Britney, Britney, Britney.
By now you’ve heard all the blowback from your… spectacular… comeback performance at the MTV Video Music Awards, and I’m guessing you haven’t been pleased. When the preponderance of critical articles, even the positive ones, include the word “trainwreck” in the first paragraph, things are not looking good.
And there are many elements of blame that led inexorably to you stumping around the stage in a leather bikini lip-syncing very nearly all of the words to your new hit song, “Gimme More.” The New York Times has reported you were rushed into doing the show by your management. There were problems with your hair. You may have had relationship issues with Criss Angel weighing on your mind. One fan has gone all Zapruder and produced a slo-mo video to prove that your heel was broken throughout the show (although the possibility of a second broken heel working with the CIA has yet to be documented).
And the ocean of mean-spirited comments about your weight can safely be ignored. No, you don’t look like your toned teenage self. But you do look better than just about everybody who was making fun of you, although to be fair most of them don’t try wearing outfits like that. Or at least not in public. Or at least not sober.
But the bulk of the blame has to rest on your newly spray-tanned shoulders. As I see it – from my vantage point of personally knowing nothing about the music business, performing in front of thousands of people, or even most of your career – you’re trying to be too many things at the same time. Pop star, all-night party girl, single mom, business brand, respected artist, unpaid Cointreau spokesperson… the list goes on. And that’s a lot to juggle, especially when the audience is throwing things.
Now that some time has passed and you may be ready to start trying to stop the train before it takes out another neighborhood, here’s some suggestions.
GO NUTS. If you plan to continue with the same crash-and-burn career path, amp it up. Release any sex tapes you have lying around, work your way through every actor (male and female) in “High School Musical 3,” drink your way to success. Notoriety is almost as good as fame, accidental nudity photos are always entertaining, and Courtney Love will need a successor someday. You’d also be providing a valuable service since all the parents who advised their children not to dress like you can now point and say “See? That’s what happens. Go put on a shirt.”
But you might have dreams of a career people don’t automatically snigger at, and I think those dreams are within your grasp. First you’ll need to:
DROP THE DIVA-HOOD. Besides the sequined limos, professionally arched eyebrows and bewildering dressing room demands, successful diva-osity requires a heaping helping of talent to lean on or it falls over and looks silly. Aretha Franklin is not a diva because she can fire everyone in the phone book on a whim but because she can sing anyone else on earth through a brick wall. She’s earned her diva-ness time and time again, and that’s the part you should pay attention to (note that she also had two teenage pregnancies and a bad first marriage). Previous success has the shelf life of a peeled banana. The first rule of the entertainment business: What have you sung for me today?
Right now when your name comes up the public is not thinking of “Baby One More Time” or even “Oops, I Did It Again.” They’re thinking of poor work habits, poor parenting, and poor public underwear management. Time to get humble, disappear for a while, work on your craft, and earn the love again. One way to do that is to:
REINVENT YOURSELF. You’ve said before how much you admired Madonna’s career; well, by this point she had reinvented herself three times and even her mailman had to ask her for ID. Time for you to change.
Might be a bit tricky; Xtina’s already working the cute-turned-skank-turned-classy arc, Amy Lee has the goth thing locked up, and Amy Winehouse is doing the crash-and-burn thing way harder than you are. Pick something else. Go classy, go young professional, go retro, go futuristic. How about an anime superhero look? Get some stagehands to wave tentacles around, look into eye-widening surgery. You’ve already done the schoolgirl version so this is just a step forward, and you’ll attract the prepubescent girls and creepy middle-aged men you’re already used to seeing in your audience. But to make this work, first you’ll need to:
GO AWAY. For a while, anyway. Maybe a year, maybe two. Get through the publicity run for your next CD and then vanish. Find some little town, change your hair, raise your kids, avoid the paparazzi altogether. Work on controlling any self-destructive impulses you might have that might result in you, say, riding a motorcycle naked into a breakfast buffet. Rehab isn’t out of the question if you need it but do it quietly somewhere besides LA and without a press release. Practice. Write some songs. Practice some more. Try performing in little bars under a different name and get your timing back. It worked for Paul McCartney (psst: he was in “Wings”).
If you’re not sure your voice is strong enough to sustain an act without the spectacle, start working out and don’t stop until you can outdance all of your backup dancers. You don’t dare go out there again until you have your moves back. And while you’re building up your performin’ muscles again:
WRITE SONGS THAT AREN’T EASY TO MAKE FUN OF. “Gimme More” isn’t a bad start for a comeback, but you might want to get away from the “I’m so lonely” and “I love sex” songs because frankly we don’t care. We have LiveJournal for that sort of thing. Go for powerful, in control, fun-loving, maybe the occasional wistful ballad. If you’re going to write songs about how the media treats you, think “funny and self-aware” and avoid “whiny,” because if you’re going to emulate Michael Jackson you want the middle of his career and not the end of it. Most importantly, you’ll need to:
WRITE AN ANTHEM. This is the 3rd act of the “Behind the Music: Britney Spears” show right now, the part when the screen goes black and the violins come out and lots of magazine covers and police reports flash by. You need something for that 45 minute commercial promo: “Coming up, Britney comes roaring back.” Your best bet is an anthem, a blood-pumpin’ song, something that speaks to your audience’s souls, increases the nation’s driving speed, and sounds good in a drag queen review. Pink’s done it, XTina’s done it, Madonna does it roughly every three years. And when you’re all ready, pack up the kids, head back into the studio, and:
COME BACK QUIETLY. Don’t hold concerts in ampitheaters. Don’t appear on award shows (duh). Don’t go on Leno. Reconnect with your fans on a personal basis. The Internet makes this possible.
Record your new CD and give it everything you’ve got, but don’t announce it. Don’t send out review copies. But put several of the songs on a new MySpace page and let people find it. Don’t worry if it takes months, let it build. Use the page – which you won’t link to from your official site – and talk to your audience, directly. Essentially leak your own music. Play in small clubs and sell your CDs there. Quietly issue invitations for your MySpace friends to appear in your music videos. Become a viral sensation. Ideally, the entertainment industry should notice and start talking about you after you’ve already been ruled a success by the people that matter, i.e. millions of fans.
Thing is, you can’t declare yourself a star. Your new opening lyric “It’s Britney, Bitch” just sounds like a bad Rick James imitation. You have to let your fans do it for you. And they will, if you give them a reason to. Right now you’re just giving them a reason to laugh at you.
And when it comes to wiggling around looking hung-over and unprepared in front of millions of people, please. Gimme less.