have more than a ninth grade education. Right.

So I'm not sure where it is with that. But then she also says, but I went to prom. I was a normal teenage girl. But again, I feel like she might have made it up. Yeah. Or that she knew it was fake and she just knew what she had to say. She was supposed to say that. Right.

So while feeling all blonde high school and really just wanting to get back into the biz, manager Lou Pearlman became interested in her for a female pop group. Boom. Oh, good. Oh, I'm glad he's here. called Innocence, and he was all like, I want to see her. I want to get...

I mean, it's not that far off. Oh, I sharded when I... Oh, I'm eating jack in the box and I'm farting shit in my pig. That means he really likes her. Yeah, that's how you can tell he likes you, Brittany. Yeah, when he starts charting everywhere. When he eats so much jack-to-the-box of these sharks, it's spares.

However, after getting a tape of her singing over a Whitney Houston karaoke song, he decided she could be a solo act but needed a professional demo tape from her. Another little interesting thing to throw in here, by the way, is the weird point of contention is like, what? A female pop star, those don't exist anymore, which is so odd to think back on because of the years since.

But really, Brittany is the reason why the female pop star is like just the most commonplace thing in music. She's the princess of pop. This is also around the time, too. So she was also given Tony Braxton songs to sing. Again, remember that back in the day, her original voice is very deep and rich like Tony Braxton's voice, but even Steve Lunt, who is an executive for Jive, who she will eventually

sign with and we're about to talk about that, said Brittany was trying to sing like Tony Braxton, which was way too low for her. It sounded pretty awful in places, but when her voice went up high, you could hear the girlish quality. And there was something really appealing about that. Yeah, like if you're a predator. So she goes to New York with this demo take that she goes in the studio to record that Tony Braxton song. It was an unused Tony Braxton song. She does meetings with four labels returning that same day back to her hometown, which sounds incredibly exhausting. Three of the labels reject her because of that part that I just mentioned about how there's weirdly no female pop singers at that time.

And people just want groups now. They want boy bands. They want girl groups, whatever. No solo. But two weeks later, Jive Records gets in touch. Specifically, senior vice president of A&R at the time, Jeff Finster, who said of Spears's audition, quote, it's very rare to hear someone that age who can deliver emotional content and commercial appeal. For any artist, the motivation, the Eye of the Tiger, is extremely important.

And Brittany had that. I mean, she absolutely has, like, an incredible performance quality. Mm-hmm. And talk about the pressure that she's under, too, is that Spears signed on with Jive. but also there is a get-out clause attached, which meant the jive could drop her without any reason within 90 days if it didn't work out. And they could create a community of white people

that take in these black people and hypnotize them, right, by spinning a water and a teak. Oh, no. And yeah, it's part of the cloths, right? And hypnotizing them get them trapped in the... Get out! You get out! So this is also the beginning of her working

with her manager who she ended up working with from 1998 until 2004, and then again, from 2008, until today, Larry Rudolph, who was another evil person, that this is when he really started controlling her image from the get-go, down to the shade of what nail-polished Britney Spears wore. Now, even a childhood contemporary of Spears, who said they didn't want to be named in this article, but there was also a part of a Disney TV show, said that Rudolph was a... obsessed with protecting this innocent clean-cut image because it was what everyone was buying into. They even went on to say, I was with Larry the first time that Brittany flicked a finger at the paparazzi, and he flipped. He was straight away on the cell phone setting up chat show appearances for her

so that she could publicly apologize. Awful. And really, it's Eric Foster White, it seems, the producer who changes her voice. For a month, they go into the studio and they work on getting her voice from going, quote, lower and less poppy to, quote, distinctively, unmistakably. Brittany, Brittany. And after hearing the material from this collaboration, President Clive Calder came in his pants and ordered a full album. Yeah, it's very disgusting.

And everybody's pants are so dirty in there. Everybody was soiled. That's why everyone wore like off white pants. There's a very interesting YouTube video. There's a lot. There's too much. many white pants in the late 90s too by the way. Oh man.

How did they keep them all clean? I don't know. I can't. I'm an animal. That's your explanation. What were you trying to say that was valid, Natalie, before I made the dirty gum jacket. There's a really interesting YouTube video about her, like clips of her voice changing over the time.

Yeah. Like from 97 to like 2019. And you hear it be normal kid voice. then it kicks up to a high octave, and then over time, it goes back down to now. She talks in a lower voice again whenever she's not, like, being too in character. But then the rest of the time,

she talks in her upper register, and as someone that listens to voices all the time, you know when someone's talking in their upper register. It sounds like this. It sounds like they're breathy. And if you watch all of her social media posts, she doesn't sound the same. And I know that,

I understand as someone that has also gone through trying to get rid of my accent. She is also trying to hide her southern accent, but there's more to the, my voice was always this register. Sure. I just talked a little bit more like this. Yeah, which is super awesome, and I don't think you should change it. Thank you. All right, I'm going to start doing my slack job Florida again.

All right, hell yeah. And there's also, you can, at a certain. point around like 98-99, you can hear her start to use the wit, like the breathy sex sounds because they're like kind of encouraging her to talk like that. I don't know what you're talking about. I was talking like, um. Like it almost sounds like a little sexy moan every time she talks. Yes.

Oh, thank you. Holden, do you want to try your sexy? What's your sexy breathy voice? Ooh. Ooh, that baby needs some milk. Milk. Oh, yeah. Some milk.

All right, ladies, sorry. I'm getting a little too riled up here. We've got to get back to the notes here. I love it too because I know you're not into babies. Like I know for a fact. What are you talking about? I'm trying to maintain my brand over here. I know.

