Britney Spears performs during Now! 99.7 Triple Ho Show 7.0 at SAP Center on December 3, 2016 in San … [+]
Getty ImagesDespite several recent reports that Britney Spears and her team are recruiting songwriters for a new album, the singer herself insists that those claims aren’t true. In fact, she says she’s done with the music industry for good.
In an Instagram post uploaded on January 3, Spears shared an image of an old painting of a woman with a man’s severed head on a plate. That visual should have let fans know that this post was going to be especially virulent–and it was.
In the caption she included alongside the graphic painting, Spears denied all the recent reports about new music being in the works in no uncertain terms. She stated that “most of the news is trash,” clearing things up and also making her feelings about the media known—again, that is, as she’s never been shy about criticizing the press.
Spears then stated what so many fans have been fearing for years now–that she may never record music again. The singer wrote, “I will never return to the music industry” with several exclamation points, for emphasis.
Recent articles from outlets like Page Six and The Sun have claimed that Spears’s camp has reached out to artists and songwriters like Charli XCX and Julia Michaels to help her craft her new album. Spears seemingly poked fun at those artists–intentionally or not–by writing, “They keep saying I’m turning to random people to do a new album.”
Spears hasn’t released a new album since 2016, when she dropped Glory. For many years after that, she didn’t work on music, but rather focused on performing in her Las Vegas residency. At the time, she was still under a conservatorship that was run, at least in part, by her father. A judge vacated that chokehold years ago, and since then, she’s been a free woman.
The Grammy winner has, actually, returned to the music industry a few times in the past two years. She’s released two singles through major labels post-conservatoriship–one in 2022 and another last year. Her first, “Hold Me Closer” with Elton John, was a global top 10 hit. Last year’s “Mind Your Business” with Will.I.Am was a sizable flop.