Britney Spears invited us all on a journey back in time late Tuesday night, when she debuted the music video for her club-banger of a new track, “Work Bitch.” The video is classic Britney. In a sex-dripping, fierce fashion we haven’t seen from her in years, she, quite simply, gets to work. Bitch.

It’s a vintage Britney video, in every absurd and amazing meaning of that label. It’s utterly nonsensical, yet tantalizing.
She’s gyrating against a white wall, flanked by female backup dancers dressed in leather. She’s gazing at herself sultrily at a vanity in the middle of a barren desert. Now the leather-clad backup dancers join her on a white platform for some floor choreography in the middle of said barren desert.

Such a sexy barren desert.

Britney then throws down some spritely choreography in what looks like an underground club. Then there’s some sensuous choreography in what looks like a different underground club. Then she wields a riding crop and whips some backup dancer who is ball-gagged and on a leash for some kinky choreography in what looks like yet another different underground club.

There are mannequins that are blown up. There is Britney Spears in a neon-pink ball gown on a lily pad cooing for the camera. This video, you see, is a lot. And we want it all.

Of course, the lyrics to “Work Bitch” are about as random as the litany of settings in the video, so this potpourri of sex and bras and BDSM and muscle cars is really just a manifestation of the hodgepodge of hotness she lists at various points in the song.

“You want a hot body?” Did you see Britney in this video? Check. “You want a Bugatti?” Look, there’s one speeding by! (Or maybe it’s a Maserati. Or a Lamborghini. Both are name-checked in the song, and—this may be surprising—the person who is writing an ode to Britney Spears right now cannot tell one from the other.) “You wanna live fancy?” She’s doing that, definitely, in this video. “Live in a big mansion?” That sex-dungeon-thing could be in a mansion, right? You get the picture.

The most important thing to point out about this ludicrously fabulous video is how Britney looks, which is just about flawless. Her body is in the best shape it’s been in about a decade. Her dancing, yes, is not what it used to be—but it’s pretty damned good. There’s a fire in her eye that we haven’t seen from Britney since the days when a new video from her—“Me Against the Music,” “Slave 4 U”—was an event.

Four years ago, a troubled Britney Spears released “Gimme More,” mumbling, “It’s Britney, bitch,” at the opening, presumably as some sort of call of empowerment that was spun into mockery as the star continued to flail. This time, she’s directing, “Now get to work, bitch.”
Message received: Britney's back. Bitch.