I'm sorry. I don't mean to blow your cover. But it's very funny your rants about how why do all the porn have to be like mommy things or sissy things. It's very weird. Oh, yeah. It's ruined. You can't even look at porn anymore because it just ruins it. It's an algorithm thing.

Everyone has to fuck their stepfather sometimes. It's either milf or little or teenage girl. There's no in between. And actually 30-year-old porn stars are having like a really hard time finding work in certain ways because they can't fit into either way. They're not a milf and they're not a teen. I'm not a minx. Not a teen.

Yay. Oh, fantastic stuff ladies. Way to take that ball of run with it. So in the studio, they do 13 songs. songs together including Autumn goodbye, email my heart. Email my heart is a bad song. By the way, email my heart is the dub. It is a bad, it's a bad song.

From the bottom of my broken heart, I'm so curious. I will still love you. Love the hurt way. Love the hurt away. Let me take you there. Soda Pop actually is my least favorite. I hear you. Thinking about you, nothing less than real.

Wishing on a fallen star and you got it all as well as Sunny and Chairs' 1967 hit. The beat goes on. I mean, that's a ton of material. And a lot of that ends up on. that first album. I don't know if those versions of the songs end up on there, but a lot of that material ends up on the first album. But it was a great demo is what it seems. I tried to listen to it, but it's hard. You can't really find it. She flies to Stockholm, Sweden, and records half of the album

with the team of producers, one of which was Max Martin, huge figure in pop music. He also worked on I want it that way, and it's gonna be me. It's gonna be me. He did Katie Perry's. I kissed a girl. T. Swift, shake it off. And blank space. Spears said, I had been in the studio for about six months listening and recording material, but I hadn't really heard a hit yet. When I started working with Max Martin in Sweden, he played the demo for Baby One More Time for me. And I knew from the start, it was one of those songs you want to hear over and over again. It just felt really right.

I went into the studio and did my own thing with it, trying to give it a little more attitude than the demo. In 10 days, I never even saw Sweden. We were so busy. Yeah, I'm sure you haven't seen half the world that you visited Britney Spears because they kept you working so hard. And that's why I get so upset now and I feel weirdly defensive when people like, look at her lip syncing, look at her doing all these things. Oh, she's not even trying. She's a fucking powerhouse of a performer. Oh, yeah.

She has been working her ass off her entire fucking life. And now she can't even enjoy it. But that's again, that's two episodes for now. We got time to get there. That's it for another story. So that song actually was originally written for TLC who rejected it, which I think is some interesting stuff. I do think it's fun too because originally originally it was written for Robin. So you think like Swedish and it was like that kind of thing.

But also the term hit me means call me. But TLC's response, which I enjoy was like, T-Boss had said, I was like, I like the song, but do I think it's a hit? Do I think it's TLC? I'm not saying hit me, baby. No disrespect to Brittany. It's good for her, but was I going to say Hit Me, Baby, one more time? Hell no. Every song isn't good for each

artist, and when you're a real artist, you know what you believe in and what you really want to sing. So that's supposed to mean call me? So it means call me. Kind of like hit me back. Like hit me back. Wow, I never ever connected that at all. I just assumed it was like leaning into the I'm a fragile little girl who likes

getting mangled by dicks. Just not American slang, which I'm actually kind of surprised that they didn't change it, but that's why it's dot, dot, dot, baby one more time. Yeah, they did the weirdest thing ever instead, which is just remove the two words from the song's title, as if that changes anything.

It doesn't change anything. Put the dot, dot, dot in. And I didn't even think about how weird that is until doing the research. Like, that is so odd. It is very weird. Call me baby one. I'm trying to see if it's...

Yeah, do call me baby one more time. That's fine. Call me baby one more time. But there's something about hit me, baby. Yeah. It is. right makes me want to hit a girl arous and fine

the original idea for the video ended up being the concept for oops with Brittany landing on Mars and doing a dance but Brittany hates this idea and instead goes to director Nigel Dick. Dick says she said I want to be in a school with a bunch of cute boys and do some dancing

your initial reaction to this is I'm being told by a 16 year old girl what I should do but this girl is 16 and I'm a grown man perhaps she has a better perspective on her audience than I do. Even though I stare at 16 year olds all the time. I feel like I stayed outside at schools all the time and watch them. I thought I knew what 16 I thought I knew. I also feel like it's again another little

ooh piggy smells a truffle. It's these little truffles of I think maybe I've just watched too many cult shows of showing her that like these little things were like oh you can have your input see we're not controlling you you're able to give us as input of these small things. She's allowed to have input, which is how the powers that be could get away with controlling absolutely

everything else. Because she's like, well, they did listen to me when I said that. Which is what, again, not only call leaders, but what abusers do? Awesome. Oh, yeah. It's that little, these little pieces that you can hold on to of like, well, that one time he didn't scream at me. So...

They put you in a cage and then tell you in that cage you can decide to go to that corner today. You're like, well, I'm I mean, I got a cage. I'm choosing a whole cage to be in. Yeah. Also, Dick said this. I've worked with her four times and I've yet to work with somebody who puts in as much preparation and was as eager to rehearse as she was, said Dick.

Spears said this famous quote about the whole thing with her being sexualized. All I did was tie up my shirt. I didn't do anything, which is the thing that they told her to say. They also told her to say this. say because again they are forcing this pure image onto her of what she's allowed to do even though it is the opposite of what they do to most young stars and that's because they were trying to make her different not because they were trying to help her or or make her better than anybody else or they're just trying to make her different than the other pop stars I just can't keep the

buttons down because my abs are so strong my bosoms just fall and apparently even they were talking about this in one of Lynn Spears books from the time she was young Lynn and Jamie let Brittany just walk around the house naked. Every girl in America was wearing top tops and booty shorts, and Brittany felt like she was being held back, a friend said. She would joke about wanting to do videos topless. Her managers didn't want to scare off her fan base. They said, these middle-aged guys were so intense about her not being sexual

and that they pushed her that way. They tell her to put on a bra or that her lipstick was too dark. They were literally picking out her panties for her. So you're going to go ahead and say that they're, Oh, no, she wants her to be, they want her to be pure. And yet these old fuckers are picking out what panties she wears. Well, that is, again, like a very cultish, like, extreme religion thing where they want the girl to remain pure by their standards. So they are still sexualizing that person.

