How Old Was Britney Spears Hit Me Baby One More Time
In 1997, Britney Jean Spears was a loftier school freshman agonized to become out of the serenity stretch of Louisiana that bumps upwardly against Mississippi. The well-nigh notable thing about her at the time was one off-Broadway credit and her status as a quondam Mouseketeer. A year later she would go one of the biggest pop stars in the earth, thanks to the force of her debut unmarried, "…Baby One More than Time." Produced by Max Martin — a failed Swedish glam-metal rocker who was making java runs while his mentor, Denniz Pop, was producing "The Sign" and "All That She Wants" for Ace of Base — the song would go on to define early '00s popular music.
Twenty years after its release (on Oct. 23, 1998), we take a deep dive into one of the nigh groundbreaking hits in history.
Jive Records had simply started branching out from its stable of R&B acts (they'd recently signed those Backstreet Boys) when a photo of 15-year-one-time Britney landed at their office.
Barry Weiss, president of Jive Records: Jeff Fenster^ had come into an A&R coming together and shown u.s.a. a picture of this actually pretty young woman on a red and white picnic blanket, nearly like a tablecloth from one of those pocket-sized, local Italian restaurants. It was kind of funny. I think she might take had a domestic dog in the flick as well. Most like Dorothy from Kansas.
Larry Rudolph, an entertainment lawyer and family friend of the Spearses, brought her into Jive for an audition.
Barry Weiss: She was wearing a black cocktail dress and high heels. She sang live for us: Whitney Houston ballads, Mariah Carey, Toni Braxton. She really was a good singer. She looked amazing. She was similar, fifteen years sometime. And nosotros kind of thought, Wow, this is really left of center. At that place'southward no female popular artist out there right now.
John Seabrook, author of The Song Machine: Inside the Hit Manufactory: Clive Calder, who was the head of Jive, signed her to a provisional contract. This was a very significant moment in pop history: The signing of Britney Spears every bit a sort of girl-next-door teenager, rather than equally a Whitney Houston-esque diva. Ane of the calculations at that place was, Clive Calder was notoriously cheap, and Whitney Houston was notoriously expensive. So Britney Spears seemed like she would exist cheap too, considering she was but a teenager from Louisiana, and wasn't enervating in any way.
Star secured, the Jive squad needed, well, music. They turned to Swedish producer-songwriter Max Martin, of Cheiron Studios, who had worked with Ace of Base and co-produced some songs on the Backstreet Boys' self-titled debut anthology.
Barry Weiss: There weren't many U.S. mainstream pop producers that could practise immature artists. The popular at the time was very right downwards the middle. Merely we were looking for edgier, younger-sounding records. Nosotros had an A&R part at Jive in Hilversum, outside Amsterdam. Martin Dodd was our A&R guy, and the Max Martin and Cheiron connection.
Max Martin*: I was in Florida and Jeff [Fenster] asked me to stop past the office in New York to meet this girl while I was in America. She was all dressed up. She was 16. She thought I was a 50-year-erstwhile producer from the old schoolhouse. I had really long hair at the time — I looked like Ozzy Osbourne. It was pretty obvious that she had something, fifty-fifty though she was very quiet and very shy.
Martin went home to Sweden and cranked out a vocal. Simply it wasn't Britney'due south… yet.
Max Martin*: I write on the Dictaphone. I came up with the melody first. I wrote the chorus; you lot just hum information technology in. Thanks to [my co-producer, Rami Yacoub], that song sounds the way it does. He is much more urban and R&B than me. I'm more of a tune man. Then he'south a big reason that the song turned out the mode that it did.
NaNa Hedin, backup vocalizer: I call back that I thought the song was for teenagers but the product was filled with a grown-up attitude and with sounds that I really liked. I was so impressed by how a guy like Max and the other writers could write lyrics that got into the hearts and spoke to teenage thinking. It actually represented [that] whole generation, not them.
Barry Weiss: Martin Dodd had this demo, which was then chosen "Striking Me Baby I More than Time," and he sent information technology into usa and said, "This is a song Max had written for TLC, but they didn't actually want to cut the tape." I think Arista wanted Deborah Cox — she was the heir apparent to Whitney, and Clive Davis was really into her. But Max was non downwards with that… When the song came into u.s.a., we idea, let's cut this with Britney. Let's transport her to Stockholm. The magic that worked with the Backstreet Boys, why wouldn't information technology piece of work again for Britney Spears?
