We had to coat your Maxim photos with fire retardant paint just to keep them from bursting into flames. How do they reflect who you are at the moment?
I love playing with the sexual side of things. That's a big side of me, and those photos were so much fun. I laughed a lot in the water. I love being a girl for those reasons. Guys just can't be sexy like girls can. OK? They just can't.
Are you comfortable with being naked?
For sure. At home I walk around all the time in just panties or whatever. Lingerie is definitely one of my biggest indulgences. The skimpiest things I have are the cutest little panties with tassels. They go with a sailor outfit - it's so cute!
Is your love of nudity the reason why you called your new album Stripped?
Not really. It's more about me baring my soul and being stripped down to the real me this time.
You seems to have picked up a few piercings.
I like my piercings. I'm not gonna tell you how many and exactly where, but some are visible, and some are in... other special places that I really like. It's a thing that started on tour. Whenever I was having a bad day, I'd go get a piercing. It was empowering, something I had control over.
When you were a preteen on The New Mickey Mouse Club with Britney Spears, how'd you deal with puberty?
I know she's gonna kill me for saying this, but me and Britney wanted to get our periods so bad. There were some already developed older girls who we looked up to, and we were 11 and 12 - still at the stuffing stage. Thank God for Britney on that show, because we definitely needed each other.
About those Britney feud rumours: would a celebrity boxing match take care of it once and for all?
Sometimes the press just takes that stuff to such an extreme level, but really, Britney and I used to be close, and now we're doing our own things. I don't get a chance to talk to her as often as maybe I'd like. I'm not sure how close we'd be anyway. I think we've grown into two very different people.
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