Just like, I want the image to be this. It's not the way that maybe a teenage girl would want to feel sexy. I want it to be sexy for me. And I will at least hand it to me. Dick also said this. Certainly my initial reaction was, are you sure we should be going down this route with this young lady?

And the people who were in control, the record label and whatnot said, yes, this is the route we want to take. I think there's also a little bit of strategizing of how do we slip the Britney Spears ball past the protective parent goalie, making her say she's going to save herself for marriage and all this stuff,

while also actually being the thing that girls that age really want to see, which is like, I'm a rebel, I'm sexy. I'm yeah, I like boys. But they're not protective parents. They're controlling parents. They're not protecting her from anything.

Well, I'm saying the parents of the girls at home. Oh, I see, I see. Who would not allow their daughter to maybe listen to Madonna or something like that, but would be okay with Brit Brit, because she says one thing and then does absolutely. Because we've tricked you into thinking she's a child. Yeah. Even though it's more nefarious what she's doing than Madonna,

who's madonna's acting like an adult woman. Woman. See, I say nice things about Madonna. This is a very interesting anecdote from the president of CHR programming at IHeart Media when he first met Britney Spears. Here she comes in, little kid, no makeup. You can tell how young she is, but very wise already. They had just gotten the final edit of the video on VHS. We went into this office and I'm sitting there watching it with her. And I'm looking at her and looking at the video like, hey, what's going on here? It showed what was going to happen very quickly. When you see it, you're like, oh my gosh, this whole school girl thing. It's a little sexy. But then I'm sitting here and she's really little. She's got no makeup on. She's just a little

kid. It's making my skin crawl. It should. And I can't believe it didn't make the country's skin crawl. Well, in the 90s, they really objectified checks in the 90s. They really infantilized. They really pushed girls to do the virgin horror thing because they really, there wasn't a lot of women being able to have their own shit. It was really, everything was so controlled by dudes during the 90s. It just really shows in the culture when you look back at it.

The male gaze for sure. Yeah, for sure. So Spears is still doing mall tours in 1998. Food courts, malls in the U.S. and Canada consisting of a 30-minute set with two dudes as their backup dancers. It's like songs from the new album, even some covers.

And the track is released in October of 1998, it hits the top 100 a week later and spends 32 weeks on the charts. And Spears goes from malls to total stardom. Immediate, like, blow up. I don't even know if we've stressed enough that how huge, if you weren't around for Hit Me Baby one more time. And if you were, you'll remember how massive that. It was like smells like teen spirit all over again. She was everywhere?

Everywhere. The second it came out. It was crazy. Yeah. It was insane. It exploded. And it really was the changing of the guard, I feel like that moment, that video released. Have you seen that belly button?

That belly button is a star. I mean, between her and then Christina Aguilera and Jeannie in a bottle. I have never in my life had a flat stomach. No. And watching both those, it was like, and again, being able to wear those low-rise jeans. No, no normal human being can wear those pants. It's like them in Paris Hilton. Nobody else.

How did they stay up? I don't understand it. Like, I'm looking at it, it was like, my vagina lips would be slurping up over top of the buttonhole. That's a look. You could start a trend? You think so? Should I start to keep going lips out? Lips out Zabrowski?

Yeah, we'll go lipping it. All right, lips out. So, by the way, this all happens at the perfect time. This video hits right as two programs are combining on MTV. Those programs are MTV Live and Total Request. And that is when we get total requests. which essentially market tested MTV's videos for them, getting opinions of teens straight from the source.

It also is the absolute changing of a marketing towards men between the ages of like 20 to 30 to teenage girls. Like it happens almost seemingly overnight when I look back on it what that network became. And it's perfect for Brit Brit. And so the album is released in January of 1999. It sells 121,000 copies in its first week. And she became the youngest female in Billboard History

to have the first single and first album, go number one in the same week. And it goes on to sell 1.8 million copies in its first two months. And over 25 million records worldwide. She is 19 years old. And I am actually, and I never realized this

until looking into everything, the fact that she doesn't win a Grammy until toxic. And so she, this is, this is an album that we could probably do an entire episode of what this album really did, because again, she's referred to as the Princess of Pop for a reason.

This is exactly what people were looking for. Pop is as accessible as music gets. That's why it's not for everybody. But most people were aware of the hits of this album, whether you wanted to or not. And so she was nominated from this album. She was nominated for Best New Artist, and she was nominated for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance.

She didn't win either one. and she even said when she lost the Grammy she said it hurt her but she was more upset because her parents were so upset she said my mom wanted me to win so bad and my dad I felt kind of sad that I let them down and then I talked to them and they were worried for me my mom said baby I could care less if you win or not

I love you which I'm going to go ahead and throw that out there was probably made up in her fucking rain didn't happen but also talk about the extension of Britney Spears versus Christina Aguilera because again, it's Christina Aguilera that wins over Britney at this time period.