Jive sent Britney to Sweden to record her debut album.
Britney Spears*: I didn't know what to expect. Information technology was my first fourth dimension overseas. They had vi songs, [and] I had a week.
Max Martin*: She was very well prepared. Since "…Baby Ane More Time" was the first vocal, we really didn't know where to take information technology. We only kept on recording. We tried a couple of different styles. Later on a while, I could hear her stomach growl in the microphone. I asked if she was hungry. We'd been going for eight hours. She said, "No, I'm fine." I said, "Let's take a break," and she had three burgers.
John Seabrook: In those days, and maybe this is even so true, Max made all the demos himself. He would sing the dissimilar harmony parts himself, too. Max has an amazing voice, and very few people have ever really heard that demo. I did hear information technology, and Max sounds exactly like Britney, including all the little sounds that sound improvised; the mow-woww sounds. Then Britney ended up sounding exactly similar Max.
Chris Molanphy, chart analyst and pop critic: The reason why information technology remains one of the nearly iconic songs of the 1990s teen pop boomlet is information technology's kind of a perfect marriage of song and creative person and songwriter. If Max Martin is John Hughes, he plant his Molly Ringwald. His muse-vehicle for his item make of writing. Yous tin't picture information technology being sung by anybody else.
Barry Weiss: I remember when nosotros got it dorsum with Britney on it, she had that "oh BAY-BAY BAY-BAY," these ad libs. We thought it was really weird at start. It was strange. Information technology was not the way Max wrote it. Simply it worked! We thought it could be a really good opening salvo for her.
NaNa Hedin: The magic is the attitude. Deep underneath the pop sound it has a sexy rock rebel attitude, from a young schoolgirl and her vox.
There was but one problem: the chorus. Specifically: the "striking me."
John Seabrook: Before the song came out, nobody in America liked the hook, "striking me baby one more than fourth dimension." Everybody thought it was some sort of weird allusion to domestic violence or something. Only what information technology really was was the Swedes using English non exactly correctly. What they actually wanted to say was, "hitting me up on the telephone one more time" or something. But at that point, Max's English wasn't that slap-up. So information technology came out sounding a piddling bit weird in English. Merely when they tried to get him to change information technology, he said, "No, it tin't be changed. That'due south it."
Barry Weiss: I actually changed the lyric. I was concerned near going to U.Due south. radio with a vocal called "Hit Me Infant 1 More Time." I don't know if I'one thousand proud of this or non: I came up with the "…Babe One More than Fourth dimension."
With a lead single locked in, information technology was time to shoot a video.
Barry Weiss: I went immediately to Nigel Dick, the video director. He had done the Backstreet Boys videos "Backstreet'southward Back," [and would later do] "I Want information technology That Way."
Nigel Dick, director, "…Baby 1 More than Time" video: Interestingly, a lot of people I worked with at the time told me I should walk abroad from the project. "She's an unknown girl. She'due south sixteen years sometime. Information technology's candy-floss popular." I'd washed quite a lot of stuff which was a bit more meaty: Oasis, Guns and Roses, apathetic, blah, apathetic. I but thought the vocal was really, really good.
Barry Weiss: Nigel came up with an idea, like, Britney is in outer space. She comes and lands on Mars on a spaceship, and then she breaks into this trip the light fantastic routine. [Editor's note: You may recognize this equally the video treatment for "Oops! …I Did Information technology Over again," which Dick too directed.] I was like, "Wow, this is great!" And Britney looked at this and said, "This is horrible. No way am I doing this. This is really cheesy. Let me get on the telephone with Nigel Dick."
Nigel Dick: She said, "I want to be in a school with a agglomeration of cute boys and do some dancing."
Barry Weiss: Her idea was the whole Grease affair, dancing in the hallway. She gave the kernel of the idea to Nigel, and he came upward with the remainder.
Nigel Dick: Your initial reaction to this is, I'm being told past a 16-twelvemonth-old-girl what I should do… [Only] this girl is sixteen and I'g a grown homo; perhaps she has a better perspective on her audience than I do. And then I swallowed my pride.
