Britney Spears has no aspirations of ever making music again.
The singer has had a rough couple of years, to say the least.
The infamous conservatorship that took control of her life for more than a decade finally ended in 2021.
Once she had control of her own life again, many fans hoped that Spears would finally make her return to the music industry.
The star hasn’t released an album since 2016, when she put out her project, Glory.
Her loyal fans were hoping for a follow-up to that project, now that almost 10 years have passed–but, unfortunately, it doesn’t seem like that’s happening.
On Wednesday, Jan. 3, Spears took to Instagram on Wednesday to squash the circulating rumors that she is recording a new album.
“Just so we’re clear most of the news is trash!!!”
“They keep saying I’m turning to random people to do a new album,” Britney wrote. “I will never return to the music industry !!!”
That doesn’t mean that she’s done with making music completely, though.
According to Spears, she’s still helping other artists with their music, but from behind the scenes.
“When I write, I write for fun or I write for other people,” Spears wrote, adding that she has ghostwritten over 20 songs in the past two years.
Spears has previously said that she doesn’t plan on making a comeback, so this isn’t new information, but it is quite the dagger for fans hoping she’d change her mind.
Britney revealed in her memoir, The Woman In Me, that her conservatorship was “deadly” for her music career.
“Pushing forward in my music career is not my focus at the moment. Spears wrote in the book.
“It’s time for me not to be someone who other people want; it’s time to actually find myself,” she continued.
Also in her Instagram post, Britney set the record straight about some other rumors surrounding her recent behavior.
“People are also saying MY BOOK WAS RELEASE WITHOUT MY APPROVAL ILLEGALLY,” she wrote in her caption.
“…And that’s far from the truth,” Spears clarified.
“Have you read the news these days???” Spears asked. “I’m so LOVED and blessed !!!”
One recent moment that had fans hoping for Britney’s return to music was a surprise outing with J Balvin and Maluma.
Back in October, the musicians had everyone talking when they unexpectedly posted pictures together. Fans couldn’t get enough of the unexpected trio, immediately wanting to know more about why they were together.
Seeing Maluma and J Balvin together wasn’t surprising, as the two have worked together in the past. They have a song together, “Que Pena” that was released in 2019.
The real shocker was throwing Britney Spears in the mix, who seemed extremely excited to meet the Latin music legends.
“HOLY S**T it just hit me,” Britney captioned a selfie of them together. “I can’t believe I met these 2 !!! Holy smokes.”
Maluma was just as excited about the interaction, also taking to his Instagram page to post about the dinner.
“Quien así como yo en el amor?” he wrote on Instagram at the time, which translates to, “Who like me is in love?”
Now, a couple months after that interaction, we get to hear some more insight into what the trio was doing at dinner. According to Balvin, he and the “Hawái” singer could not pay Britney enough compliments.
“We told her how proud we are about her,” the Colombian singer revealed to E! News of his and Maluma’s time with the pop singer. “You know, like she’s part of us, and we were in love with her.” No matter what position you are in music you gotta give respect for what they have done.”
He also acknowledged that while he might be a huge artist in his own right, he had to give Spears her respect.
“No matter what position you are in music you gotta give respect for what they have done,” he said.
He also went on to say that regardless of the hardships Britney might be going through with her divorce, the 41-year-old is thriving.
“I saw her in really good spirit,” Balvin revealed.
Not only that, it looks like we could be seeing a collaboration from the trio sometime in the future! When asked if fans could we see them in the recording studio together, the “Perra” singer said, “Absolutely yes.”
In addition to giving props to those who came before him in the music world, J Balvin recently did the same for his parents. Having recently become a father, he opened up about what he wants to do differently than his own mom and dad.
“We have to take responsibility because we’re more conscious of how our parents used to be,” he said back in February. “And I don’t blame them and I’m not saying that they’re not good, but it’s the idea that you’ve got to be better than your parents.”
“Teaching my son about love and being happy, that’s what I want him to be,” the singer continued. He welcomed his son Rio with girlfriend Valentina Ferrer in June 2021.
“I don’t want him to be the best of something, I want him to enjoy what he does and be happy,” Balvin added. “That’s my number one rule. Because once you’re a happy person, it makes life feel better.”
If there’s anyone who can attest to how important happiness is, it’s Britney Spears. After spending more than a decade of her life in a conservatorship, she’s finally learning what it’s like to be free.
In June 2021, the pop star spoke to a courtroom in Los Angeles, giving a 23-minute statement about her struggles under the conservatorship that controlled her personal and business decisions for 13 years.
“I’ve been in denial,” she said at the time. “I’ve been in shock. I am traumatized. I just want my life back.”
During the years that Spears was restricted by the guardianship, she performed a residency in Las Vegas and released four albums. Behind the scenes, the singer said she lived in terror and shame, all because she was unable to make decisions about her work or her own body.
Five months after Spears’ impassioned speech, Judge Brenda Penny terminated the conservatorship. Britney went on to embrace her newfound freedom to speak freely, unloading about all of the family betrayals and years of isolation she suffered from on her Instagram page.
Just a few months after the arrangement ended, the singer married her longtime boyfriend, Sam Asghari. The marriage lasted just over a year before he filed papers asking for a divorce in August 2023.
The last time Spears released music was in 2016, when she dropped her album, Glory. Because it’s been such a long time, the pop star admits she’s hesitant to jump back into the studio.
In her memoir, The Woman In Me, Britney says that the one person who did entice her back into the studio was Elton John. She says the 76-year-old sent her a video message asking her to collaborate on “Hold Me Closer,” a duet that remixes some of his hits, including “Tiny Dancer.”
The recording session took just a few hours in the basement of a producer’s Beverly Hills home, according to Spears. While describing the song, which was released in 2022, she described it as the first new song made on her own terms in a long time.
“Mind Your Business,” a song with a former collaborator, Will.i.am, was also released this past summer. Now that she’s friends with J Balvin and Maluma, maybe she will be more eager to get back into the studio.
With her newfound freedom, Britney is constantly communicating with her fans on Instagram. While some of her followers are eager to see everything she posts, others are concerned with how she acts on the platform.
The pop star commonly takes to her social media page to show off new dance routines or just an outfit she wants to flaunt. But, because of how eccentric these clips can be, some people still worry about her mental state.
She tries to explain her desire to reveal her inner life to fans in her memoir, admitting that she already knows how misunderstood she truly is.
“I know that a lot of people don’t understand why I love taking pictures of myself naked or in new dresses,” Spears writes.
“But I think if they’d been photographed by other people thousands of times, prodded and posed for other people’s approval, they’d understand that I get a lot of joy from posing the way I feel sexy and taking my own picture,” she continued.
Since the end of the conservatorship, Britney’s posts have regularly stirred up debates among fans about whether she has the support she needs post-conservatorship.
Earlier this year, fans called the police to check on Spears after her Instagram account disappeared. Another call was put in to the police last month after she posted a video of herself dancing with a pair of knives.
“So unacceptable for cops to listen to random fans and come in to my home unwarranted,” she wrote on Instagram at the time. “I’ve been bullied in my home for so long now…ITS ENOUGH!”
Regardless of what you think about her life, it’s safe to say she gets joy out of finally living on her terms.