Long long ago, when I was young and naive, I snuck into a skeezy dance club with my roommate's brother's best friend, a dimpled absolute cutie called Jordan. We were both underage, and in costume for the Halloween Bloc Party, and we'd gotten separated from our friends, and wandered into the dance club, Evolution or Revolution or some silly name.
They were playing Britney, and Jordan leans in and says, "You know, I used to think I was meant to marry Britney Spears because we have the same birthday." It was hilarious - well, it seemed hilarious to me at the time. So we got drunk and made out, and of course the next day realised (in my case pretended to realise) that we'd made a huge mistake. It's what you do I suppose, when cute dimply people called Jordan tell you let's-pretend-this-didn't-happen and oh-by-the-way-I'm- joining-the-army.
My ex was semi-stalking me at the time: weepy phone calls, angry confrontations at my favourite pub, drunken appearances at my doorstep at 3am, contrite emails, the works. So the tryst at the nightclub was a sweet, brief interlude that left me with, if nothing else, a strange and lasting fondness for Britney Spears.
And a fondness for at least some of the artists who seem to share at least some of my fondness for Britney. So here's another top ten list, in no particular order, of my favourite versions of the Britster's three most covered songs from three different periods in her career: Baby One More Time, Toxic, and Womanizer.
BABY ONE MORE TIME: Who doesn't love Britney's breakout single, and occasionally mouth it in front of the mirror, both fists clenched over the hairbrush microphone? "My grandma, that's who" is not a valid answer! You know you've done it too! What else would you be doing while takin' those purported "long showers" in there! Travis did a satisfyingly angsty (and satisfyingly Irish accented) cover of the song, replete with aforementioned clenched fists, clenched jaws, generally clenched everything.
TRAVIS, Baby One More Time
The Bowling for Soup version completely bowled me over (ooh clever pun there, haha!). Bonus points for being featured in Freaky Friday, starring my other favourite child-star-turned-teen-pop-princess whose existential fuck-ups seemed to echo the rising and falling cadences of my own adolescence. Thanks to Lindsay (we're on first-name basis in my mind) and Britney (ditto) my wordless teenage heartache-y cries of "No-one understands me!" (okay not wordless obviously) were quickly amended to, "Lindsay would understand, because she has Known Pain!"
And for sheer glorious so-bad-it's-good-ness, there's Chad Michael Murray, for the memorable scene in Freaky Friday where he pulls a John Cusack (Say Anything) or Mike Myers (So I Married An Axe Murderer) by serenading his ladylove in the rain. Is that his real voice? Jesus.
CHAD MICHAEL MURRAY, Baby One More Time
and BOWLING FOR SOUP, Baby One More Time
Nevertheless, the top spot for Baby One More Time covers, and trust me I wavered between them and Bowling for Soup for the longest time, goes to... *drumroll* ...FOUNTAINS OF WAYNE! from their 2005 album Out-Of-State Plates. Yep, the same band that gave us Stacy's Mom.
FOUNTAINS OF WAYNE, Baby One More Time
They didn't release a music video, so that's just a still from their album cover.
TOXIC: Can't say I was ever a huge fan of this song. Toxic came out at the end of 2003 (thank you Wikipedia) after the horrid breakup with Justin Timberlake (now I heart JT as much as the next person, but that whole episode where he outed Britney as not a virgin? not cool, JT.) and the abomination that was Crossroads. The gross-tastic on-stage make-out with Madonna didn't help. Britney circa November 2003 was teetering at the top of the pop world.
But Toxic did lend itself to some creative interpretation: Mark Ronson's version features some badass rapping (not that I can tell badass rapping from not-so-badass rapping, though I suspect Snoop Dogg would fall in the second category?). But between this and Alesana's screamo punk take, I think there's no question that the latter rules.
ALESANA, Toxic
But what really made me reconsider my not-so-glowing impression of Toxic was Israeli singer Yael Naim's cover. Naim's accent and enunciation transforms a slightly robotic (even by pop standards) dance floor hit into a thing of beauty and pain, an insta-anthem for high school kids in emo eyeliner worldwide.
