Whereas
Popstars
was a rather polished production, Raw Spice appears to use less camera
techniques than Man Bites Dog.
There is without a doubt no-one out there who hasn't heard of the Spice
Girls and in their heyday there was no let up from them. Whereas most
bands, after finishing their first album, would go away and quietly work on
their next - and then release it with a list of tour dates, the Spice Girls
advertised Walkers crisps, Impulse Spice - a new fragrance, but whereas those
crisps taste nice, the Impulse spray smells horrible. They even went so far in
their promotion of Pepsi as to record a song, Step To Me, only for them
for it to be given away on a CD single in a promotion if you sent off a stack
of tokens. They also took in a Polaroid camera, the SpiceCam.
It was only July 1996 when the girls shot into the chart at No.3 with
Wannabe, climbing to No.1 the following week and then followed it with
three more No.1's from the same album, Say You'll Be There, 2 Become 1
and Mama / Who Do You Think You Are. Then the first single from the second
album, Spice Up Your Life, went straight into the charts at the top as
well, making five No.1's in a row at the time.
Around this time they had also filmed, due for a Boxing Day release, their
first - and only - film
Spiceworld. It was
directed by Bob Spiers, who has worked on the TV series Absolutely
Fabulous and written by Kim Fuller and the programme's star, Jennifer
Saunders. The film also had a number of cameo appearances by famous people.
As well as Richard E. Grant playing their manager, cameos come
from Michael Barrymore, Richard Briers, Bob Hoskins, Elvis Costello,
Stephen Fry, Dame Edna Everage, Elton John, Hugh Laurie, Meat Loaf, Jonathan
Ross, Toyah Willcox, and Jennifer Saunders.
Click on the above for a review of their second album,
Spiceworld.
After that their second Xmas single, Too Much, gave them their second
Xmas No.1 in a row, but the follow-up, Stop, didn't make it, faltering
at No.2, being held off the top slot by Run DMC and Jason Nevins' It's Like
That. Summer and Xmas 1998 saw yet two more No.1s in Viva Forever
and Goodbye, giving them the honours of being the first group ever to
score three Xmas No.1s in successive years.
Sadly, the shit has now appeared to hit the fan. While Holler/Let Love Lead
The Way, the first single from their third album, Forever, did make
the top, album sales were incredibly poor and with the girls' solo careers
heading off in different directions it looks like the time is right to call
it a day. They won't admit that, of course, but since any future singles
releases from the album and the planned tour have been cancelled, it appears
the end is nigh.
For the girls themselves, Mel C is probably doing the best at the
moment since Geri appears to have become a parody of herself trying to
tone herself up beyond belief but it really doesn't do her any favours.
Is it just me or does she look a lot better in Raw Spice than she does
now?
Emma's only had one solo single to date, a cover of Edie Brickell's
What I Am, but the upcoming release of What Took You So Long
looks set to do the business for her.
Victoria missed out on her first No.1 single, when Spiller beat
them to the top with Groovejet (If This Ain't Love), headed by the
gorgeous Sophie Ellis-Bextor, daughter of Blue Peter and
Jigsaw's Janet Ellis, but then to the public I say you must have
been Out of Your Mind to buy Posh's solo effort. As for Melanie B,
her private life has been made very public, splitting from dancer Jimmy
Gulzar and now seeing her solo career going down the toilet. Her first
single, I Want You Back, made No.1 but after that things went downhill
fast. Her solo album, Hot, hit lukewarm at No.28 and if her next single
doesn't make the Top 5 with significant sales, she will be dumped by her
record company.
Raw Spice contains scores of chat from scores of other people including
their manager at the time, Chris Herbert, now managing
Hear'Say,
his late father Bob Herbert, voice coach Pepi Lemer, ex-Eternal
singers Louise and Kelle Bryan and the original fifth Spice member
before Emma joined, Michelle Stephenson.
Click on the above for a review of their third - and last? - album,
Forever.
First shown on TV cut to just over half of its length, the full version
expands a little on what we've already seen, but as all the early footage was
shot on a dodgy hand-held camera the quality is pretty appalling. There's
nothing we can do about that now, but at the time docusoaps weren't the
in-thing so such care over presentation wasn't taken. Shot in 4:3 fullscreen,
the average bitrate is a steadyish 6.2Mb/s.
The sound quality is similarly bad for the camera footage. You can hear the
dialogue but it certainly won't beat
U-571 to the Oscar
for Best Sound Effects Editing! The only stereo content comes in the talkie
clips filmed today of those commenting on the band.
The disc contains a paltry 8 chapters over the 79 minute production,
there are no subtitles and the only extra is a 2-minute TV trailer.
What I can't understand is, after releasing
Popstars
with a good picture quality and copious chapters for £14.99,
why Granada have charged an extra fiver for Raw Spice which is shorter
and doesn't look so good.
As of April 2009, Blu-rays and DVDs reviewed by the editor are watched on a Panasonic TH-37PX80B
37" Plasma TV with a Sony BDP-1500 Blu-ray player and played through a Yamaha DSP-AX820 amplifier.
PC games reviewed by the editor are on:
Since Jan 2011: Intel Quad Core Dell XPS 8100, i7 CPU 860 @ 2.80Ghz, 8Gb RAM, nVidia GeForce GTS 240, Windows 7
Since Nov 2005: Intel Pentium D 830 3.0Ghz, 1Gb RAM, 128Mb nVidia GeForce 6700XL, Windows XP
Since Aug 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.66Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb GeForce4 MX440 graphics, Windows XP
Since May 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.6Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb ATI Radeon 9600TX graphics, Windows XP
Since Jun 2002: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, 64Mb ATI Radeon 8500LE
Since May 2000: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, Voodoo 3 3000 AGP
