Britney Jean

Britney Spears released her eight-studio album, Britney Jean, on November 29, 2013. The project contains 13 tracks.

This is the different intro I’ve heard in all of her projects: this dream pop beautiful thing? Wow okay this introduction is promising it’s not a known banger but it’s slow and decently put. It’s being set to be a bad b*tch reflective album and it gets into sad b*tch hours as well during the whole project run.

Quite the interesting transitions and sound choices, like super hard chorus beats this isn’t dance pop this is full electronic now. Also almost mid-album and it seems something made for a club – where’s the story, the diversity, it almost feels like they were targeting something way too much and got lost in the middle of it. Almost all of the tracks start so promising but the transitions, the fading and the sound placements compromise almost all of them.

First listen brings a final score of 56/100 and, as standout tracks, there is Alien and Work B**ch.

...Baby One More Time

Britney Spears released her debut studio album, …Baby One More Time, on January 21, 1999. The project contains 14 tracks.

So, this album starts with a banger – one of the most known tracks Britney has released, and it sets quite an interesting vibrant tone to the project. However, going through it can be way more surprising that a few might expect.

There are a few instrumental repetitions, similar melodies, and approaches on multiple tracks, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing but it’s a bit too noticeable here.

Maybe the problem overall it’s not feeling dated because it’s pretty old, but it seems like a lot of elements are out of place or put in a rush, it seems like there was a lot of genre experimentation here as well but yet it all seems safe, it would be interesting if the album went crazy experimental since it’s the debut. It seems so bland at multiple moments and quite underwhelming honestly.

It shows the potential of the singer to make catchy songs, catchy bridges and vocal plays as well (doesn’t always work the best but she does them and it brings versatility in a way) and since it’s the debut this clearly leaves a lot of room for improvement.

The first listen brings a final score of 58/100 and, as standout tracks, there is …Baby One More Time, (You Drive Me) Crazy and Sometimes.

Oops!...I Did It Again

Britney Spears released her sophomore studio album, Oops!... I Did It Again, on May 21, 2000. The project contains 12 tracks.

This album started, just like the debut, with a banger, another of the very known Britney songs, quite timeless actually. In the beginning the album seems to be somewhat darker, bolder, with an empowerment and sassy quality to it, quite different from the debut.

However, this quickly changes on the course of the album, where it gets very bright with the dreamy production, similar choices already heard and also a very similar approach to the first project also. But, interestingly enough, this project feels a lot more focused, not so much all over the place trying to see what fits, and it approaches what can be seen as a cohesive album.

The gem of this album belongs to the few moments where we see a proper build and a chorus with vocal layering that doesn’t sound rush or messy or misplaced – again, it seems to aim for the cohesiveness of the whole.

But there are still some sound repetitions with the debut, and even with feeling looser overall and more determined, it still lacks and underperforms where it seems they got a bit safe on the artistic choices and overall making of the tracks.

The first listen brings a final score of 67/100 and, as standout tracks, there is Oops!... I Did It Again, Stronger and Don’t Let Me Be the Last to Know.

Circus

Britney Spears released her sixth studio album, Circus, on November 28, 2008. The project contains 15 tracks.

This album opens with a banger – a common denominator on Britney’s albums. It seems that dance pop is getting disco and electronic vibes to it, you can see this intention peeking through at times.

Also, it’s slow to show diversity most likely but it seems too forced, too rushed and not as smart or as thought as we already seen before.

The artistry seems a little bit faded on this project, it gets so messy and out of place this time, maybe If it were a bit shorter it could have a better sound story to tell? Who knows, but like this it seems a lot of things at once: some aspects do work in an interesting way, but some do miss the mark.

First listen brings a final score of 68/100 and, as standout tracks, there is Womanizer, Circus, If U Seek Amy and Radar.

Femme Fatale

Britney Spears released her seventh studio album, Femme Fatale, on March 25, 2011. The project contains 16 tracks.

Not only starts with a banger of a song but with dance pop mixed with edm which sets the tone of the album to be just that which makes you think it’s taking the approach of her last album.