John Seabrook: Britney knew better than the adults what people wanted and I think that's also significant, considering I recall the adults began to realize that they didn't necessarily know what the kids wanted anymore.
Nigel Dick: [Shooting] was very easy. There was no real drama. What I did not know at the fourth dimension was that, of class, yous have this feel with the Mickey Mouse Guild. As far as I knew, she was merely a schoolgirl from the South. [Only] she was very relaxed in forepart of the camera. She was very, very drilled with her dance routine. I've worked with her four times, and I've all the same to work with somebody who puts in as much preparation, and was equally eager to rehearse, as she was.
Every clothing in the video was purchased at K-Mart and cost less than $17. An inauspicious beginning for what would go a famous (or infamous, depending on your point of view) outfit for the underage performer.
Nigel Dick: I don't have kids, so my understanding of what teenagers wore was express to driving home from the office and seeing kids continuing past a bus stop. So I suggested they would be wearing jeans and t-shirts and sneakers and would have backpacks, and Britney said, "Well, shouldn't I be wearing a schoolgirl outfit?" And I was very dubious about this idea. Simply I was overruled.
Chris Molanphy: I tin can't prove this, but, the fact that all female teen pop stars for the next roughly three years had to shoot a video with their omphalos bared — Britney made that look iconic.
Vanessa Grigoriadis, reporter, "The Tragedy of Britney Spears": She said to Rolling Stone, "All I did was tie up my shirt. I didn't do anything." And this has ever been the question with Britney: Does she know what she's doing? Information technology was very much on the edge of what was adequate then.
Nigel Dick: Certainly, my initial reaction was, "Are you lot sure we should be going downwards this route with this immature lady?" And the people who were in control, the record label and whatnot, said yes, this is the route nosotros want to have.
Britney Spears**: There are so many other teenagers out there that dress more provocatively than I do and no ane says anything about them. How can I explain this? I don't see myself — mitt on the Bible — I know I'm non ugly, but I don't see myself as a sexual practice symbol or this goddess-attractive-beautiful person at all. When I'grand on stage, that's my fourth dimension to do my thing and get there and be that — and it's fun. It's exhilarating just to be something that you're not. And people tend to believe it.
Nigel Dick: I was kind of aware that some people might feel that that was exploitative. And equally it turned out, I got a huge amount of grief about it once the video came out.
John Ivey, President of CHR Programming for iHeartMedia: I was programming Osculation 108 in Boston, so Jack Fader [head of record promotions at Jive] brought her into the station. Here she comes in, little kid, no makeup. You can tell how young she is. But very wise, already. They had only gotten the final edit of the video [on] VHS. We went into this role and I'yard sitting there watching it with her, and I'g looking at her, and looking at the video, similar, hey, what'due south going on here? It showed what was going to happen very speedily. When you see information technology you're like, omigosh, this whole schoolgirl affair, information technology's a footling sexy. But then I'yard sitting here and she's really little, she's got no makeup on, she'due south but a piddling kid.
Vanessa Grigoriadis: When I was reporting this commodity, a lot of people said Britney wanted to be sexy. And the people who are managing her, all the guys who were so involved in her image, they were trying to make her wait less slutty, basically, was the word somebody used to me. And she wanted to push the boundaries. I think that it'due south impossible to know if information technology's actually true.
Britney Spears**: I guess it's considering I do have a younger audience that, you know, parents worry nigh the role model thing…. Simply when I was younger, I looked upwardly to people, simply I never wanted to be them. I always had my own identity. I'thousand an entertainer when I'm on phase…and they need to explain that to their kids. That'south not my chore to exercise that.
"…Baby One More Time" was released on October 23, 1998. It debuted on the Billboard Hot 100 less than a month later and spent 32 weeks on the charts.
Barry Weiss: Nosotros had her a on a mall tour, handing out cassette singles, in the summer and the fall. The video came out pretty simultaneous with the vocal. It was but an accented explosion… Past November information technology was just a worldwide miracle.
John Ivey: Nosotros felt like it was a hit. There'southward sometimes you get records, [and you think], I want to play it every bit presently as I tin. I know I wasn't the simply person that felt like that. Nigh of the fourth dimension, for a record like that, I said, I'll first information technology out at nighttime, run into what the kids think, and see what happens earlier we spread information technology out to the solar day. And obviously information technology became a big monster hitting.
