Idolator

Up to this point, Britney Spears hasn't done much in the way of traditional promotion for Blackout, and with the newly 26-year-old's album doing a soft swan dive down the album charts (it's at No. 41 in its fourth week on shelves, with 467,000 copies sold), she decided that maybe it would be a good idea to go around to the traditional music press and inquire about a cover story or two. But her negotations with Rolling Stone—whose cover she has graced in the past—broke down when she realized that the motivations behind Wenner Media's interest in her may not have been all about the music.

The train wreck, who hasn't done much publicity for her new album, "Blackout," besides her daily run to Starbucks to get photographed, has pulled the plug on a potential Rolling Stone cover, said an insider. Spears was close to signing a contract with editor and publisher Jann Wenner, to pose for the cover, but called off talks when the Wenner Media boss refused to promise her it would actually land on Rolling Stone instead of Us Weekly, said the insider. Last year, Nick Lachey was duped into believing Wenner's promise of a Rolling Stone cover and was furious when he landed on Us instead. "It was going to be a good platform for her music to be taken seriously because it had been so long. But she refused to get screwed by Wenner," said our source. "They kept negotiating, and it got nasty."

Using Nick Lachey as a cautionary tale is pretty wise; after all, Britney doesn't want to end up on season two of Clash Of The Choirs. Anyway, apparently she's now in talks with Blender, who, should the negotiations work out, will at the very least will dress her in the style to which she's accustomed. By which I mean she'll probably try to out-butt-crack Nicole Scherzinger.

BRIT UNCOVERED [NYP]