Britney Spears is actually back. Back doing singing and dancing an dancing and stuff. As we recently reported, the new Britney Spears album Circus will be released in December. But it’s going to be preceded by a single called Womanizer, and that single’s been leaked, and we’ve got it here.

So does Womanizer mark Britney Spears’ stunning return to cultural relevancy? It’s actually hard to tell, because the leaked version is 38 seconds long and sounds like it was recorded from a mobile phone onto another mobile phone in a tin bucket full of jelly down a well in space. But we’ll just assume that it doesn’t, anyway. We’re bastards like that.

The most exciting thing about having Britney Spears back isn’t that she gets to wear nice clothes again or that we don’t have to start each story about her with the phrase ‘Troubled pop starlet Britney Spears’, but that we’ll finally get to hear Britney’s take on the year she’s just had.

Britney Spears has always managed to pass comment on her life in song – whether in Lucky, where Britney wryly commented on the pressures of fame; Piece Of Me, where Britney wryly attributed part of her meltdown to the prevalent tabloid celebrity culture of the day; or I’m Not A Girl, Not Yet A Woman, where Britney wryly commented on what we assume to be her tattered hymen.

And since the new Britney Spears album is called Circus, we can safely assume that it’ll be a no-holds barred account of the swirling mayhem that’s engulfed her life over the last 12 months. Since that’s included a stay in a mental asylum and losing custody of her own children, we’re bracing ourselves for a gruelling, emotionally stark journey.

And that much is clear on the first single from Circus, entitled Womanizer. Thanks to a DJ in Nashville who played 40 seconds of the song while it was still officially embargoed and got suspended for it, leaked snatches of Britney Spears’ Womanizer are all over the internet, allowing us all to hear Britney’s eloquent description of her own harrowing personal nadir ahead of its release. It’s a bruising listen, so be warned…

You can really hear Britney’s anguish in every single one of her tinny, barely audible “ooh ooh ooh ah-ah-ah”s, can’t you? It’s tragic, really. The personal turmoil really shines through in the way she seems to have just ripped off that Katy Perry song. We’re in bits. Honestly we are.

But still, on a brighter note the artwork for Womanizer by Britney Spears has got a snake in it. Hopefully that means that every single from Circus will reflect each of Britney’s most memorable MTV VMA appearances. First Womanizer has a snake in it, then the second single will feature Britney Spears getting off with an old lady. And the third one will have a dumpy homeless man in a wig and a bikini stumbling around like he doesn’t know what’s going on. Ace.

A far cry from the one we’re about to tell you. Now we’ll be the first to admit we don’t keep up on the day to day soap opera that is rap music. Last we heard Young MC had an evil twin or something, Andre 3000 came back from the dead and Erica Kane was about to cut an album.

Also the fellow known as Young Buck got kicked out of 50 Cent’s thingy called G-Unit. We’ve got a link to a wonderful place on the next page wherein an audio recording of a phone conversation Young Buck had with 50 begging for reentry into the group can be heard.

The guy even cries in it.

You gotta be careful on the telephone. Why just the other day we found a website that had over 50 of our call-in pizza orders for the public to hear. It wasn’t that exciting, really. It’s just us saying words like pepperoni, extra cheese and cat sliced extra thin. But the point is we had no idea those calls were to be kept forever.

Hulk Hogan is a recent victim of all this too. So is the guy that called him with a mouth-full of death threats. Paula Abdul & Alec Baldwin have both thrown themselves in front of the internet sensation train too. And now Young Buck has joined the club. After checking literally 20 different websites, we finally found a quote with fleshed out sentences and vowels in the appropriate places. For that, thank you sandra Rose.com:

“After slinging mud at G-Unot and 50 Cent, Young Buck tears up in a phone call to Fiddy and begs Fiddy to take him back into the fold cause he’s, well, broke. On the other hand, this call exposes the fraudulent lifestyles most of these rappers live. All that perpetrating like they’re millionaires when in reality, they’re broke and borrowing from Peter to pay Paul.”

Take a a listen for yourself right here.

It really is a call – and Buck actually does start to cry in it. To spare his feelings, let us just say it’s ok for men to cry now and again. Why, we remember seeing our father cry lots of times – and in the fetal position too. It happens every year on our mother’s birthday. We’re not sure why exactly, but the clues we’ve put together over the years involve leather underwear and a high-dive. That really is all we know.

Dad listen, if you ever need to talk…

Like that time Lindsay Lohan accepted our MySpace 'friend request.' How was hecklerspray supposed to know that 'friend request' didn't mean 'please stand outside my house shouting inappropriate sexual slurs before being dragged off by the police in a haze of tear-gas and rubber bullets'? And don't even get us started on that time the internet promised us a load of money from Nigeria.

