It's disturbing enough that Britney Spears' life has been a public train wreck with an inevitable ripple effect through her fans and immediate family. What's twisted about it is the way the Spears camp tries to turn some of the more shameful aspects of her spiral into cash. After her adventures in head-shaving, drugs, rehab, children taken away for their own safety, etc., she released an album last year called Blackout. Classy.

Now on the comeback trail, she's releasing Circus, which is exactly what she's turned her life into over the past couple of years. Song titles like Shattered Glass and Blur also cynically feed into the scandal.

"Mr. Photographer, I think I'm ready for my close-up" and "Eff me over," she sings in the anti-paparazzi song Kill the Lights, as if she had no part in her elaborate dance with fame and infamy.

Circus is a throw-it-all, see-what-sticks disc that has great moments (the first single, Womanizer, even if it's super-repetitive) and weaker ones (the title cut, where Spears notes that she's "like a performer" - yeah, kind of).

Out From Under is a sweetly heartbroken ballad where you can actually hear her voice through all the filters and processing. Shattered Glass stands head-and-shoulders above the rest as the best track on the album (even if she annoyingly pronounces glass as "glay-ee-ass"). It's a powerful story of a woman who cuts loose her unfaithful lover, no second chances, leaving him to a life of regret for a moment of weakness: "Was it really worth it? / Was she everything that you were looking for? / Feel like a man?"

No one ever counted Spears out, and while this isn't a great album, all the elements are here to launch her comeback.

Mark Brown is the popular music critic. Brownm@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-2674

Britney Spears

Circus

Zomba Records

Grade: C+

* To see videos of Britney Spears' Shattered Glass and Womanizer from Circus, go to RockyMountainNews.com/Extras.

Live at Canterbury House 1968

Reprise Records

Grade: B

Neil Young is supposedly releasing his massive, long-delayed Archives project next month, but we've heard that story before. Meanwhile, the slow drip of releases from his vaults continues, including this Michigan show that has never leaked in collectors' circles before.

This is early Young at his rawest, and given that it's pre-Harvest, the set list is very different from the 1971 Massey Hall solo acoustic disc he released last year.

This two-track, straight-to-tape recording allows very little tweaking, so some tape hiss and other variables are included, along with Young's ongoing raps that border on the bizarre at times. He opens with On the Way Home and Mr. Soul, as if to get his Buffalo Springfield hits out of the way before getting down to business.

The deep tracks are what fans will want; we're definitely entering the area that is for hard-cores only. Buffalo Springfield's sprawling suite Broken Arrow is reduced to a guitar and a voice here to intimate effect. Last Trip to Tulsa is always welcome.

Yet another appetizer. Let's hope Young finally serves the main course in January.

ALSO RELEASED THIS WEEK

* Akon: Freedom

* Panic! At the Disco: Live in Chicago

* Dave Clark Five: The Hits

NEXT WEEK

* Aretha Franklin: This Christmas Aretha

* Brandy: Human

* Musiq Soulchild: OnMy- Radio

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