MUSIC REVIEW: Too bad Britney can't black out this phase of her career

By GLENN GAMBOA - Newsday

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BLACKOUT. Britney Spears' new CD, out today. The title says it all. Grade D.

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The new Britney Spears album "Blackout" (Jive) is terrible. But how could it not be?

After all, music was never really the strongest part of the Britney Spears package in the first place. She was more about, well, packaging - the look, the videos, the personal life, everything that surrounded the music.

So now, in the midst of all of her personal turmoil - the custody battle, the substance abuse allegations, the wobbly public performances - did anyone really expect "Blackout" to be some sort of artistic leap forward? Of course not.

Like much of the pre-fab dance beats and the robotic, studio-enhanced vocals that fill it, "Blackout" is simply the next, predictably pre-ordained step in "The Britney Spears Story," which also doubles as her life. It's the point in the narrative where the commercial failure of her album finally makes her realize that she needs help. It will be followed, of course, by rehab - both image and otherwise - and the inevitable comeback featuring songs about empowerment and making it through the rain and stuff, tentatively titled "The Emancipation of BritBrit."

It would be funny if it weren't so sad.

What makes "Blackout" so over-the-top-bad isn't Spears, however. Her seemingly minimal involvement is pretty obvious and her over-processed, faux-electro vocals could basically be dropped into any setting or reprocessed to fit any situation.

The real failure is in the ridiculous things that the songwriters give her to sing and the uninspired musical backdrops that the producers provide her.

The album's best song, "Heaven on Earth," a cross between Donna Summer's Giorgio Moroder days and latter-day Kylie Minogue, could be a hit for anyone. Spears' blank delivery doesn't sink it, but it doesn't really help it any, either. There was a time when getting Spears to do one of your songs was a coup. But now that her involvement is arguably a liability, you have to wonder why songwriter Kara DioGuardi would hand the song over to Spears instead of one of her many other superstar clients or even holding onto it herself.

For some, it's a way of boasting, which Danjahandz does in the hammy ending to "Gimme More" and which Sean Garrett does on the Missy Elliott rip-off "Toy Soldier," saying "Smash on the radio, bet I penned it."

At other times, it seems like her handlers are pulling pranks, like big brothers getting their little siblings to say crazy stuff that they don't understand. ("What I gotta do to get you to want my body?" she asks in "Get Naked." "Won't you warm up to me, baby? I can make you feel hot, hot, hot," she sings in "Break the Ice.")

Heck, even the title seems like a joke, considering the substance abuse allegations, even if her team tries to explain it away as a reference to "blocking out negativity and embracing life fully."

Most of these dance tracks are benign enough, even if they sound like rejects from the Nicole Scherzinger album or the bland backing tracks of some cruise ship diva.

But on "Piece of Me," a Spears protest song of sorts against people's judgments and celebrity culture written by the Swedish duo Bloodshy & Avant, her woe-is-me attitude becomes ridiculous.

She runs through a list of judgments - "Oh my god, that Britney's shameless" and "She's too big, now she's too thin" - that she believes are specific to her, even though judging and getting judged on the basis of looks and actions is unfortunately part of life for everyone, famous or not.