It is extremely dance pop and focuses a lot on what can be seen as the commercial aspect of music, with too many repetitive beats and a safe radio friendly approach of sound.

It’s very bubble-gum too at times which is not ideal and makes the artistry lack a little bit as well. This feels like we are going back it’s so bland, similar sounds, not amusing placements, almost equally sonic tracks.

The ending portion of the project however is so promising, and it leaves to wish there was much more of that during the entire album.

The first listen brings a final score of 70/100 and, as standout tracks, there is Till the World Ends, Hold It Against Me, I Wanna Go and Criminal.

Glory

Britney Spears released her ninth studio album, Glory, on August 26, 2016. The project contains 17 tracks.

It’s her longest album to date It opens with a very dreamy track just like in Britney Jean – and yet again it sets potential to a very conceptual sound story on the album.

First feature is okay, it’s going to have a sexual connotation, but it seems more toned back on the instrumentals. Her voice seems different, altered for sure, but also the technique, more baby-like just like when she first started – leaving dance pop and going for dream pop, slow and commercial-ish too.

The electronic addition on the vocals can be a little bit too much at times, the alteration, but it’s smoother than a lot of her previous stuff as well. The whole cohesiveness seems way better already even if dreamy pop meets dance pop, not too many elements fighting for attention are making the songs work so beautifully. The Tinashe feature is one of her best features; they both dominated the song and made it what it is, a banger.

First listen brings a final score of 74/100 and, as standout tracks, there is Invitation, Just Luv Me, Do You Wanna Come Over, Slumber Party, Love Me Down, Change Your Mind and If I’m Dancing.

Britney

Britney Spears released her third studio album, Britney, on November 21, 2001. The project contains 15 tracks.

Starting the albums with a banger seems to be the main thing here – and this is such a banger. Being that said, this project took a huge run for the neck of people who doubted Britney as an artist.

The dark route seems to be intensifying, pop infused with rock instruments There’s a lot more drama in here, more simple effects at certain times, it’s quite surprising actually. It doesn’t seem as childish anymore, more mature, even more cohesive, and more purposefully made – a huge jump from the first two albums by a mile.

Very tiny aspects are still present from the other two albums but it’s not as impactful now as the new artistic approaches shine a lot more and help blending those small moments way better.

The first listen brings a final score of 74/100 and, as standout tracks, there is I’m A Slave 4 U, Overprotected, Lonely, I Run Away and Before the Goodbye

Blackout

Britney Spears released her fifth studio album, Blackout, on October 25, 2007. The project contains 14 tracks.

We open with a sexy sultry banger that defines the mood of the album to be the continuation of in the zone in terms of emancipation, sexuality, and freedom of speech – also one of her most known songs and until this day it’s a banger.

The instrumental cohesiveness seems even more thoughtful here, but crazy far from the sounds she started with, instead this is darker, bolder, sultrier, powerful. It’s being so heavy, what a difference, much intense, straightforward, adding little elements here and there, the build ups are fantastic as well.

Maybe starting with all those bangers isn’t a good idea in this project specially. It can create the hell of a hype that can fade. Towards the end it seems like the sounds from the beginning are returning more – it blended weirdly with a lot of edm sounds, it’s dance pop but some elements weren’t really necessary to make the songs.

What makes this project not even greater is the sound placement, the clear two types of approach divided that compromised the whole cohesive aspect of the album, even tho it’s one of her best projects.

First listen brings a final score of 75/100 and, as standout tracks, there is Gimme More, Piece of Me, Radar, Break the Ice and Perfect Lover.

In The Zone

Britney Spears released her fourth studio album, In The Zone, on November 10, 2003. The project contains 12 tracks.

It starts with a bang one of her best collaborations – interesting, it starts with the losing control message, facing the music, facing the public. She started to show herself on the previous project, so this is the continuing of her personality and hopefully it builds from there.

This project took my heart during its course, island vibes inspiring instrumental with arabic sounds but not as cliché as before. The sassiness is increasing even more on this project, it feels mature, conscient and actually even bolder.

