Britney Spears - In the Zone (CD)

All Music Guide

If 2001's Britney was a transitional album, capturing Ms. Spears at the point when she wasn't a girl, and not yet a woman, her 2003 followup, In The Zone is where she has finally completed that journey and turned into Britney, the Adult Woman. Like her peer Christina Aguilera, Britney equates maturity with transparent sexuality, and the pounding sounds of nightclubs, but since she's not as dirty as Xtina, her spin is a little different. Where Christina comes across like a naturalborn skank, Britney is the girl next door cutting loose at college, drinking and smoking and dancing and sexing just a little too recklessly, since this is the first time she can indulge herself. And that's what In the Zone is Britney indulging herself, desperate to prove that she's an adult. She has been freed from her musical parent, Max Martin, who is absent for the first time from a Britney Spears album, choosing instead to play the field and work with a bunch of different collaborators, including Madonna,... Moby, the Matrix, TrixsterRoy "Royalty" Hamilton, Bloodshy, and Avant, and R Kelly. Since she's so determined to be a woman, not a girl, she has completely shed the sugarcoated big hooks and sappy love songs that drove her stardom, concentrating on music that glides by on mellow grooves, or hits hard with its hiphop beats. It's all clubready, but despite some hints of neoelectro and the Neptunes, it doesn't quite sound modern it sounds like a cut from 1993, or Madonna's Bedtime Stories and Ray of Light. Productionwise, these tracks are not only accomplished, but are much more varied than any of her previous albums in particular, Moby's "Early Mornin'," which has a sleek feel, Mark Taylor's "Breathe on Me" is alluring, and the Bloodshy and Avant productions, "Showdown" and "Toxic," are irresistible ear candy in what is surely her most ambitious, adventurous album to date. - Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide Read more Less