And when the Guardian even said in 1999 in an article how Christina has the naughtier image and Britney's corn fed Midwest wholesome look is now the core of the new American mass culture, zeitgeist. I really do think that it, and I don't know Christina's backstory

too much, but I do always just get a sense that she has more control. It was more her in the performance than Britney and I'm sure she was still completely controlled in most ways, but you look at their trajectories from there and you can see Christina is more assertive with what she wants. And that plays in music. You can tell. And also it does hurt Christina even more in the long run or I think I said it hurts, both of their images hurt them in the long run because even down to like when Britney Spears comes out with slave for you and she's praised for it, but that was the same year that Aguilera came out with dirty and

she was referred to as a direct from an intergalactic hooker convention. And then Britney Spears was glorified. Well, she is wearing a thong with chaps and that, if you were calling. Oh, I love it. Oh, I was, uh, very, see, I mean, I was definitely, I was like you know, more sexually attracted to Christina. She's more my type. Oh, sure.

I'd rather see the dirty girl 100%. Dirty girl. Yeah. So Brittany is now in the machine full time with the tour music videos being filmed. press engagements. Driver Abe Sarkizian said, we would wake up Britney at 6 a.m. and she'd work on a video for three or four days straight for 20 hours a day. She was a kind, generous sweetheart, with a big heart and no poor habits. I will say this over and over again. Everything that anyone that's ever worked with Britney Spears talks about that no matter what, she was the nicest person they had ever

met. So humble and just a very, like just a genuinely good soul. And I don't say that lightly. I'm sure she is a genuinely good soul but she also was sort of programmed to be that she was a robot child and that's why when they when they shit on her later on and like one was like oh but she was a nightmare in the early 2000s like yes because she skyrocketed to stardom she also wasn't a nightmare

that's bullshit no she was being yeah like busted out of her prison that she was being kept it every once in a while and yeah I'd go get fucking hammered too for sure fucking deal BFD is what I say. Especially when it's also genetic with her father. You've got, so with the family right now, you've got Lynn kind of disappearing at this point

because now she's got all this money and she's now needs to work on the other daughter, right, guys? She's got to get Jamie Lynn to be a cash cow as well. Lynn Spears was having a great time, although she would show up to be like, me and my daughter are best friends. It doesn't everyone want to be just like us and then she would fucking disappear. So she was never around to help her. she was never there to support her in any other way.

She was just there for the fucking pops. The paps. Are you calling paps? Yeah, her and Dina are off somewhere doing lines off a guy's cock. And her father is apparently just continuing his status quo being a drunk prick. An anonymous friend source said, by the way, a lot of these sources come from an article called The Tragedy of Britney Spears and Rolling Stone. Very good article.

Wow. So there's a lot of, but it has a lot of anonymous sources and this is all like alleged and everything. I just want to maybe set all that up just in case. But either way, a friend said it was upsetting for Brittany to be around her dad. He came backstage one night and he was wasted. She was devastated. And it's around this time also that she gains her first bout of criticism for getting breast implants, thus her first step into detracting from this perfect, you know, virgin schoolgirl image.

When did she get breast implants? I remember Lexi was saying like, oh, right, the second video was the big deal. Yes, she had much bigger. because she clearly had breasted breasts. What video? Which song was it? The second video, which was... Was it sometime? Maybe sometime.

Was it? Sometimes I'll run. That one? Yeah, maybe it's that one. Definitely by oops. That song takes me to a sensory memory of working at the hot food section of Shop and Save by my parents' house.

So all I can think of is like the smell of chicken when I hear that song. Just thought I'd share that with you. But then that's also, talk about another way of how she is told She has to hide all of how she feels. She pretends like she didn't get breast implants because she doesn't want anyone to know the truth about who she really is

and how she feels about her bodies. I didn't realize she had them because they're not like porn movies. No, they're not insane. But I think the grossest part about them is she eventually gets them removed because her actual breasts had not developed. Developed yet. She was just so young and her mother, that's really good is that Lynn Spears encouraged her to do it. I'm trying not to make too many noises, but I have very, I have a lot of feelings.

I have been screaming in my office all week. Everything I read about this story. And it's just like at the end of the day, it's like, honestly, in reading all this stuff, and most people I'd be like, oh no, I would probably, I love my life, but like I'd probably change it to, you know, to some big stars. I think that's kind of fun. Never a Britney Spears. I will take anything over having absolutely no control over my life. When people, this is when people really first started criticizing her in the press.

A friend said, when Brittany saw the paper, she was crying in the bathtub uncontrollably asking, why is everyone being so mean to me? And she denies, of course, getting the procedure done. And it's just so sad. Like the whole thing. So that's, I mean, this is the beginning of the press coming after her. Putting the breast implants in her own knowing that she was still developing. Yeah.

And also fuck her mother. That's how much money he got from that. He's still counting it. Yeah. still to the stay. He's too distracted by California. But also at this point of time is when her mother comes out with her first memoir that essentially serves as a defense brief of how Brittany chose the life for herself.

It's propaganda. And Lynn's always just her supportive mother trying to help her do the right thing. It's 100% propaganda. I wrote a whole fucking book about it. Fuck you. So next we have, oops, I did it again. Spears said when I did the first album, I just, or actually people told Spears to say this and then she said it.

When I did the first album, I had just turned 16. I mean, when I look at the album cover, I'm like, oh, my lordy, I know this next album is going to be totally different, especially the material. I just got finished recording the first six tracks in Sweden two months ago, and the material is so much more funkier and edgier. And, of course, it's more mature because I've grown as a person, too. It is funkier, for sure.

It does have a little bit more. This album, I think, is a step up from the first. The first one is definitely a child album. It is before she finds herself. And with oops, I did it again, I think that she was given probably, oopsie, oopsie, I got it back. I think that she was trying desperately to bring some of her into this, you know? And I think that they immediately shit all over her, which is what happened.

