Girl, Powerless

M.J. Fine does it again

by M.J. Fine

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Published: Jan 29, 2008

With a group as calculated as the Spice Girls, you just know a reunion was always part of the recipe, and their rationalizations for getting back together now are more entertaining than the choreography. Posh had a particularly compelling reason to get with her old friends: She's said that since her kids see soccer fans screaming for their father, David Beckham, she needed to prove that Mummy's famous in her own right. So, naturally, while Scary, Sporty, Baby and Ginger each do a solo song on the group's current tour, Posh poses on the catwalk for her singular moment.

Spice Girls Spice (Virgin 1996)

Spice Girls Greatest Hits (Capitol 2007)

The perfectly timed Greatest Hits offers two new incentives amid the highlights from the Spice Girls' three original albums, but they don't add much to the canon. "Voodoo" won't win any new fans with its dated club production, though the sassy beats and confidence-building lyrics might suffice as a gentle invitation to dance for those who've been sitting out the party for the last decade. At least it's better than "Headlines (Friendship Never Ends)." Despite the parenthetical nudge — hey, wasn't that a line from "Wannabe"? — the group's first single in more than seven years is more polite than friendly, and the punctuation is the song's only punch. Synth strings yawn while the Girls take turns cooing about the power of love that's both eternal and effortless. (Nice gig, if you can get it.) Sporty's husky voice provides more kick than the words warrant: "And it feels so good, every bell's gonna ring/ Your love is alive and it's making me sing/ I could fly, wanna cry, want the whole world to know/ We are together, come on, baby, let's go." So much for putting sisters before misters.

A dozen years on, Spice is all guilt and no pleasure, from the safe-sex ballad "2 Become 1" ("Free your mind of doubt and danger/ Be for real, don't be a stranger") to the exploitative "Naked." At best, there's a thimbleful of soul in the lite-funk "Who Do You Think You Are" and "Something Kinda Funny." At worst, the Girls come off as obnoxious ("Wannabe"), cloying ("Mama") and confused ("Say You'll Be There"). Their vocals are thin, the lyrics are corny and the production's stale. Unsavory stuff.

(m_fine@citypaper.net)

If you wanna see the Spice Girls, you've gotta get to the Wachovia Center on Feb. 19.

 

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