who do you think you are?

until recently (today), it has been the policy of this blog to discuss musicians/musical artists. this seems unfair to me. there are talentless hacks out there who are not getting the attention they deserve within this blog. it is for this reason i would like to discuss my favourite bunch of talentless hacks, the spice girls.



they can't sing, they can't dance, and they certainly can't act, but i was a ten year old girl living in the UK when they rose to fame. thus, the spice girls will be in my heart until the end of time. viva forever.

as a special nod to me and my love for them, the spice girls opened their world tour here in vancouver on december 2nd, 2007. as a special nod to me and my love for them, my aunt bought me an ourageously expensive ticket and i was there. i almost got trampled to death in the merch line (it was like a mosh pit only scarier), i saw a man in a union jack dress and go-go boots, and i heard the sound of 20,000 drunk girls about my age (the other 8,000 in attendance were a couple of kids and a bunch of gay men) screaming their heads off for the greatest band of all time (i use that term loosely).

the concert opened with a video of some spice-like girl children playing dress up. blah blah blah. bring on the spice girls. the audience was possibly about to explode by the time they came out. the build-up was unbelieveable.

then, there they were (in their fabulous roberto cavalli costumes). rising up from the floor, my spice girls. singing (i use that term loosely), "spice up your life." i'm not kidding, i started crying. racing through my mind was, "i wish i could go back in time and tell my 10 year old self about this!"

the girls continued with "stop" and "say you'll be there," with 28,000 mostly female people screaming along. it was pretty great. then they sang one of their new songs ("headlines") so we could all give our lungs a rest.

the concert was pretty all over the place from there. it was great and exciting and bright and loud, but there was sort of a lull between the opening and the encore. it's worth mentioning, however, that each of the girls had a little solo act, starting with posh. as she is the least talented of all of them, she did not sing during her act and simply walked around the stage and struck poses. actually, that's what she did throughout the entire concert. it was pretty funny.

the next act was scary, who did an s&m themed rendition of lenny kravitz's "are you gonna go my way?" featuring a very long whip. then baby performed her song "maybe," and it was back to the classics with "viva forever" (my favourite spice girls song ever. as decided when i was 12). for those of you who don't know, this was their last single before ginger (my favourite spice girl) jumped ship and therefore gave me no cause to care about the spice girls anymore. at the end of the song, she sank into the floor and the other four were left to perform one of their songs from after gerri left, "holler." this was pretty funny as well.

then, for gerri's triumphant return, she walked out and performed "it's raining men" in what was basically a bright red one-piece swim suit with a big white belt and some white go-go boots. it was fantastic. then for the dramatic anti-climax, sporty performed her solo "hit," "i turn to you."

after that there were a few more songs, a crazy medley of tacky 70's songs, and the girls performed "goodbye" and left us to wait about four seconds for the encore.



five seconds later, in new outfits of course (there were a lot of costume changes. at one point ginger was in an incredibly sparkly version of her union jack dress. it was great) the girls were back singing "if u can't dance." for those of you gentle readers who are familiar with the spice girls, you may have noticed that "wannabe" had yet to be performed at this point. so did the girls, in their incredibly scripted onstage banter. "i feel like we've forgotten something," said scary.

they all pondered this and then broke in to "wannabe" to which i replied "it's about damn time" (actually, i replied "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH! SPICE GIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIRLS! WANNABEEEEEEEEE!!!!!"). oh, it was so good. it was so so good. i almost died. it was so good. then an alternative version of "spice up your life" and they were gone.

i can't think of anything redeeming about the spice girls. they exist to make money, not music. few of them actually even understand music (i except mel b and possibly mel c from this, but only somewhat). they exploited a generation of little girls with their shitty albums and their shitty merchandise.

but dammit, i love them. they exploited me then and they exploited me again ($75 for a t-shirt and a pack of buttons?!) and they can exploit me any damn time they want. girl power.



-jocelyn