She got a whole six days of vacation after her baby one more time tour ended. September. What is she complaining about then? Jesus Christ! She got six days! Every second of her life is scheduled. Even Natalie and I were both talking about this. She was like, she was allowed, actually allowed, one hour a day that she could call her own. Every other

actual minute was scheduled. And that free time was timed every day. Yes. Mm-hmm. It was scheduled out. So she goes back into the studio, this is September of 1999 after her whole six days of vacation. She goes in NYC. And she's working with Max Martin, Eric Foster White, Diane Warren, Robert Lang,

Steve Lunt, as we mentioned before, and Babyface. And with Martin, she does, oops, I did it again, which I think is one of her strongest pop hits. The album definitely has a more mature R&B sound. That is attributed to, of course, Spears growing older and them also trying to market her as that. Spears said, my voice has changed a little bit, and I'm more confident. And I think that comes across on the material. Lies she is told to say But also the first crack you get

And my favorite track Lucky, the song about the movie star Who's named Lucky Who has all this fortune and fame But inside she's incredibly unhappy And that song is like I think Brittany's first call for help I think that is it right there

Did she write that? No You don't think I think she helped write it I mean she ends up co-writing like music She does write some of it. Yes. And now this is also around the time, you have to remember, too, she came from nothing in a very small town and being trampolined into this type of fanfare has to not only be different.

I know that they say a lot of child stars that you stop progressing mentally after you become famous because essentially you just don't have time to. You are, yeah, you are effectively, your life is cut off. It is stunted. Yeah. She even says around now, she says, it makes me feel good when people realize I'm just a kid because people expect so much out of me right now. She also says she thrives under pressure, but that she feels alienated from the public because she's constantly hounded by paparazzi. Yeah. She says, I'm a shy person and I'm particularly not really made for this industry because I'm so shy.

It's not something I deal with so well. It's almost like she didn't choose it. Almost like she was forced into it from her parents so that they could make money. These little things. I don't know. And it's very tough to watch her get harassed by these grown men. And she is. So gross.

Because you know she's instructed to do this. She has to just keep a smile on her face, use absolute restraint. I mean, you mentioned the middle finger incident before. And that was a big press incident when she did that, like as if that was a big deal. But they don't show you the hours of harassment. And then she had to go publicly apologize and be shamed for it. It's so disgusting. She was at that point had probably been harassed for over a hundred hours by these people.

I mean, what the kind of shit that Justin Bieber was doing and kept making music? What about Chris Brown? What about these people that, and yet she has to be publicly shamed because she flipped off a paparazzi that was hounding her? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. It's so difficult. It's so, so, so difficult.

So the album is released in the U.S. in May of 2000. It sells 500,000 copies on its first day. She goes on tour that same year and puts out her first book written with her mother, Britney Spears, heart to heart, followed by a mother's gift. I'm just watching Jackie's face. Her eyes are rolling into her back of her head.

Too happy that I gave you this? Live. Both of her parents should be in jail. Seriously. I wish there was parent jail. There should be parent jail. Yes. And that you shouldn't be allowed to touch any of her money.

Yeah. Oh, yeah. You mean, instead of what's, happened for the most of her adult life that her father's been in control of it her his guy that we've been describing this whole time in no way positively now has all the control then again and i i brought it up what was screaming about this to my roommates the other day and i was like it's like it makes me think of like the invisible man the new version of the invisible man like imagine your tormentor that you had to deal with growing up that not only you had to deal

with that trauma but he is in complete control of the rest of your life. It's a horror movie. And all you can wait for is for him to fucking die. Yep. Yep. But you don't even know, you don't even know how to handle, you probably wouldn't know how to handle that either. Because you've been given no life skills other than to make your parents money since you've been born. It's a nightmare. At least she

has some skills. You know what I mean? Very talented. It's no fucking wonder that Jamie, uh, what's her name, Jamie Lynn, the sister. She got pregnant so young. I feel like that was her trying to just get away from her family. Distance herself. And she always, and Britney Spears always tried to protect her sister because she didn't want her sister to go through what she went through. But there's only so much she could do.

This is also when she confirmed she was dating Justin Timberlake. Oh, yeah. Oh my God. I have so much to say about it. I know, I know. A source of a Rolling Stone article claims it was Timberlake who came in and sort of rescued her from a team that was keeping her in the grind. And essentially like instead of being like, you should take some time off. You need a month off. Instead it's like, here's a bunch of drugs. Go let your steam off and then get back into the studio and just solving it that way.

And he was the one who was like, get away from these people. And let's, you know, try to get you, you know, a little grounded here and everything. And so, yeah. However, the team did remain super strict about their relationship. And their so-called, quote, abstinence until marriage. They had to tell the press once they did come out as together, which they held off on that as long as humanly possible. They waited for at least a year.

Virgins, yeah. They waited for at least a year to tell anyone publicly that they were together. So she was opening for them. And they, but also think about this. Justin Timberlake, who was a natural child star, and seemed to have been supported, but in a way that is not something that I agree with, but at least a more understanding way than how Britney Spears was quote unquote

supported by her parents. Did you ever say JT in the beauty pageant when he's a kid? Yes. So funny. Oh, we're definitely going to do him at some point. Yeah, yeah. Oh, I love to.

So with Justin Timberlake and Britney Spears, they met a Mickey Mouse Club, obviously, down to the fact that, so that was, they started dating in 1998, but Justin Timberlake was always, also Britney's versus, whether this is true or not I don't know, was her first kiss at the age of 13. So think about her brain and what she's going through and how she looks to this person of like, oh, well, I've always had a crush on him and he's always been so nice to me.

