The Secret History Of Britney Spears' Lost Album

Ten years ago, Britney Spears said she was working on an album called Original Doll , but her label denied its existence. The search for Britney’s “lost album,” and the freedom that still eludes her.













An imaginary cover for Original Doll, inspired by fan art.


Elizabeth Arden / Christina Lu /











The KIIS-FM offices in Burbank, Calif., were nearly deserted the day Britney Spears called. It was December 2004, just before New Year's Eve, and Jesse Lozano was filling in for the regular host, who was on vacation. "Britney Spears is on the phone," he was told. "She says she wants to play her new song."

Lozano thought it was a prank. "Usually, you don't believe that," he told in March. But an hour later, the singer was outside the station's Burbank studio with a bodyguard, her chihuahua, and, Lozano recalled, no shoes. "She had a CD with her and said, 'Can we play it on the air?'"

"Britney Spears live in studio! Do you have to take a super-secret CIA mission-secure route to Burbank from your crib so you don't get followed?" Lozano asked.

"No!"

"I didn't see anybody outside."

"I know! It's awesome."

"I walked out there, there wasn't one camera anywhere."

"I know, it's great!"

"Well thanks for hanging tonight. Good luck with your album. It's untitled."

"It's probably going to be called Original Doll, so…"

"And it's half done?"

"Yeah. It's halfway done right now."

"Alright, so maybe by the summer? Maybe by the fall?"

"Yeah, yeah maybe a little bit earlier."

They came back from commercial break. Spears introduced the song she'd come to play, "Mona Lisa."

























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Ladies and gentlemen / I've got a little story to tell
About Mona Lisa / and how she suddenly fell
See, everyone knew her / they knew her oh so well
Now I am taking over / to release her from her spell
She's unforgettable / She was a legend though
It's kind of pitiful / That's she's gone
It's kind of incredible / She's so unpredictable
It's time to let her go / Cuz she's gone



It was the first and last time "Mona Lisa" would be on the radio. A representative for Jive, her record label, told Billboard a week later the song wouldn't be serviced to radio, and "no album is scheduled at the moment." They did, however, note that Spears was "in the studio working on some material."

Today, our pop stars tend to be open and imperfect, a byproduct of the social media age. Miley Cyrus and Justin Bieber are in their fans' feeds, selling their music, but also talking about their lives. But 10 years ago when Britney brought "Mona Lisa" to the radio station, there was no Instagram, only TRL. Original Doll and what Spears hoped it would become represented a shift in the pop music landscape, away from the Disney-groomed turn-of-the-century pop star toward something more honest and raw that we see today in Lorde, Rihanna, and others.

The 22-year-old Spears didn't have a Twitter account to vent with, or a Soundcloud page she could post her songs on, but for a small window of time, she managed to bypass the gatekeepers to tell the public what was on her mind. She had long been criticized as a puppet, but Original Doll was her attempt to cut the strings.

But it would be three years, two trips to rehab, and one divorce before she would release another studio album, and by then, Original Doll was scrapped and forgotten. While some of the songs which may have ended up on the album, like "Mona Lisa," were eventually leaked or released, the mystery of Britney Spears' "lost album" remains, and piecing together its story offers a rare and revealing look inside the mind of a carefully managed pop icon before her fall.







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