It seems way more cohesive even if with similar sounds, it’s not so crazy experimental as the previous works, it seems to aim more for a sensual, grown woman expressing herself, and honestly that’s great – the overall sound transition that drives you insane of how much emancipation this album screams is amazing.

The sounds play between softer and harder songs, inside the instrumentals chosen, so it offers a bit of variety but doesn’t kill the cohesiveness and it ends perfectly.

The first listen brings a final score of 78/100 and, as standout tracks, there is Me Against the Music, Breathe on Me, Toxic, Touch of My Hand, Shadow and Everytime.

Overall score

Had listened to the discography it’s safe to say this was a hell of a ride. Britney Spears is heavily known for her catchy singles since the beginning and for someone who didn’t adventure through her catalogue, album-wise, there are a lot of mixed feelings.

The projects seem, as a personal opinion, to fight each other, where there is this initial rise, from the artist who is being presented to the public to the artist that Britney wants to be, but then a lot of push backs are felt as the years progress and the projects get released.

Britney is an artist, every single project proves it, even if the album doesn’t work as it could, you can get little elements that show she is passionate, she has intention, delivery and honestly a lot of smart thinking at times.

The projects mostly lack due to the heavy experimentation, being this an approach to see what it sticks or an approach to something very little that will be pleasing to a very few number of people only. There is an ongoing problem with cohesiveness when it comes to her albums, and it would be amazing to see a more revamped In the Zone and even Blackout sound, where so much was promising there, and one could just imagine the development of that.

Nonetheless, Britney did get her name by right in the industry, and her whole discography has many more layers than most people might think, it’s very interesting to see the whole progress of her albums but also how deep she got, how raw and emotional she delivered at times too.

The Fame

This a pretty great debut album. It’s incredibly catchy with super interesting melodies and plays on the considered pop genre. The transitions in the tracks are super interesting, somewhat simplistic but impactful and little gems are here and there really to bring up what might be portrayed as simple production.

The Fame can be considered a very essential pop album, if someone wants to get an idea of what that is, and of course the genre has evolved over the years but this project states a perfect example of the pop essential feeling music with a little touch of exploration, just to spice it up.

Gaga’s artistic choices make the album go flat sometimes however, it doesn’t make it bad but it just rises expectations and deflates them a little during the album’s course, what might be something that can turn off some listeners.

The first listen brings a final score of 79/100 and, as standout tracks there is Just Dance, Love Game, Poker Face and Disco Heaven.

The Fame Monster

In this project some tracks are the same as her debut album, The Fame, so you can focus a lot more on the called new tracks here. What happens here is that the momentum created with her debut album actually starts to sky rock in here, the additional tracks bring so much flavour into the project, complexity and straight forward lyricism that is well supported by the heavy and loud productions.

It might seem this project approaches more the commercial pop type of songs, where the artistic presence of Gaga is still very shown but from start to finish it does lean you to think it’s slown down on purpose: to fulfil the commercial radio purpose, which actually fits into what she talks about in The Fame following to The Fame Monster.

The first listen brings a final score of 81/100 and, as standout tracks, there is Bad Romance, Alejandro, Speechless, Telephone and Paparazzi.

Born This Way

This has to be one of the best sophomore albuns that came out in the 2010’s. What was present in The Fame Monster, as potential starting to skyrocket, completely got wings in this project.

Born This Way marks the first artistic peak of Gaga’s music, where all the intention, all the emotions came out so beautifully in the song arrangements, the vocal layering, the combining of voice and sounds to lift it or put it down if intentional.

It also seems like this project does define a little bit what you think a standard pop song sounds like: in here the lyrical content is incredibly strong, incredibly direct and it does seem like she waited for a momentum to completely go mad – In the sense of addressing a lot of identity issues while singing catchy pop songs, with reduced verses and a lot of sonic transitions.

This is the project that if you don’t identify with the lyrical content you might not feel attached to it, which is not entirely an album flaw, but it’s something caused by the artistic choices Gaga makes here.

The first listen brings a final score of 86/100 and, as standout tracks, there is Born this Way, Judas, You and I and The Edge of Glory.

ARTPOP

It’s safe to say that as this point there was a lot of expectation on what ARTPOP would sound like, specially after Born This Way got to be so huge and brought a lot of momentum into what Gaga’s going to create.

