From
Entertainment Weekly
#518/519 | December 24/31,1999
Best
of 1999
The Tops In
Movies,
Television, Books,
Music, Video,
and Internet
The new queen of bubblegum
pop
blew up the competition
with her dewy insouciance,
vampy videos - and
the best navel in the business
hen Britney Spears addresses the guy she hopes will hit her one more time
(with the truth, not his fist, she's hastened to explain), she calls him her
"baby" in a growly moan that would do a veteran soul singer proud.
"Oh, bay
-buh, bay-buh" is her refrain, and that throaty purr, combines with
the pert
video that was all over MTV like milk chocolate on a Ding Dong, turned the
18-year-old Spears into an end-of-the-century sex kitten who'd humble Humbert
Humbert. Not that there's anything wrong with that, since Spears bypasses
Nympho-ville and zooms straight into the Mall-lands of America, where her
public appearances make prepubescent fans scream with innocent delight. It's
like the Knack (a teenybop act that peaked before Britney was born) once
said: "The little girls understand."
What the little girls in Spears' sphere get is that their idol is one
confident role model who's chosen her own influences well: a bit of Janet
Jackson in her take-charge dance moves, a smidgen of Mariah's sultry
sassiness, some Stevie Wonder in her croon, and, behind the scenes,
Backstreet Boys mentor Max Martin cowriting and co-producing unshakable pop
hits. Spears' '99 debut, ...Baby One More Time, has sold more than 9
million
copies, and her non-mall stadium tours were sellout hormonal fits. One
non-setback: Rumors she'd guest-star on Dawson's Creek came to naught.
(Wise
career move, Brit - have you seen the show this season? A young woman in
your
positoin shouldn't have to share screen time with an aging harlot like Jen or
a mope-a-dope like Pacey.) She's also weathered her first controversy -
speculation that Kentwood, Louisiana's Baptist-raised sweetie ("I've always
been really religious," she told EW. "I was brought up in the church,
but I
can still party!") has had her chest enhanced. (For the record: accusation
denied.)
Spears knows where she's coming from, artistically speaking. She sees her art
through the mists of ancient pop history: "There was a period when R&B
was
really strong. You didn't hear any pop. It was like New Kids on the Block,
and then all of a sudden it just went away." Britney, on the heels of the
Backstreet Boys, helped bring pop back. And, on the much higher heels of the
Spice Girls, she's taken girl power to higher ground. Where 80's predecessors
Tiffany and Debbie Gibson had to maintain at least the pretense of
white-bread innocence, Spears has tapped into hip hop's free-flowing
sensuality without scaring off kids or their 'rents, duplicating beats that
are funky buy not so freaky they can't be reproduced by little girls in front
of their mirrors. (At this point, even Mariah's co-opting Britney's
butterschotch hair, with matching lipstick and youthful, semi-port sweatpant
chic.) In 1999, she was the brightest reflection of prepubescent longing and
joy.
"My audience looks at me like a girlfriend," says Spears. "That's
how I was
trying to portray it on stage, like 'All of us girls out there!' Instead of
being, like, I don't know, 'I've got a man and duh-duh-duh.' I didn't want
the jealousy thing."
Someday, Britney, you'll be old enough to sing comfortably about how you
"got
a man," but in the meantime, trust us: "Oh, bay-buh, bay-buh"
is a pop mantra
as good as anyone needs right now. - Ken Tucker
Entertainment Weekly