Britney Spears is, according to some (far too many, from where I stand) a singer. And, as a singer, it was only natural that she finally released that over-hyped comeback album the world had been expecting and dreading at the same time for the last couple of years. Whichever of the two doesn't really matter in the end, because Brit Brit's new studio material is still going to drop this Tuesday; that is to say, like it or not, you too will have to take a deep breath, hold on tight to whatever you get your hands on, cringe and prepare for an avalanche of Britney's 'music'. A term I use with the utmost indulgence, since that which you will find on 'Blackout' is not music per se... I would call it overproduced piece of electronic caca, at least from an artistic point of view, but, hey, that's just me.

Don't get me wrong, given Britney's current circumstances, this album is good by far, and better than nothing at all. Of course, that would mean literally dismissing the very idea of making music and the concept of real singer but, since it's Britney we're talking about here, we might as well. So don't expect anything different from her previous materials - that, just in case you were wondering where she still found the time to head to the studio and lay down no less than 12 original 'tunes' (ahem), what with making babies, getting married and divorced, fighting for custody and apparently her sanity, shaving heads and viciously attacking people and cars with umbrellas and the almost incredible amount of posing for the the paparazzi (with or without panties, but mostly the latter one). The secret is that Britney's involvement in the making of her own comeback album is almost non-existent. And it shows in all of the twelve tracks.

Of course, Britney has always been the type of artist who focused more on her image as the core of her entire career. She was, from the very start, just a puppet that stood for something way bigger than her, an entire industry set on selling albums that only used her as a prop. Her vocal talent has always been minimal and this is exactly why she always relied on other things to attract fans, like steamy videos, merchandise, fiery shows and her larger than life public persona. Heck, as long as we were willing to go with the entire charade, I suppose we can't find her at fault for wanting to ride the wave of fame. However, those times are gone now: artists like Rihanna or Timbaland, the latest Beyonce album or Jennifer Lopez, all indicate that, while studio trickery is accepted, it has to fall back on something like, oh, I dunno, talent. And here is where Britney comes short.

Let's start with the beginning: would I advise anyone to buy 'Blackout'? Would I buy it myself? Well, no, not really. Now that I've heard what the whole deal was about and that I've finally gotten to hear the final tracks included on it, I say I could live without it. But that doesn't mean that it's that bad or that it won't sell. Quite on the contrary - people will probably buy it, either out of curiosity or simply because they like it. And, truth is, 'Blackout' is so bad that it's actually good. It's extremely annoying, yet it grows on you. Just so that you can better understand what I'm trying to say, suffice it to say that what Paris Hilton accomplished with her 'Stars Are Blind' a year ago was nothing when compared to this. All the tracks on 'Blackout' (is that irony I sense in the title or just plain old stupidity?) are like that: an attack on the ears, comprised of a multitude of sounds meant to cover Britney's incapacity to carry a tune, that ends by digging deep into your brains, where it lingers for at least another hour after the track has ended.

The album is clubby and electronic to the extreme, which will probably make it the ideal choice for a party where you basically don't care about the music you're dancing to, as long as the beat is a killer. Britney's voice is barely recognizable in most of the tracks - which would be just perfect if it weren't so damn annoying. The lyrics, on the other hand, are all meant to be an in-your-face type of attitude, especially in 'Piece of Me'. A more inexperienced fan/listener could be fooled into believing that this is actually Britney responding to the criticism she's been put to in the past following months. But, if you know more about the pop tart than a regular consumer, you know that the joke is, at the end of the day, on her: it's like the writers made her sing about all these things she has no idea of, something about being hot, the sex siren on the dance floor, the woman everyone would love to see naked, the living legend, the ultimate misunderstood diva. About the woman who is control, not only in terms of her sex life, but of her life in general. Yeah, the joke is definitely on Britney!

From the very first track, the already well known 'Gimme More', it becomes very clear where 'Blackout' is heading to. In fact, the whole album can be described as a flat line, since there is nothing to set the 12 tracks apart. Maybe this is why I find it so hard to name the best and worst track on it, since after listening to them all, I felt I was left with nothing to hang on. There is no feeling, neither in the music nor in Britney's performance. It's all about the sex, the fame, the hotness, the uh, yeahs and whispered voice, mixed with a lil' bit of rapping on Britney's part (or something that comes very close to it) and Janet Jackson's sighs. And if all that were not so poorly rendered, then maybe 'Blackout' could have been the next 'Erotica'.

I'm not going to go into discussing each track, since I say it's best you decide for yourselves - you can listen to the entire album HERE. Plus, things like trying to find the hidden message behind some lyric or another becomes completely redundant in this case. This is Britney, bitch, and you know she has better things to do than communicate with her fans through her music. Like getting frapuccinos and shopping. Posing. Standing as front for something that she doesn't even understand. The morale of this story: whenever you hear one of the tracks from 'Blackout', get your dancing shoes ready and get jiggy with it. It's the least we can do to take advantage of it...