YAEL NAIM, Toxic
WOMANIZER: I heard Womanizer on the radio long before I even realized that Brits was BACK. A favorite with the worthy gentlemen at the cafe I worked at, Womanizer played on endless loop along with Estelle's American Boy and the Pussycat Dolls remix of Jai Ho. It was hard to ignore it, and it was even harder to keep the swish from my hips as I served the customers coffee and toasted sandwiches. And before I knew it, everyone and their monkey had done a cover version of the song.
At the bottom of the pile would be the jarring, tuneless rendition by an otherwise awesome band, Franz Ferdinand... except, that spot has been reserved for the All-American Rejects, who prefaced their dull-as-carpet version with a truly obnoxious and unfunny declaration mocking the song and claiming that they could do it better than Britney. Try again in a million years, grease head.
You've gotta love a band that calls itself Timid Tiger. Add the fact that it's a geeky German electro hip hop group, ah the love, I can feel it overflowing. You go, Timid Tiger.
TIMID TIGER, Womanizer
How do you beat geekelicious Germans? With dorky French pop phenom Sliimy, whose falsetto renderings are nevertheless pitch-perfect and miraculously non-shrieky, of course.
SLIIMY, Womanizer
Lily Allen's version of the song is probably the most well-known cover, and for good reason. Her rendition sounds like it's on the verge of taking a running leap off a cliff - in a good way. A very very good way.
LILY ALLEN, Womanizer
And again, it was hard for me to decide which I liked better - the Lily Allen cover or the Ladyhawke version. And I'd have to go with Ladyhawke, by a slim as salami margin, because in addition to the same palpable undercurrent of tension, there's the awesomeness of Ladyhawke herself. Not that Lily Allen isn't awesome. Oh hell, I can't decide.
LADYHAWKE, Womanizer
So, here's the roundup!
10 Timid Tiger
09 Alesana
08 Travis
07 Yael Naim
06 Chad Michael Murray (funny and short!)
05 Sliimy
04 Bowling for Soup
02 Tied between Lily Allen and Ladyhawke
01 Fountains of Wayne!
They were playing Britney, and Jordan leans in and says, "You know, I used to think I was meant to marry Britney Spears because we have the same birthday." It was hilarious - well, it seemed hilarious to me at the time. So we got drunk and made out, and of course the next day realised (in my case pretended to realise) that we'd made a huge mistake. It's what you do I suppose, when cute dimply people called Jordan tell you let's-pretend-this-didn't-happen and oh-by-the-way-I'm- joining-the-army.
My ex was semi-stalking me at the time: weepy phone calls, angry confrontations at my favourite pub, drunken appearances at my doorstep at 3am, contrite emails, the works. So the tryst at the nightclub was a sweet, brief interlude that left me with, if nothing else, a strange and lasting fondness for Britney Spears.
And a fondness for at least some of the artists who seem to share at least some of my fondness for Britney. So here's another top ten list, in no particular order, of my favourite versions of the Britster's three most covered songs from three different periods in her career: Baby One More Time, Toxic, and Womanizer.
BABY ONE MORE TIME: Who doesn't love Britney's breakout single, and occasionally mouth it in front of the mirror, both fists clenched over the hairbrush microphone? "My grandma, that's who" is not a valid answer! You know you've done it too! What else would you be doing while takin' those purported "long showers" in there! Travis did a satisfyingly angsty (and satisfyingly Irish accented) cover of the song, replete with aforementioned clenched fists, clenched jaws, generally clenched everything.
TRAVIS, Baby One More Time
_____________________________________________
The Bowling for Soup version completely bowled me over (ooh clever pun there, haha!). Bonus points for being featured in Freaky Friday, starring my other favourite child-star-turned-teen-pop-princess whose existential fuck-ups seemed to echo the rising and falling cadences of my own adolescence. Thanks to Lindsay (we're on first-name basis in my mind) and Britney (ditto) my wordless teenage heartache-y cries of "No-one understands me!" (okay not wordless obviously) were quickly amended to, "Lindsay would understand, because she has Known Pain!"
