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Pharrell Williams · S3 E5
I'm a Slave 4 U
Pharrell rewrites Britney Spears and rewires pop music
2001 MTV Video Music Awards, Metropolitan Opera House, New York. Britney Spears walks onstage with a seven-foot Burmese python draped around her neck, dancing to a beat made by two guys from Virginia Beach.
Britney Spears, I'm a Slave 4 U (2001). The moment Britney sheds her teen-pop skin entirely. Neptunes production, a completely new sound, and the most radical reinvention in pop since Madonna.
I'm a Slave 4 U, Britney Spears (2001)
The production is built on a slithering, hypnotic bass line and a breathy vocal loop that sounds closer to a Neptunes hip-hop track than anything on "...Baby One More Time." There are no power choruses, no soaring melodies, no Max Martin hooks. Instead, the song pulses and breathes: minimal drums, humid synths, and Britney's voice treated as texture rather than showcase.
A New Britney
By 2001, Britney Spears has sold over 30 million records on the back of Max Martin's Swedish bubblegum pop. She is 19 years old and tells Jive Records she wants something completely different: darker, funkier, grown-up. The label connects her with The Neptunes, and two worlds that couldn't be further apart suddenly fit together perfectly.
TAP TO REVEAL: Who was "I'm a Slave 4 U" originally written for?
Metropolitan Opera House, Lincoln Center, New York City
The venue where Britney performed "I'm a Slave 4 U" with a live Burmese python at the 2001 MTV VMAs, in what became one of the most memorable live television moments of the decade.
Boys (The Co-Ed Remix), Britney Spears ft. Pharrell Williams
Another Neptunes production from the "Britney" album. Where "I'm a Slave 4 U" is slow and hypnotic, "Boys" is punchy and playful, built on a bouncing bass line and Pharrell's staccato drums. It was later remixed for the "Austin Powers in Goldmember" soundtrack.
What chart position did "I'm a Slave 4 U" reach on the Billboard Hot 100?
Pharrell is the hottest producer in the world, but making beats for other artists is not enough. He wants his own band, and what he builds next will confuse everyone who thinks they have The Neptunes figured out.
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