(Gottwald, Kelly, Levin)
Album: Circus – Single / Circus
The follow-up to “Womanizer” delivered one of her strongest one-two punches in her discography. “Circus” makes it clear from its onset why it became the album’s brand-defining title track: “There’s only two types of people in the world/The ones that entertain, and the ones that observe/Well baby I’m a put-on-a-show kinda girl/Don’t like the backseat, gotta be first.” The electropop stomper oozes confidence and puts Spears at the helm of the mania that surrounds her. Fittingly, it serves as the opener to her acclaimed worldwide The Circus Starring Britney Spears tour with Spears the Ringleader descending from the ceiling to the stage as the song builds. An impressively cinematic video (with some of Spears’s best post-2007 choreography) was a VMA favorite and established the album’s theme. Whereas “Womanizer” harkens back to the synth-heavy production of the Blackout era, “Circus” marks a clear departure with a song that would never have made sense on her previous album. It remarkably marked the first time in Spears’s discography where she nabbed two top 10 hits in a row (a feat she would surpass in her next era with three), and the first time where Spears had two singles simultaneously in the top 10. Britney was back with a vengeance.
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