And for sheer glorious so-bad-it's-good-ness, there's Chad Michael Murray, for the memorable scene in Freaky Friday where he pulls a John Cusack (Say Anything) or Mike Myers (So I Married An Axe Murderer) by serenading his ladylove in the rain. Is that his real voice? Jesus.
CHAD MICHAEL MURRAY, Baby One More Time
and BOWLING FOR SOUP, Baby One More Time
_____________________________________________
Nevertheless, the top spot for Baby One More Time covers, and trust me I wavered between them and Bowling for Soup for the longest time, goes to... *drumroll* ...FOUNTAINS OF WAYNE! from their 2005 album Out-Of-State Plates. Yep, the same band that gave us Stacy's Mom.
FOUNTAINS OF WAYNE, Baby One More Time
_____________________________________________
They didn't release a music video, so that's just a still from their album cover.
TOXIC: Can't say I was ever a huge fan of this song. Toxic came out at the end of 2003 (thank you Wikipedia) after the horrid breakup with Justin Timberlake (now I heart JT as much as the next person, but that whole episode where he outed Britney as not a virgin? not cool, JT.) and the abomination that was Crossroads. The gross-tastic on-stage make-out with Madonna didn't help. Britney circa November 2003 was teetering at the top of the pop world.
But Toxic did lend itself to some creative interpretation: Mark Ronson's version features some badass rapping (not that I can tell badass rapping from not-so-badass rapping, though I suspect Snoop Dogg would fall in the second category?). But between this and Alesana's screamo punk take, I think there's no question that the latter rules.
ALESANA, Toxic
_____________________________________________
But what really made me reconsider my not-so-glowing impression of Toxic was Israeli singer Yael Naim's cover. Naim's accent and enunciation transforms a slightly robotic (even by pop standards) dance floor hit into a thing of beauty and pain, an insta-anthem for high school kids in emo eyeliner worldwide.
YAEL NAIM, Toxic
_____________________________________________
WOMANIZER: I heard Womanizer on the radio long before I even realized that Brits was BACK. A favorite with the worthy gentlemen at the cafe I worked at, Womanizer played on endless loop along with Estelle's American Boy and the Pussycat Dolls remix of Jai Ho. It was hard to ignore it, and it was even harder to keep the swish from my hips as I served the customers coffee and toasted sandwiches. And before I knew it, everyone and their monkey had done a cover version of the song.
At the bottom of the pile would be the jarring, tuneless rendition by an otherwise awesome band, Franz Ferdinand... except, that spot has been reserved for the All-American Rejects, who prefaced their dull-as-carpet version with a truly obnoxious and unfunny declaration mocking the song and claiming that they could do it better than Britney. Try again in a million years, grease head.
You've gotta love a band that calls itself Timid Tiger. Add the fact that it's a geeky German electro hip hop group, ah the love, I can feel it overflowing. You go, Timid Tiger.
TIMID TIGER, Womanizer
_____________________________________________
How do you beat geekelicious Germans? With dorky French pop phenom Sliimy, whose falsetto renderings are nevertheless pitch-perfect and miraculously non-shrieky, of course.
SLIIMY, Womanizer
_____________________________________________
Lily Allen's version of the song is probably the most well-known cover, and for good reason. Her rendition sounds like it's on the verge of taking a running leap off a cliff - in a good way. A very very good way.
LILY ALLEN, Womanizer
_____________________________________________
And again, it was hard for me to decide which I liked better - the Lily Allen cover or the Ladyhawke version. And I'd have to go with Ladyhawke, by a slim as salami margin, because in addition to the same palpable undercurrent of tension, there's the awesomeness of Ladyhawke herself. Not that Lily Allen isn't awesome. Oh hell, I can't decide.
LADYHAWKE, Womanizer
_____________________________________________
So, here's the roundup!
10 Timid Tiger
09 Alesana
08 Travis
07 Yael Naim
06 Chad Michael Murray (funny and short!)
05 Sliimy
04 Bowling for Soup
02 Tied between Lily Allen and Ladyhawke
01 Fountains of Wayne!
