On the Curious Similarities Between Britney Spears and James Brown

I may be mishearing this, but then there's a long and noble history of misheard lyrics in popular music. I'm finally listening closely to "Womanizer" by Britney Spears. I don't know whether I should be embarrassed by that or not. I suppose as a popular music scholar, I should be embarrassed that I hadn't really heard this song until today. But the small part of me that's still a jazz-and-classic-rock snob is shocked to even be admitting to listening to this song ever. But I'm trying to catch up on all of those end-of-year lists and so forth, so I figured I should give this track a serious listen.

Anyway, the song is fine. And I'm so out of the loop on the Britney comeback/crash stories that I'm not sure which part of the cycle we're in right now. So I'll limit my comments to one of the lyrics on "Womanizer." Britney is taunting this guy, saying she won't get with him because she knows that he's a womanizer. And then she says, "You say I'm crazy/ I got your crazy." Which is really cool, at least in the way that I'm reading it. It's like, "Oh yeah? I don't care what the tabloids say. You think I'm crazy? I got your crazy right here, mister. Come a little bit closer." And then POW!!! She smacks that no-good womanizer.

However, I may be wrong on my interpretation of the lyric. In fact, I may be repeating a similar mistake. One of my favorite songs by James Brown (who went to the great big funk show in the sky almost exactly three years ago) is "The Big Payback." And my favorite line in that song is "I don't know karate/but I know ca-razy!" It's actually the same kind of sentiment that Britney's song is putting out there. It's like, "I might not know karate, I might not make it neat and clean, but if you cross me, I will mess you up big time, I will go crazy on your ass." Except I've also heard this transcribed as "karazor" or something instead of "ca-razy." And karazor, according to various interpretations I've seen on that most prestigious of sources (the internet), is either some sexual technique (really--I researched the controversy surrounding this misheard lyric a few years ago) or just JB's way of saying "razor." Meaning he's going to cut you with a razor. A similar sentiment to my interpretation, I guess, though certainly more explicit about the kind of violence intended.

But there's a similar sort of ambiguity happening with "Womanizer," too. Indeed, some of the lyrics websites have a slightly different hearing of Britney's lyrics, putting it as "I got you, crazy" instead of "I got your crazy." Which changes the meaning completely. But I think my interpretation is right, because Britney's vocal accent is clearly on "got" which only really makes sense if the lyric is "I got your crazy." If it was "you" and not "your," the vocal accent would be on the "you," since that's the most important element in the phrase. "I've got you, crazy." Just like that other song by James Brown: "So good, so good, I got you."

So you've got to hand it to Britney. If she can make me think of James Brown twice in one discussion of a rather unremarkable pop song, she's got something going for her.

Three times, actually. For, as somebody once said, "Hit me, baby, one more time." And as somebody else once said, "Hit it and quit it!"