The song, “My Prerogative”, was originally recorded by Bobby Brown in 1988

Aaron Hall, Teddy Riley (b.1967) and former New Edition member Bobby Brown (b.1969) wrote the song “My Prerogative” for Brown’s second solo album, “Don’t Be Cruel”. It was released in America in October 1988 as the second single and peaked at No.1, Bobby’s first and so far only number one. Internationally the song became a hit into the early months of 1989 reaching No.6 in the UK and the top ten across much of Europe.

Britney Spears covered the song for her 2004 greatest hits album and released it as the lead single, also using the song as the subtitle for the album. Her version was produced by Bloodshy & Avant and came out in September that year, getting to No.3 this time in the UK, topping the charts in Italy, Finland, Norway and Ireland, and being a top ten hit in more than fifteen countries worldwide including Australia. Stateside, it failed to make the singles chart but went to No.1 on the ‘Bubbling Under’ chart and No.3 on the digital song sales chart.

But which version is the best? BOBBY’s original or BRITNEY’s cover?

Take a look at some of the other posts in this series and don’t forget to follow the playlist.