…Baby One More Time

She has a good voice, but for a pop album, there's a lot of boring songs on here. 2/5

I can’t not like this, so I’ll go ahead and dig it. Reputations aren’t at stake. A great opener, ‘Soda Pop’ is fantastic, the whole thing makes me feel good. Fuck it. The beat goes on…

Not a Britney fan. Not a great album either.

Michael Scott loves it, so why shouldn’t I.

Today's album isn't making it easy on me. I mean, I loathe romantic pop. Aside from my disgust I was surprised at the reggae on "Soda Pop". That is maybe the soul interesting cut left on this whole album. It is mathematically crafted to sell the idea of young sexuality...which, I'm 43. so...no thank you.

It was less awful of an experience than I was expecting on the whole. I was maybe a little surprised that the non-hits on the album were more listenable than their more popular counterparts. "I Will Still Love You" with Don Philip was frankly an 80's ballad. The following track was a super-soft gay dancehall bop. Maybe "Deep In My Heart" is the "best" track on the album.

My life is shorter and incrementally worse but I am wiser for having embarked on this listen. Isn't that just the way of learning.

Aged like milk. I get that Britney was a significant figure of the late 90s and early 00s, but aside from the title track (which holds up quite well) this is forgettable cookie cutter R&B pop which dominated a large portion of the 90s and 00s. It shouldn't be on the list.

Probably THE pop album I think about from my childhood. I find it impossible to separate from nostalgia but I'll say it, it's iconic.

I've tried to be open-minded in this whole 1001 thing. That was rewarded with discovering that pop artists like Madonna and Christina Aguilera weren't as bad as I thought. But this one - yeah, it's as bad as I thought. Her singing style makes me cringe - she sounds like she's trying to be sexy, but just...no. The music is cheesy formulaic pop. Absolutely soulless. Yeah, this is awful. So why a 2 rather than a 1? To me, a 1 is absolutely unlistenable. I don't like this, but I could tolerate it (and even had to admit some of the simple, formulaic songs are earworms). So, a 2 feels more appropriate. But barely. Tracks that had some redeeming value: Soda Pop, Born to Make You Happy.

Impossible to overstate how influential Spears was back then. I remember baby one more time being played all over the place and the girls at school singing and mimicking her dance moves. Britney was only barely 17 when this album came out and the adult themes of love that she sings about is... unsettling. Gross, even.

I had no idea what a Britney Spears song sounded like, aside from the big hit on the album. Lots of the album sounds like it could be any late 90s pop artist. Still a nice album that keeps your attention and the Sonny & Cher cover was a fun surprise.

The singles are all classics, the rest of the album is a mixed bag - better than I expected though

The big hits of the time on this album, but also a lot of dross filler, don’t think this needs to be on the list.

...Baby One More Time feels like an album which is capable of doing something good but does it so much that it starts to become not so good. The vocals and guitar segments were solid as well as the lyrics but it does tend to feel like the songs were overusing the same formula at points. A majority of the songs used the same drum beat over and over again and the songs that did deviate from it were some of the worse ones as they could be repetitive in their own way. This album is alright (the songs that use the same formula all were of the title track and that is a good song so it doesn't affect me too bad) but there is no doubt that it can become a repetitive and boring one.
Best Song: ...Baby One More Time
Worst Song: Soda Pop

Holy key change! I was prepared to give this a fair chance; I'm not averse to a bit of bubblegum pop. But beyond the title track and a couple others, the rest is formulaic blandness.

Baby one more time is a huge nostalgia bomb. The rest is forgettable teeny bop pop.

Jesus another iconic album of an awful era. Lotta overlap with the Timberlake album I listened to last round, but this one's way more interesting to think about, even just culturally. Both of those albums were dropped from later editions of the book, but imo they should have kept this one on there. Makes me really sad to listen to, knowing the injustice of what was coming up for her.

Setting aside the paparazzi angle, though, I would have been 7 when this released, and I couldn't stand this music back then. It was interesting to revisit this, having picked up more literacy about what Music was doing during that era. It was cool to be able to detect "oh this is doing shit that Janet Jackson had already worked over 10 years ago." R&B repackaged for white people, there's a much bigger context that this is clearly a component of.

Any case, I didn't really like this. I do like "Toxic" alright, but I never sat down with the album it came from, so idk if the rest of her stuff from that point sounded like that.

I just can't do it. The album looks and sounds purpose built to sexualize her and given what we know now about her entrapment, I just can't get passed it.

I can't not be biased by nostalgia. Britney is my pump-up music these days. As an album it may be too saccharine and not hold up the test of time, but I can't review this album in a vacuum.
It opens very strong with baby one more time, crazy, sometimes, born to make you happy.
Soda pop was surprisingly catchy.

Lydmæssigt er tiden nok løbet lidt fra den her plade, men den er også 25 år gammel 🤯
Vildt produceret og tonesættende for det næste årtis pop musik.
Langt de fleste sange er stadig fine, men det er lige lidt svipsere hist og her.

Kommer aldrig til at høre den her igen fra ende til anden, men ligemeget hvor langt væk jeg flygter, så kommer jeg ikke til at kunne undgå nogle af de her sange.

This album is a mess. But probably by design to get a single out of it matter what. I'd this a decent album? No. Is this an album id listen to again besides the first 2 songs? Also no, but man does it hit a zeitgeist. Plus I'm only giving this a 5 because I know that there are assholes just giving this a 1 because it's brithey and I have to void one out