This project feels a lot like a continuation of the artistic approach that started on the sophomore album; this one intends to bring yet a new artistic inspiration, a continuation of a free sound and a free-type message in the song lyrics.

The problem with this project is that where it gains a lot of artistic expression and poetic value, it loses in cohesiveness and in logic from start to finish. This isn’t at all a bad project but it could had a lot of refinement on the song structures, the transitions, the extreme pushing of the sounds.

The first listen brings a final score of 76/100 and, as standout tracks, there is ARTPOP, Dope and Applause.

Joanne

This project is the one that does show you how versatile Gaga is when we talk about music. Joanne is the strip down, personal, and raw version of the singer and this can be considered the essential album if you wanna know Gaga as a person.

What is surprising about this project is that it gets progressively better while you’re listening to it. The somewhat more simple musical approach, more acoustic-ish intended to make you pay a lot more attention to her lyrics shows you a huge mature sound, not only for her vocals but for the whole lyrical content as well, it’s not only personal but it is mature, it is healing from something in the past and it has a lot of structure to it.

This might not be the best album to me personally but I think it’s the more cohesive Gaga has released so far: it’s incredible when you let yourself go for it, how much it grabs you and even tho you’re not all over the place dancing you’re vibing.

The first listen brings a final score of 81/100 and, as standout tracks, there is Joanne, Million Reasons, Hey Girl and Angel Down.

A Star is Born Sountrack

A Star is Born is Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper’s album to tie with the film that has the same name, released on October 5, 2018. The project contains 28 musical tracks.

Being a soundtrack, you already expect that the following of the songs should obey to the order they come up on the movie – that can be either good or bad.

The main feeling this project gives in firstly is the vocal range of Gaga, not that we didn’t knew, but it’s an amazing refresher of what she can pull off. The genre exploration is also super present in here as the singer shows again that she can be versatile inside the pop genre, without having to fall all the time to what you can call generic or prefabricated music to please the commercial audience.

Concept-wise the soundtrack works quite nicely even if you don’t watch the movie, the song segments are somewhat disperse at a few moments but they also can balance each other with the whole genres that are present here, it’s not a straight division but a very interesting blend.

The first listen brings a final score of 82/100 and, as standout tracks, there is Shallow, Always Remember Us This Way and I’ll Never Love Again.

Chromatica

Going into this project is a huge wild ride – first point to shoutout are the interludes in here, the interludes are fantastic and beautifully arranged on instrument combinations.

Having that said, the sound transitions they are presenting aren’t always delivered by the rest of the tracks, it does work, but sometimes it sounds a little bit forced, it shows the different directions on the album but some songs sound so different from what the interlude actually is setting up.

This project is a very Born This Way meets ARTPOP with artistic poetic value blending with inspiring production, somehow deep lyrics, and wholesome messages.

The instrumental transitions seem a bit rushed sometimes, you wish it would be smoother at some moments – these loops get way too repetitive sometimes, they are great for specific moments in the tracks but making them longer turns the song a bit flat.

The lyrical content is beautiful and very inspiring, storytelling and super empowering; what becomes underwhelming when you put it into a lot of the production choices made here. When it’s too much it seems like the whole integrity gets lost and her vocals are not enough to save the songs.

The first listen brings a final score of 77/100 and, as standout tracks there is Alice, Fun Tonight and Sine from Above.

Overall score

Had listening to the discography it’s safe to say Lady Gaga is a pretty complete artist with amazing vocal delivery that got even better over the years, a lot of empowering lyrics and intentions on making music.

What makes the projects lack are always due to her artistic choices that might put extremes sometimes, vocal-wise or instrumental-wise, but it shows at the same time that she’s not trying to be what commercial pop probably wants her to be and yes the momentum singer: the mood is specific for each project, and even if temporary, it’s showing what she is intended at a certain time.

I would like to see however explorations of her artistic expression because it works so well sometimes and it’s so interesting to think how could she actually reflect on that, the components being balanced so it doesn’t ruin the experience at stages but without compromising her artistry at the same time.