If she had just led a normal, carefully-maintained, immaculately presented celebrity life, her fame and the huge amount of media and public interest in her would gradually have tailed off. But by "going off the rails" in the past and having had this recent spate of personal disasters, she's garnered MASSIVE media attention (negative) then she's been able to bounce back and amaze everybody and gain even more media attention (positive).

Her profile becomes a little higher with each bounce, and THIS time (assuming the music's good, and I can't see how it won't be) her album and tour will eclipse everything else in showbiz.

But what kind of comeback do we want for her? More of the same? Would that be all anyone has a right to expect? Or should we look for something more, something that would have the effect of adding substance to the legend - something that would force observers from outside of her fanbase to admit "Well yeah, she IS good, actually...."

I have always said "She's a dual-purpose artist - a great singer in the studio and a great showgirl on stage" and I also said "Most of us will only ever see her once in a live show at the very most, but we'll hear her records hundreds of times and isn't it better THIS way than having somebody who's a great live singer but dull as dishwater on CD".

But if we're fans of the girl, we would obviously want to be able to stand her up against all of the competition and be proud of her in EVERY respect. So it would be great if she could INCREASE the amount of live singing in her shows (1) To satisfy fans who love live singing and have doubts about her because she apparently can't do it; and (2) To increase her credibility as an artist in general.

I do think we've entered an era where fans EXPECT more live singing and don't care so much about fully choreographed acts. Most big-name solo artists have figured out ways to create a sense of constant on-stage spectacle WITHOUT trying to sing and dance at the same time and I think Britney should do that too. For example, Pink on her last tour did just about EVERYTHING including a flying trapeze sequence but she also did a looooong section where she just sat on a chair with her backing singers and sang.

We know Britney loves dancing even more than singing and TO HER it would be hateful to put on a show where she just stood at the mic and sang while dancers whirled all around her doing what SHE wanted to be doing. But wouldn't it be OK if she was to introduce sequences where she JUST danced and didn't feel that she had to pretend to sing at the same time?

The next issue we then have to address is exactly how she would sing if she sang more songs live. Historically, the advent of electronic recording technology in the middle of the last century enabled singers to adopt a more intimate, confidential approach on the albums you heard in your living room. It became clear that belting songs out was something people did on stage. But what do you do if your natural style is intimate and confidential but you're in a 10,000 seat arena, not a small club?

It's interesting to read Lynne Spears saying that Britney is getting her "glorious voice" back. If this means she'll be able to astound us with her vocal power and range, that will be wonderful. But how can she reproduce her studio sound on stage? It's like a totally separate art form. It's just one more fascinating thing for us to look forward to.

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