The video came out only as MTV combined ii existing programs ("MTV Live" and "Total Request") into the new, Carson Daly-hosted, soon-to-be-pop-phenomenon "Total Asking Live."
Chris Molanphy: I'k sure if y'all were 40 and wanted to telephone call TRL, you could. But no one over 20 was calling TRL. So it was this mainline, hooked to your veins, of what teenagers were well-nigh obsessed with. And it was either the stuff that fabricated them experience like a hard badass or the stuff that made them swoon. And Britney arrived just as this is showtime. The way she was presented as this schoolgirl gone bad, it had a combination of Swedish pure popular crossed with a piddling frisson of border. It could non accept been more than perfect for the era of TRL.
John Seabrook: MTV had, up to that point, tried to resist mainstream pop, because they wanted to be perceived every bit cool… But I think with Britney, and the video in particular, and the fact that TRL had launched at around the same fourth dimension, it really changed MTV.
John Ivey: Britney had the second level. People saw this video and idea, what is this daughter? Because everybody latched onto this immediately. It wasn't very long after that, she was on Rolling Stone .
Britney Spears Baby One More Fourth dimension video screen grab Credit: Britney Spears Vevo
"…Baby One More than Fourth dimension" didn't only launch Britney'southward career: Information technology kicked off the teen pop smash of the late '90s, immigration the way for a fleet of Britney also-rans and male child bands to boss TRL and the airwaves pretty much until teenagers stopped watching TRL and listening to the radio. Information technology too was the breakout moment for Max Martin, who went on to become one of the near successful, influential popular producers in modern history, and all the Swedish producers who followed.
Barry Weiss: What it was like was worldwide domination. And the differential with "…Baby Ane More than Time" and why information technology was such a cataclysmic event, it was the reemergence of pop music.
John Ivey: Information technology would be in the summit percentile of singles in the past 25 years. Considering it broke her as an artist and what she became. Information technology'due south like Madonna's "Like a Virgin," or Prince's "Allow's Go Crazy." Information technology'southward the song that made her Britney Spears.
John Seabrook: It was instrumental in putting Cheiron and Max and Sweden on the map. Other Swedish songmakers got the idea that they didn't merely accept to write for Swedes or mayhap Brits; they could write for Americans and really tap into that huge marketplace.
Barry Weiss: I mean look, was she involved with writing those songs? Max Martin is a genius, okay? He's brilliant. He tailor-made those records for her. But she would never have had the career without her vision. She has this innate ability to move the media.
Joe Levy, Rolling Stoneeditor: The public perception is that this is all created, that the tape company created this — the artist, the music, the image. I accept to tell you, if the record company could have created more one Britney Spears, they would take done information technology, and they tried! And people, Mandy Moore is an actress.
John Ivey: There were a yard Britney Spears wannabes.
Joe Levy: Britney Spears is someone who, from the fourth dimension she was a child, wanted to exist a star. The bulldoze, the conclusion, the ambition — you lot have to give this woman the same sort of respect that Justin Timberlake gets. Otherwise, I'm lamentable, merely you're engaging in a double standard.
20 years later, "…Infant One More Time" sounds as sharp as information technology ever did: Sultry, catchy as hell, both totally of its fourth dimension and like something that could have been released this morning.
John Seabrook: I think the melody is eternal, or at to the lowest degree, transcends its tardily '90s period. And I think the words, the beginning time you hear it, it's always going to be something that makes you get, what? Tin I say that? Tin I sing along with that?
Barry Weiss: It sounds as good now as it did and then. It hasn't weathered or dated.
Chris Molanphy: The fashion the song is structured, how the chorus goes to this chorus of voices — the song is structured to deliver maximum pleasure.
John Ivey: At that place's some songs that simply have a timeless feel. I imagine if you said, "Sing a Britney Spears vocal to me," that'southward the one people would sing the hook to. That's what'south ingrained into your heed as what she is. And the thing is, when you look at her, she however looks the same. I mean, she's older, but you still meet the same kid there… When y'all await at Brit, you yet see her. You notwithstanding see the same girl. And yous know, information technology's one of those things, I always have the feeling likewise that people root for her.
Source: https://ew.com/music/2018/10/23/baby-one-more-time-britney-spears-oral-history/
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