Ladies and Gentleman of the jury, you have heard the evidence presented to you and yet I am duty-bound to go over it one more time so that you are aware of the heinous crimes that have been committed.
When the Spice Girls split, it created five solo careers. Five very different and yet equally awful solo careers. We have had to endure the outputs of these solo careers for over three decades now and it’s about time each and every one of them is brought to justice.
Let’s start with the best of the five, Emma Bunton. Apart from that weird one where she starts singing about sucking you off all night and that sub-par cover of Downtown, Bunton remains the least offensive. She has a warm voice and her discography is a lot better than it should be. ‘Maybe’ remains a genuinely decent song. There are a lot of singles from her past that aren’t anything to be embarrassed about.
The same, however, cannot be said for Mel B. The only reason she isn’t higher on this list is because of the frequency of her singles is significantly lower than some others. Absolute stinkers like ‘Want You Back’ and her stitched together with string and cellotape cover of ‘Word Up’ by Cameo stick long in the brain and not for good reasons. Perhaps she knew that singing wasn’t her strong point and thus gave up quick sharpish. The over polished American R & B smear that appears on most of her singles makes her sound like every other R & B singer during that era. Time has not been good to our Mel.
The same also cannot be said for Victoria Beckham. Less a singer and more a millionaire’s daughter who decided she wanted to be a singer one day, if you don’t count the autotuned-to-within-an-inch-of-its-life ‘Out of your Mind’ with True Steppers and Dane Bowers, she only has three singles to her name. Do you want some really sh*t rapping over a ballad? Becks has you covered with ‘A Mind of it’s Own’. Are you interested in someone singing a terrible Kylie b-side at you? Try ‘This Groove’. Every single feels as though they made the video first and cobbled a song together around it. You have to stick to what you know. It’s a good job she’s a fashion icon and also has a millionaire husband otherwise she’d be bored senseless.
We’re down to the dregs and you know where we’re going. She has eight (count em’) albums to her name although I doubt any of you would have heard anything past the second one. Mel C almost almost took the crown from you know who because her crimes are numerous. On her first album she covered as many genres as possible including rock (Going Down), pop (Northern Star), twinkle-shafting R & B (Never be the Same Again) and Ibiza club nonsense (I Turn to You) without mastering any of them. She then went a bit alternate with the second album, probably doing an Avril Lavigne thing, which was the style at the time. If we could give an award for trying then Mel would get it. I’m sure if we had enough time there’s probably a lot to like in her later stuff and she does seem like a lovely person. Still, strength of character is not on the stand today. Personality is not being judged here. What’s being judged is keeping Bryan Adams in the public consciousness and ‘When You’re Gone’ continues to dominate certain easy listening radio stations. That cannot be forgiven. Canada thinks we’ve forgotten, but we haven’t.
I’m going to come out and say it; Geri Halliwell’s career is the worst. Think I’m joking? She only has nine singles to her name. Nine singles! It feels like more because they’re that terrible, ladies and gentlemen. Once you get past the go get ’em sassiness of first release ‘Look at Me’ you’re left with disturbingly bad anglo-Spanish your mum’s holiday video ‘Mi Chico Latino’, so unmemorable and by the numbers you’d think it was written for an advert ‘Lift Me Up’, feminist anthem but nobody was listening ‘Bag it up’, I left my switchblade on the bus but I’ll happily cut off my ears with this oyster card before I ever touch this again cover of ‘It’s Raining Men’, my five year old wrote some words on a paper that rhyme so make it a song ‘Calling’, another Kylie b-side but worse than Victoria’s if you can believe it ‘Ride It’, Emma’s doing a 60’s thing so I’m going to copy her shamelessly ‘Desire’ and the puke-inducing generic song about driving and probably talking about sex too ‘Scream If You Wanna Go Faster’.
I need to sit down. It’s all too much for me. Remembering is fun but not today. I hereby condemn all five Spice Girls solo careers (okay, we’ll let Emma Bunton off).
