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Victoria Beckham can’t remember exactly when she last saw her husband play football for Manchester United. But she remembers what happened at the match very clearly. She had gone with her parents, Jackie and Tony. They took their seats, the game began, David got the ball and the chant started: “Posh Spice takes it up the arse…” As usual, the fans sitting around Victoria sat in awkward silence. She was used to this–she knew she just had to take it. But her father turned to her. “What are they singing?” he asked. There was a terrible moment…broken by a light tapping on her arm. A woman sitting next to her, her face a mask of sympathetic embarrassment, was offering Victoria a boiled sweet. The moment passed. Her dad didn’t mention it again.
Since then, things have improved. David tells her that now opposition fans no longer chant “Posh Spice takes it up the arse” or even “We hope your kid dies of cancer”. Now they’ve got a new one: “David Beckham takes it up the arse.” “And he’d prefer that they sing that,” says Victoria. “I think he probably finds it a lot easier.”
OCTOBER 2000. A Rambling Georgian house in Spitalfields, London. Melanie C wanders past, taking off her bra from beneath her khaki vest and gesturing towards some piece of wardrobe in the nest room. “I’m not wearing that, “ she announces, “’cos it’ll make me look like a fat cunt.” Emma Bunton ponders over a small table covered in jewellery from Bvlgari, each piece laid out on its own little suede pouch. Melanie B is on the phone, ordering up Norman Wisdom videos (“I’m gnona have such a giggle tonight,” she announces). And on the landing stands Victoria, her hair in curlers and a white cardboard shoebox labeled “Made exclusively for VICTORIA BECKHAM” at her feet. She stares balefully at my newspaper, as if by concentrating she can make it turn to ashes.
It’s Tuesday. A photoshoot is underway. The Spice Girls are together in the same place for the first time in a couple of weeks. Today’s headlines are: IT’S WHO-ATE-ALL-THE-PIES SPICE (The Sun); MEL’S SPICE THE SIZE SHE WAS (Daily Star); and finally, BECKS “INVENTED BABY SNATCH BID” (London Evening Standard).
It’s almost two years since the Spice Girls last released a record. Since then, there have been babies, hilarious weddings, a divorce, a debate about sexuality and solo records which met with varying degrees of success. Along, the way, without anyone noticing, their old invulnerability wore off. Being the Spice Girls used to look easy. Tabloids, the music industry and a global audience of lorry drivers and militant 12-year-olds were all on their side. But in the 21st Century it’s clear that Spiceworld is not the superpower that it once was. The girls solo records reveal ever diverging priorities. The papers treat them cruelly. It’s increasing clear that a colourful explosion on platform boots and cartoonish postures is not going to cut it any more, not in the era of Britney, Christina Aguilera and the impossibly youthful acts following in their slipstream. The Spice Girls are facing their mid-live crisis.
What do you do? In similar circumstances, other maturing artists have eithere done a Ronan (ie mine a thick seam of soupy ballads for the over060s) or a Robbie (recreate themselves as half Alice Cooper, half Queen Mother). The Spice Girls have opted to go for credible and grown-up, with a slick R&B makeover from Darkchild Studios’ Rodney Jerkins, who earned his platinum reputation producing Brandy, Monica, Whitney and Jennifer Lopez. Forever, the third Spice Girls album, glints with all the state-of-the-art clunk-click precision you’d expect from the man who is currently completing work on the new Michael Jackson album. Jerkins’ McDonalds bill during the Spice Girls sessions was said to be $200 a day.
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