And then he also helps get her the job of opening for Insink, for their tour. And so Insink had already blown up. So he was also helping her. And I got to say that they must have been in some sort of, like, Like, she was looking for someone to protect her. Sure. And she looked at him to protect her because he did. They'd even said about Justin to her, like at this point in time,

Justin had his head screwed on so straight. And he rescued her from that world. He became the great force in her life. But it started a pattern. She began to look for guys to help her get away from the people who control her. And also, they were on the same level, which think about her brain that way, where she wasn't competitive about attention with him. She just wanted to love someone

that looked at her that she wasn't Britney Spears, that looked at her like a person and like a teenager, because she was a teenager, and that they openly, you know, declaimed that they were having abstinence, but obviously that's not true. It shouldn't matter. We shouldn't have to, like,

they did the same thing with Jessica Simpson where they tracked her virginity, which is so gross. Yeah, so weird. It's none of our business when they affect each other, ever. Everything was about their virginity. So once they came out, it was just like, but did she lose her virginity? She says she's a virginia, but did she lose her virginity?

Somebody check her hymen. Yucky, yucky, yuck. So horrible. And very soon she will make a horrible mistake, but I think that she really did. She hid underneath him in a way that she always needed someone to protect her. and I think that we'll talk about it because in between this

We haven't even gotten to Crossroads yet Are we going to have to do four episodes? No, no, no. I think we'll Because now we will talk about the album Brittany and Crossroads which all kind of happens at one time and of course the blowout

with Timberlake. So drawn in by the sounds of Jay-Z and the Neptunes Brittany wants a funnier sound on her next album called Brittany and this comes out in 2001. She also co-writes this is where we get her co-writing

several of the songs which is she's gaining again just a little bit more control over the product a little bit more and a little bit more she also is working with boyfriend Justin Timberlake as a producer on the album which she talked about was kind of awkward at first again I just

everything I read I'm like this is just so so pre-written so canned that I'm like okay Brittany was it awkward I don't know I guess that's what you're supposed to say either way the big stand out here is the song I'm a slave the number four the letter capital you and she always said

I'd get bored singing the same type of songs all the time. I still love my old stuff, but you have to extend yourself and grow. And NME even declared the song, I'm a slave for you. The song is funk the way God intended, hypnotic, insistent, mysterious, suggestive. And if Prince was a 19-year-old former Disney Club host and Virgin, he'd be proud to create such a record. That is a disgusting fucking line. That is disgusting. You should be ashamed of yourself, enemy.

You should be disshamed of yourself. I didn't realize that I'm a slave for you was co-produced by Farrell Williams with Chad Hugo of the Neptunes. And it was originally intended for Janet Jackson, actually, which makes a lot of sense. Oh, yeah, I could see that as a Janet song. Yes.

It feels definitely way better as a Janet song looking back at it than it's a little bizarre. And of course, there's a memorable music video and the MTV Awards performance at which she dons the albino python nickname Banana. Oh, with Doc, with the guy from Tiger King. Yeah, a guy from Tiger King. He's in there.

But who else was there? It was Wade Robson. Carol Baskin. Wade Robson, who had been her choreographer for most of her music videos as well as her two tours that had come so far, both the 1999 and 2000 World Tours and her dream with it a dream tour. And Wade Robson was brought on because he was friends with Justin Timberlake. Now, Wade Robson, who yes, is the same person from leaving Neverland, the documentary about the children that were abused by Michael Jackson, same dude. He is the one that is her choreographer and agreed that it was her time to blossom

and that she needed to own her new image by draping the proverbial snake around her neck while performing, I'm a slave for you. This is all tied in with her virgin. Bullshit. But at that same point in time, even though Wade Robson is friends with Justin Timberlake. Oh, so the snake is the penis. Snake is also in the garden of hedonism. Yeah, but it's Adam and Eve thing too, right?

Yes. And so this is part of it. And then Wade Robson and Britney Spears cheat on Justin Timberlake together. Now, this was a big issue because not only was he was closely working with our close friends with Justin Timberlake. And both of them immediately, Brittany and Weston, Wade Robson also denied the affair, but it was Wade Robson that went to Justin Timberlake and said, we cheated on you. Really sorry, dude, but I think I need you to know. The question I guess I had was, why would she do that? Because she's a teenager. And she's a teenager. And also because it's another

form of rebellion where it is that, where I think that people use these kind of things of like, oh, she wasn't in charge, but what does she do with Wade Robson? It's like, I think that it's just, she feels completely trapped in it sometimes if you're that trapped, you do anything. Exactly. Even if she really looked to Justin Timberlake as a protector and liked to him, it was basically like everyone around them deemed it.

This is an okay relationship to have. We like this couple. Now this is what you're going to do for the rest of your life, right? You're going to marry this guy. Yes, another forcing her into something that she didn't necessarily want. Or did she?

Maybe she did. But she was so young. How was she supposed to know anyway? It's also this time that Wade is tasked with upping her sexuality to its like the most nth degree. So all this time they're spinning together is just making Britney sex, sex, sex, like that's the whole theme of their dance routine. So I just think, sure, I mean, easily could see something happening, especially the young, immature person, especially with, you know, all these, like you said, restraint surround her.

I mean, I completely can understand, you know? I mean, just everybody, people fuck up. I made so many dumb mistakes. How old is she here? She's 20? Maybe 20. Maybe 21? Yes, she's not even 21 yet.