Pain is only relevant, however, if shared by a celebrity. Any fool knows that. Which is why hecklerspray is particularly enamoured with Kelly Clarkson - she hates the internet too, and she's going to tell you all about it. Well, actually, we are. In a vaguely sarcastic manner. Before linking to the story itself. Come on, you know the score by now.

Why does Kelly Clarkson hate the cyber-realm all of a sudden? Because it went behind her back and stole some of her new unfinished tracks, that's why. Then what did the internet do? It went and shared them, with the entire world. The unimaginable bastard.

The four songs in question go by the names of Close Your Eyes, Ready, One Day, and With a Little Bit of Luck, which sound less like chart-topping pop classics and more like George describing the rabbits to Lennie. Hecklerspray for one eagerly awaits the next big Clarkson single: I Done Killed Some Girl By Petting Her Hair Too Hard (feat. Justin Timberlake).

What are Kelly Clarkson's thoughts on the whole thing? She had this to say:

"I write all the time – lots of stuff not meant to ever be released, just working on ideas. The fact that people have heard music that's not ready yet sucks, but I hope they like it."

If anyone is interested, we're happy to tell you that the tracks are said to have a 'folksy arrangement' with a 'bare-bones country approach'. We're also happy to tell you that you should consider getting out of the house more. You're actually interested in what new Kelly Clarkson material sounds like? Are you serious?

What next – you're going to get all excited about Shakira's really deep new lyrical content? Is that what's going to happen? Christ, you need to make some changes, man. Pretty soon you could find yourself writing about Kelly Clarkson's new songs in a vaguely sarcastic manner, before linking to the story itself. And how much of a loser would that make you? Eh? Eh?

Eh?

Read More:

Kelly Clarkson Annoyed By Leaked Tracks - Reuters

Psst.

Psst. You. Hey! Do you like nineties sci-fi TV shows about a couple of FBI agents who should have been boning each other senseless but never got round to it because they were too busy chasing/not believing in (delete as applicable) UFOs and aliens? If so, then, boy, have we got a treat for you.

Some wag, it seems, has secretly filmed a sneak preview of the upcoming X-Files movie sequel, due for release this July. And whaddaya know – despite being a horribly low-quality clip – it's actually enough to wipe hecklerspray's memory of the awful last few seasons of the show. Why, there's nary a T-1000 in sight!

What you will find, however, is Gillian Anderson digging something mysterious up in the snow, David Duchovny running around looking anxious, and a white-haired Billy Connolly pretending to be some sort of mysterious bad guy. Intriguing, you say? It is, rather, isn't it?

And, unsurprisingly, Tom Cruise isn't exactly happy that his genuinely disturbing Scientology rant has found its way onto the internet. Sources are claiming that Tom Cruise is "extremely unhappy" about the video being mocked across the internet in such a widespread way.

But, as Tom Cruise says himself in the Scientology video, it's rough and tumble, it's wild and woolly and it's a blast. And, as Tom Cruise also says: "Eeehyuhyuhyuhehhhh!" Or however you spell that deranged chuckle of his.

The leaked nine-minute Tom Cruise: Scientologist video has yanked a reaction out of just about everyone. The majority of people seem to be slightly freaked out by the burning fervour in Tom Cruise's eyes as he explains how he won't hesitate to push his ethics onto someone, while Scientologists have rushed to the internet to claim that anyone who disagrees with Tom Cruise and Scientology is probably a known criminal.

And as for Tom Cruise himself, well, he's just a teensy bit annoyed that a Scientology video of him intoning "Now is the time!" like some sort of frightening doom-voiced cult leader has been unstoppably leaked all over the internet, especially so soon after those rumours that Tom Cruise's baby was made with L Ron Hubbard's dead sperm. The Daily Mail reports:

Last night, an insider revealed: "Tom is extremely unhappy about this. He takes Scientology very, very seriously and he does not want it subject to abuse and ridicule on the Internet."

In fairness, this leaked Scientology video is probably just about the last thing that Tom Cruise needs at the moment. Since the last period of weirdness that almost fatally wounded his movie career – thanks to Sumner Redstone sacking him from Paramount because all women hate him, Tom Cruise has been painstakingly rebuilding his reputation and, blammo, nine minutes of incomprehensible religious babbling and mindless creepy chuckling later and he's back to square one again.

It's hard to see how Tom Cruise and Scientology will be able to cope with this new deafening ridicule. The ball is well and truly out of their court now, and any typically heavy-handed Scientologist response will surely be just as publicly revealed. After all, more people have probably seen the leaked Tom Cruise: Scientologist by now than Lions For Lambs. And, yes, we're aware that means more than about four people. 

Still, as honestly unsettling as the Tom Cruise: Scientologist video is, it could have been worse. Just imagine what a bag of shit the John Travolta: Scientologist video would have been. 

Read more:

Tom Cruise 'furious' over leaked Scientology rant – Daily Mail