Julia Friese explains in the column why (and by whom) Britney Spears’ old nachos are reheated
Three observations:
1. millennial bait is…
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“Millennial Bait” is the name given to cultural products that are intended to lure millennials with nostalgia. Greta Gerwig’s “Barbie” film (2023) is probably the best-known Millennial Bait. Incorporating the members of the one-hit wonder Tokio Hotel into any form of content is always: Millennial Bait. Millennial Bait tries to bake the last profitable cookies with Millennial baking pans.
This happens especially in non-current media, i.e. media that is fighting for survival. Millennial Bait says: Please don’t migrate to TikTok. Remember how beautiful it used to be! TV! Magazines! MTV Video Music Awards! The latter are increasingly becoming a Britney Spears memorial platform: Sabrina Carpenter wore a moderate plagiarism of the “Dream Within A Dream” tour outfit (2001-2002) there this year, in which Spears sang “Baby One More Time” in the rain. A pop culture moment – google it, you know it – that many pop stars try to recreate again and again – for example Shirin David on her first tour in 2023.
Carpenter, however, completed the mimicry including rain and Spears’ sexy whisper vocals. It’s as if this wasn’t a Carpenter performance, but rather she was the leading actress in “Britney – the Musical”. Spears famously lasciviously danced around on the stage floor at the 2000 VMAs, and this will be taken up again for its 25th anniversary: Tate McRae, who dances more technically adept and even more agile than Spears, also had the stage floor sprinkled with sand in order to then also perform the Millennial Bait trick of the year: Spears’s Sexy whisper vocals: “But you got a spotsrtcar / We can uh-uh in it” also: “You have a sports car / We could uh-uh in it” she whispered.
Britney whispered a lot. For example, the now iconic “Get Nasty” in “Boys” (2002). A song that consists entirely of whispered seduction that seems to be sung directly into a boy’s ear, just seconds before he’s supposed to go “uh-uh.” But the bar for latte-inducing pop is set high and Rae misses it. “Sportscar” is a song that doesn’t stick in your mind even after listening to it several times. Ryan Tedder produced it. Maybe Rae should stick with Swift and call Max Martin too?
2. … air frying, but as a cultural technique
Present is who creates a new baking pan. ZAH1DE managed to intone the Internet lingo “not that deep” (e.g.: it’s not that dramatic) in their song “Zahide Did It Better” in such a way that in German-speaking countries you automatically want to say “not that deep” in its intonation. Shirin David also achieved this with her intonation of “Iced Matcha Latte” in “Belly Legs Po”. These auditory markers are new baking molds. In other words: memes. There’s also a meme on the internet for Millennial Bait: “Reheating Someone’s Nachos.” Reheating someone’s old nachos. Tate reheated Britney’s nachos. And: Sabrina definitely burned Britney’s nachos.
3. coby county
The Millennial Kracht Leif Randt has written a midlife crisis novel to match. Half-ironic it is called “Let’s talk about feelings”. Marian Flanders lost his mother, and Randt reports this as matter-of-factly as he can. The surface description in Randt’s undoubtedly best text “Shimmering haze over Coby County” (Berlin Verlag, 2011) was still an aesthetic utopia in white, silver and beige – just curated Instagram aesthetics, without even mentioning Instagram, simply surface-smooth prosperity, yes: perfection (cf. Vincenzo Latronico, Ullstein 2023), Randt protagonist Flanders now believes he is at the all too unpleasantly realistic end of his youth.
Randt no longer explains his protagonist’s surface scanning as pleasurably empty, but rather as a kind of defect. As if Marian Flanders couldn’t establish a tangible connection to others, to reality. And then there are all these rather unpleasant markers of yesterday: A Berlin novel! The idea of running a boutique! And then dating again – but now over 40! As well as some anticipatory markers of yesterday, things that one suspects will age poorly in literary terms, such as the mention of TikTok. Is it possible that after a certain life experience you no longer like snacks? -.-
This column first appeared in Musikexpress issue 11/2025.