Music video: Britney Spears - Hold it against me

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With that intro, I thought I was watching "Oops...I did it again" 2011!

Everything was spot on with this video, except for...yup, you guessed it: Britney's dancing. Brian Friedman should be shot for talking up the choreography the way he was. Then again, he was never going to put it on blast that Britney's Onyx hotel tour swagger was dead and gone. The dancing here was no better than it was in the "3" video. In fact, I think the dancing in "3" was better, because we got shots of Britney dancing which lasted more than 2 seconds. Every one of the dance sequences in this video got handled by a China man with a meat cleaver: chopped to f**k.

The strength of the visuals is what compensates for the lack of Britney being on her A-game with the dancing. In fact, the visuals of this video are what absolutely make it. The sets, the lighting, Britney goin' Tekken 6 on her own arse, the wardrobe, the new edit of the song, even the weaves were all on-point. The only mis-step was with Britney's (lack of) dancing. I can't even defend it by saying that "Hold it against me" is not a typically structured song to go all out to with a routine; because there are hundreds of fan choreographed videos on YouTube of hot, fast paced routines to the song. But as much as I wanted to see a bitch make like Bayonetta, pussy pop, weave thrash and work her waist with some wild animal on her head - the dancing didn't break the deal here, as it did in the cases of "Circus" and "3". Better dancing from Britney would have made this video better and restored some faith that she still has it. But even with her whack dance steps, the video wasn't a complete failure because of the strength of the visuals.

Britney did not hold up her end of the bargain with the dancing. But Jonas Akerland sure as hell worked his money's worth with the visuals, and put forth what is quite possibly one of Britney's better videos. The setup of Britney int he white dress reminded me quite a bit of Ayumi Hamasaki's "Real me" video, with a bit of Hikaru Utada's "Passion" thrown in.