So What's all this about then?

Britney Spears - just the mention of her name and you have a range of responses from people, possibly as many responses as people you mention her name to.
  
Britney's first single, ...Baby One More Time was released in the USA on October 23 1998, and was a number one hit around the globe, from that point on it seems she has rarely been out of the news
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Everyone loves (Or does not love!) Britney!  Everyone it seems has an opinion on her. 


Some say she started out the innocent every-girl teen and then slowly went down the road to overtly provocative music and a matching lifestyle.  Others claim she was provocative right from the beginning.  She has been praised and blamed for changing the fashion agenda of what we now call 'tweens' and even used as an example either of the moral bankrupt nature of our society or how the paparazzi can cause so many problems for such a young person.


She has always been regarded as someone who is very physically attractive, and there is no denying that she is certainly very beautiful and her music has been very influential to many others.

It has been over twelve years since she hit the scene and like many of us Britney has had highs and lows, the only thing for her is that her highs and lows have been viewed through the eyes of an adoring, skeptical and hateful public all at the same time.   

She has faced pressures most of us would never dace and had moments called controversial that for us would be just life.  There has been much said and covered about her life. Who could forget the emotional tears of Chris Crocker begging people to leave Britney alone!   It is right here now if you want to re-watch or even experience it for the first ever time.

This one video has had over thirty-six million people watch it, almost the entire population of Australia watching it two times each.  That is amazing!

There has also been parodies and whilst most of them are pretty poor some have actually been amusing.  Here's a parody of Britney's hit song Oops I did it Again by Weird Al Yankovich.  Very base humour to be sure, but very funny!.

Ultimately however it is all about the music and with Britney due to release her seventh studio album in 2011 there has been quite a bit of it, and so with this in mind I have decided to go back and look at Britney and to be honest as a person who has not listened to a lot of her music to explore the phenomenon that is Britney Spears.

So I will be going through her career song by song and seeing what we can make of these songs.

People have analysed the words of poets for centuries, today some people say it is not about the words but the beat of the song and how people dance, but short of songs like Barbara Streisand by Duck Sauce or the (in)famous Get Get Down by Paul Johnson  (Let me remind you of that one.  Virtually the only word in the lyrics is Down. )  words of songs can be thought about, and Britney's words may make us think about things.  It has been said that what someone says can be interpreted and be meaningful to people in different ways.

So without further ado, let's return to late 1998 and where it all began.  Each blog will reflect on one single Britney song.  I hope the ride will be interesting and I hope you can join me and share your thoughts as we look at Britney Spears in this the Britney Spears Project.
So since I am going to cover her songs I won't leave you with a song but I'll leave you with Britney singing in this awesome Pepsi commercial, and it rare that you will hear me say commercial and awesome in the same sentence.