Click to listen to Britney Spears' "Hold It Against Me"

"Hold it Against Me" is prime Britney, packed with aggressive electro jitters, a Euro-cheese riff that's strangely close to AC/DC's "Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap," and a weird breakdown where Brit moans, blows kisses, and snaps her gum. The first single from her upcoming seventh album, the song (co-produced by Max Martin and Dr. Luke) recalls the synth-gloom ambience of Britney's 2007 gem, Blackout, possibly the most influential pop album of the last five years. The lyrics head toward Austin Powers/Benny Hill territory: "If I said I want your body now/ Would you hold it against me?" It isn't hard to hear a tinge of desperation in Brit's digitally processed growl, especially in the line "You feel like paradise and I need a vacation tonight." But even so, "Hold it Against Me" promises great things for her album, aside from the overall jaw-drop factor that Britney has hung in there to make a seventh album at all.

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“Is It True”

As the British Invasion reached its peak in 1964, Brenda Lee went from Nashville to London to record one of her hardest-rocking hits, her perky vocal backed by a stuttering, squalling guitar. That guitar was played by session musician Jimmy Page, yet to skyrocket to fame with first the Yardbirds and then Led Zeppelin. "She said to me, 'I've come here to make a record with the British sound,'" remembered producer Mickie Most. "She felt she wouldn't get the same sound in Nashville because they're only just catching up on the British beat group sound of about six months ago."