I was a complete idiot at this time. In my relationship, I was like cheating left and right or anything, but I was an idiot. You know what I mean? I was dating a 34-year-old fucking loser at this time. Yeah, and definitely not, uh, not seeing, being with anybody who I had any business being married to for the rest of my life or like, anything like that. So, I mean, of course. Yeah. So they break up,

right? They break up. And then two months later, her parents get a divorce. And she wasn't allowed any time off. And even her ex-assistent manager said, no one took the time to say to Brittany,

let's take some time off here. Let's get you some counseling. They expected her to have the drive to just dust it off. And this was her first big relationship. Can you imagine your first time after your first big relationship, whether it was good for you or not? That breakup and then you still have to work seven days a week like 16 hours a day. Plus, including people hounding you about it 24-7. 24-7. You also didn't talk about the part where I have it that Timberlake discovers a note from

Wade Robson while they are preparing to perform that night on SNL. Like the whole breakup happens while they're at S&L with the whole purpose of doing this sexy duet together that they just have to you know grin and bear it their way through and just that sounds brutal we did get the song cry me a river from it which is still a banger I love that song that's a good song he apparently writes at like two hours after this happens maybe even on the set of S&L I'm not really sure and the whole music video is clearly implying that it's Britney and that she cheated on him. It's implied in the lyrics. Spears said, he called me up and asked me if it was okay.

I can't believe I'm telling you this right now, but who cares? By the way, that's her in an interview because she's clearly not supposed to be talking about anything like this. She's not supposed to talk about it. But I will, you know what? I will throw this at Justin Dipper like, he did call her up and say, hey, I wrote this song about you. Yes, there's a video coming out.

You are in it. Is that cool? Well, everything points to him being like a decent person. She says he called me up and wanted to supposedly get back together or whatever, but behind it was, and by the way, you're in a video that's coming out, that kind of got slipped in. Don't worry about it. It's not a big deal. After seeing the video, though, she recalls thinking, I should have said no to this shit. Whatever.

She cheated. He's loud. What I do, I appreciate is later on down the line, Justin Timberlake did talk about this relationship openly. And he said, I just don't think we were normal. There was nothing normal about our existence. We spent way too much time being the biggest thing for teeny poppers. And I mean that about everybody, Backstreet Boys, InSink, Brittany, Christina, we could literally go, oh man, let's go to Bali. And we'd be on a plane to Bali.

We were little kids with big toys. You do the math. That's not going to last. Yeah. And remember, of course, we have to mention the blue gene outfit. Wow. It's very important. I will give props, which also last year, or this year, Justin Tibberlake did say, you know what, that outfit wasn't that bad, which I don't agree.

with them on foot. Coming back around, please don't let this happen again. Don't let that happen again. Please don't do that again. Don't let that happen again, guys. Either way, let's talk about Crossroads

before we wrap things up. Do you have anything else to say about Justin Timberlake and Britney Spears before we talk about Crossroads, Jackie? I will. This is just a... Do you have some more noises to make about the relationship? In 2002, though, this is kind of fun.

Towards the end of their relationship, Britney ordered two custom-made toilet seats. one with her face printed on it and one with Justin's. She gave the one with her face to Justin and kept the other one for herself. The seats cost $21,000 each. She said, I just couldn't resist

ordering one for me and one for Justin. People might consider spending that much on toilet seats excessive, but for us, they're a reminder of how far we've come since our days in the Mickey Mouse Club. Now, the thing is that I think that if I was, can you imagine the dumb shit you would buy

at that age if you were that rich? Well, sure. This is part of what they will use against her down the line. of how she shouldn't be in control of her money. You're right. That's a lot of money. But also, you're fucking rich as shit.

What the fuck ever? That's her money. That is her money to spend as dumbly as she wants. My question is, you gave your boyfriend your face to shit in? Is that? That's what we're doing here? No, he's shitting underneath her face. Natalie.

Okay, fair. All right, fair. So let's get into Crossroads. A woman named Ann Carly leaves Jive Records. to get into film and discovers the spec script from another woman named Shonda Rimes that she really liked. Shonda Rimes is going to actually go on

to create Grey's Anatomy. Yes. Which is a little thing there. So this is, but she's unknown at the time. The script is a retelling of Antigone set in an African-American town in the 1930s. A retelling is very loose retelling of Antigone. Oh, wow.

I didn't know that was the origin of this movie. Well, I think that was like, Holy shit. She maybe took some small things from that script, But either way, she's unable to get it sold. And Carly hits her with the idea of, why don't we develop a film for Britney Spears? Because Anne Carly is working with drive records at the time.

I love that she said, so this is another one of these little experiences where Brittany did have some say in what is going on in the movie. And Anne Carly talked about Brittany in it, and she said, Britney said to me, I don't want a movie that talks down to my peers. And I also don't want a movie that teaches a lesson, but I also want a movie that means something.

What is that mean? Crossroads, throw this out there. Crossroads, very difficult to find for some reason. It's another one of those that we all have to like... You probably have to pirate it. Don't worry, it'll be on every streaming service in tomorrow. It must be. It's the curse of the researcher, I think, is what it is.

But either way... I don't know. I actually think probably the cases that they couldn't get licensing for all those songs they sing. Probably. Yeah, there's a lot of bad early 2000s. covers of songs. Don't even get me started.

I remember at this time this came out, I was viscerally offended that they did I love rock and roll because it is god awful and it is

by somebody who probably does not ever listen to rock and roll. I'm not angry at her anymore now that I know so much about her but I'm angry at the people who made them.

Yes. Yeah, angry at the puppeteers. Yeah, exactly. Either way, Rhymes really wanted to do it after seeing her perform live. Rhyme said, I was much more interested

in the young woman that I met than the image that people had of her. She was a person, and I don't think anyone at the time was looking at her because it's such a misogynistic society as a person. The idea that we could portray her

as a three-dimensional young woman was interesting to me. To have mean-girled her and turned her into a caricature would have been a mistake. They also brought in a female director as well to make her feel as comfortable

as she could. Oh, I hope so, because they have her in underwear like 16 times in the movie for some reason. And what is, I think, something that is glaringly apparent, which I will say, Crossroads is not a good movie. But what is, especially entertaining, though. All of this research, it's interesting how Zoe Saldana and Taryn Manning felt about being in the movie with her because they still talk to Britney Spears and because she was

looking for people, she wanted to be working with people that were real girls. And that this was the first time, I really think, that Britney Spears was allowed to, even though it was just acting, act like a normal teenage girl. And talking and hanging out with two people that were not famous was something she cherished, that they created such a bond that Britney Spears needed so much that Zoe Salada said that they still talk.

