Toxic (song) - Legacy

Legacy

"Toxic" earned Spears her first Grammy at the 2005 ceremony in the category of Best Dance Recording, and gained her credibility amongst critics. The song also won Most Performed Work at the 2004 Ivor Novello Awards. "Toxic" was ranked at number fourteen on Stylus Magazine's Top 50 Singles between 2000 and 2005. In a 2005 poll conducted by Sony Ericsson, "Toxic" was ranked as the world's second favorite song, only behind "We Are the Champions" by Queen. Over 700,000 people in 60 different countries cast their votes. The song was also included on The 500 Greatest Songs Since You Were Born list by Blender. Pitchfork listed the song on The Top 500 Tracks of the 2000s. Jess Harvell commented that Spears had great pop instincts and that "Toxic" showed how "Britney always had more individualist pep than her peers, important when you're dealing with steamroller productions from the mind of Max Martin." In 2009, NPR included "Toxic" on their Most Important Recordings of the Decade list. Amy Schriefer noted that the song's synths defined the sound of dance-pop for the rest of the decade, while adding that it "still sound fresh and futuristic." "Toxic" was listed on several others end of the decade lists; at number forty-seven by NME, forty-four by Rolling Stone and seventeen on The Daily Telegraph. NME called it the soundtrack to all of the fun of the decade, from "little girls at discos" to "gay clubs and hen nights". In addition, the song was voted in Rolling Stone's end of the decade readers poll as the fourth best single of the decade. Bill Lamb of About.com listed the song at number twenty-seven on the Top 40 Pop Songs of All Time. Evan Sawdey of PopMatters commented that "Toxic" is a rare kind of song that transcends genre boundaries, and added that Spears delivered the track that defined her legacy. In May 2010, Spears revealed through her Twitter account that "Toxic" was her favorite song from her catalogue.