Britney Spears' - Hold It Against Me's release
Thirteen years after her debut single, “...Baby One More Time,” hit No. 1, Britney Spears released “Hold It Against Me.”
The single would debut at No. 1 in the Billboard’s Hot 100, making Spears only the second artist in the history of that chart to have multiple singles debut at in the top spot.
“Hold It Against Me” soared to No. 1 on Jan. 29, 2011 — 15 years ago next Thursday.
The Making of The Single
What would become the lead single off Britney Spears’ seventh studio album, “Hold It Against Me,” was written and produced by three producers and a lyricist:
- Max Martin, who had written several of Spears’ earlier hits.
- Dr. Luke: Łukasz Gottwald, who had produced hits for Kesha and Katy Perry.
- Billboard: Canadian producer and songwriter Mathieu Jomphe-Lepine.
- Bonnie McKee, who had also written for Katy Perry.
McKee’s lyrics were inspired by Perry, but her co-writers felt the song wasn’t right for her. McKee agreed the lyrics were, indeed, a good fit for Spears. “Britney Spears is just all sex, all day,” McKee said. “It’s like, how many sexual innuendos can I come up with?”
On its first day of release, “Hold It Against Me” scored the highest number of U.S. radio plays in a single day, racking up 619 plays on Mediabase and 595 on the Nielsen Broadcast Data System. Digitally, the song set sales records by selling 411,000 downloads in its first week.
“Hold It Against Me” was the first of four singles released from Spears’ “Femme Fatale” album, which would be released in March 2011.
“Hold It Against Me” debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100, making Spears the second artist to do that a second time. Mariah Carey had debuted at No. 1 with “Fantasy” and “One Sweet Day” in 1995 and “Honey” in 1997.
A video for the track, produced by Jonas Åkerlund — who had worked on Madonna’s “Ray of Light” and “Telephone” by Lady Gaga and Beyoncé — was released on Feb. 6. The video was a hit among consumers but critics for Time magazine and the Washington Post complained that Spears was shown applying her own brand of makeup, turning the pop music video into an infomercial.
About the only ones who held the success of this song against Spears was country music duo the Bellamy Brothers, whose “If I Said You Had a Beautiful Body, Would You Hold It Against Me?” had been a No. 1 country music hit in 1979 and had peaked at No. 39 on the Hot 100.
“We feel completely ripped off,” David Bellamy complained. “Hey, Brit, if I said you ripped off our song, would you hold it against me?” Howard Bellamy asked. Never mind the fact that Howard had told an interviewer in 2007 that he had borrowed that line from Groucho Marx.
Spears’ team sued the Bellamys for defamation and libel. The suit was dropped after Howard and David apologized.
Britney Spears' Chart History