And then I think that Zoe Saltona was very aware of the fact that she needed real people to talk to. It was like the only time she was ever allowed to hang out with her peers for sure. Yes. Well, this is what Rhymes had to say. She was very cheerful, very fun. I think it was so different from being on the road and doing concerts, being able to stay in one place and be with the same group of people all the time.

It was the first time I think she had hung out with people her own age. When she was on the road, it was her and a team of people. But this was her and Taryn and Zoe and Anson. They were all sort of the same age and I think they had fun together. All wearing stupid hats. Oh, man. The bucket hats were in. And the fact that they're like, she's so smart, she's the valedictorian.

It's like, oh, you're just born this on. What I think is also fun, though. I work so hard to be valedictorian. Is that Kim Cottrell was already a fan of Britney Spears, which is why it worked. And also, Anson Mount, who plays her love interest in it, was working with Robert De Niro on the movie City by the Sea. And Robert DeNiro was actually also a huge fan of Britney Spears. Oh, I have heard this before, yeah. which is, I think, very adorable.

So Robert Deere was a huge fan, convinced Anson Mount to audition for the movie and even red lines with him while they were on set for City by the Sea because he really wanted him to get the role because he thought Britney Spears was very talented. Oh, that's cute. I will say this. Yes, it's maybe not a great movie. But Britney Spears really surprised me with her acting in this film.

She did a great job. She really did. She never felt Tammy. She felt real. She felt like a real person. You could see the actual sadness coming from her. Like you could, when she did the cry scene, that was real. Yeah.

Like that was some real tears. She's not a go. Can we do another take? Can we please do another take? Please, can I cry again? I need to cry for once. She only way to let me. I get zapped by, oh, never mind.

It's my cry minutes. They give me five cry minutes a day. My cry. My precious cry. minutes. We laugh, but it's incredibly true. But either way, the film, it's super indie, made really cheaply, and it's this huge financial success. It's really entertaining and so insane. And it makes a lot of sense that it came from a much darker scripts because the movie is sort of a teeny bopper movie that has these really dark turns. Yeah. For no sense. And you're just like, why I liked it. Yeah.

It's pretty fun. I had no idea. Yeah. I mean, I forgot. I'd seen it once, maybe. I've never had And I was legitimately sad yesterday when I was unable to find it because I weirdly was in the mood to just see what it was all about. And they definitely make it that kind of movie where they're aware that it's like a date movie for teens that the guy is getting dragged to. So they do this like gross eye candy stuff. And it's like not about that at all. The rest of the movie's vibe is like women getting together. Another quick tidbit to Tamara Davis, who also directed half baked. She hired a ton of women.

the producer and the director, they hired a bunch of women crew as well. And apparently it was just a very like nurturing, safe, chill environment. And honestly, it's probably the last good environment she is ever going to be in after this point. And that's what we'll get into next week.

Well, I'm glad they had that background at least. That's good for her. Also, fun fact, the first gas station they stop at says Natalie on the title. And the second one says Henry. Whoa. Y'all were meant to be. Oh, my God.

The movie foretold our marriage. I do also a fun fact about this movie is that she auditioned the dudes herself, and there was a lot of kissing in the auditions to make sure that there was chemistry. And apparently she had a lot of chemistry. Oh, wow. I'm not into that guy who's in the part, but. No, he's horrible. But I'm glad she liked it.

I'm glad she liked him. Glad she had fun. So in 2002, Forbes ranked Britney Spears, the world's most powerful celebrity. Next week, we get into the breakdown, the shaved heads seen around the world, the, just the incredibly dark years. Essentially, 2003, we get Britney, I believe. No, no, 2003, we get the album with Toxic on it that we'll start covering next week. And that's the last album she makes until, like, 2007, 2008. Well, that's not.

there is one in between, but we will talk about that. I don't even know, but either way. Either way, we've got this very dark, dark tale to tell. It only gets worse from here, ladies jins. This next episode is just going to be chotful. We're going to be getting those truffles. And the third's going to be worse somehow. This is technically the happy episode.

This is the good episode. Get ready to be upset. We love you guys. Thank you so much for going on this trip with us. Because with everything that's happening right now, we all need to know what happened. We need to know how she got to this place. And that's what we are here to explain to you. Hashtag free Brittany. If you want to follow us further, patreon.com forward slash page seven podcast. Check us out tons of content happening on there for just $5 a month. Just every week there's content.

It's really helpful to keeping the show going to. So please, please take a look at our Patreon. Also, check us out on Twitch.tv.4. slash hold nators ho. Jackie and I do a stream called Jack It's incredibly fun. We get very drunk. So look there to us and Natalie. Follow me the Natty Jean and page 7 LPN. And we have shirts now in the merch store. Yes, please check about.

We got page 7 shirts. We've got Hakuna Bafunkin'Fuckin' shirts. You go to last podcastmerch.com. And they are there for you and your purchasing power. And Jackie? And my name is Jackie. and I will be crying over the next couple of weeks about Britney Spears and come come have a cry with me and you can see my tears on my Instagram account at Jack That

Worm. Cry me a river. Come me a river. Don't. Cry me. Cry me. We love you guys. We'll talk to you next week and more sadness to come.

Bye. Bye. High sec free Britney. This show is made possible by listeners like you. Thanks to our ad sponsors. You can support our shows by supporting them. For more shows like the one you just listened to, go to lastpodcastnetwork.com.