R&B singer Bobby Brown said Britney Spears “butchered” his 1988 hit song “My Prerogative.”
Britney covered the song on her first greatest hits album, “Greatest Hits: My Prerogative,” in 2004.
“Britney Spears butchered ‘My Prerogative,'” Brown, 56, told Shannon Sharpe during a guest appearance on Shannon’s “Club Shay Shay” podcast.”
Shannon asked Bobby what he believed was the best use of sampling from another artist using his music. But Bobby said none of the samples did his songs any justice.
“I don’t think they really did justice to any of the samples that they have done to my songs,” he said.
For example, Bobby referenced Britney’s cover of “My Prerogative.”
“Teddy Riley produced it, but that was a butchering that I – I couldn’t take it,” Bobby said. “I cleared it only because it was Britney Spears and I was thinking… Teddy Riley is doing it too, so you know.”
Bobby Brown reveals he felt Britney Spears butchered his song “My Prerogative” and says no artist who’s ever sampled his music has done it justice.
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Bobby explained his disappointment when he heard the finished single. He said it taught him a lesson about clearing samples before he hears the demo.
“I gotta hear it [in order for it to be cleared] because you don’t know what these kids will say these days. These kids say some sh*t that… you don’t want your song associated with it.”
Britney, 43, switched up the song with synthesizers and drums that fans say took “the soul” out of the song. She also changed the pronouns to a female’s perspective.
In the song’s intro, she said, “People can take everything away from you / But they can never take away your truth / But the question is, can you handle mine?”
Listen to the songs below.
