Despite comparisons ranging from a British Menudo to a girlie bastardization of New Kids on the Block, the Spice Girls have leapt into superstardom, grabbing both the adoration and defamation that comes with overnight worldwide fame. The five gals—now down to four—who go by the names Geri ("Ginger Spice"), Mel B ("Scary Spice"), Emma ("Baby Spice"), Victoria ("Posh Spice"), and Mel C ("Sporty Spice") have taken the world by storm with their saucy sexuality, adolescent antics, hummable harmonies, and innumerable shouts of "Girl Power!"
Hailing from Watford, near London, Geri Halliwell (born Aug. 6, 1972) is the most loquacious Spice Girl, frequently leading the "Girl Power!" chant. Before becoming the Girls' resident rapper, she was a model (nude photos abound on the Internet), a barmaid, an aerobics instructor, and a presenter on Turkish television. On May 31, 1998, citing personal differences, she left the group.
Mel B, a.k.a. Melanie Brown (born May 29, 1975), is a hip-hop lover from the northern English city of Leeds, and a frequent open-mouthed exhibitor of her pierced tongue. She played drums at a music college, danced, did telephone sales, and had a brief stint on the British TV soap Coronation Street. Upon Ginger's exit, the media dubbed her the new leader of the pack.
Fair-haired Emma Bunton (born Jan. 21, 1976) is the group's youngest member and token blondie, often wearing her golden locks in pigtails or bunches. Baby Spice was a child model in her early days, and many of her childhood advertising photos have made their way onto the Internet.
You won't catch London native Victoria Addams (born April 7, 1975) baring her teeth in any group photos—supposedly she hates the way she looks when she smiles. The Girls' fashion and style guru (hence Posh Spice) comes from a rather wealthy family; when she was but a girl, she had to beg her father not to embarrass her by taking her to school in the Rolls Royce.
Lastly, donning a never-ending supply of Adidas track suits, is Mel C, a.k.a. Melanie Chisholm (born Jan. 12, 1974). A soccer fanatic and all-around athlete from Liverpool, Sporty Spice sports on her right arm a tattoo of two Japanese symbols: woman and strength (read: girl power). A former ballet dancer and session singer, she is believed by some (including the Spices' former manager) to be the most talented of the group.
How did the beloved and reviled quintet meet? In March 1994, four of them (Emma excluded) answered the following advertisement for an all-girl group in The Stage, a British periodical for star wannabes: "R.U. 18-23 with the ability to sing/dance? R.U. streetwise, outgoing, ambitious, and dedicated?" Not only did the four girls fit the bill, but they were also furious fame-seekers who knew each other from various auditions around London (they dreamed of getting parts in Andrew Lloyd Webber's Starlight Express). Under the guidance of father-and-son management team Bob and Chris Herbert, the four future Spice Girls and a woman named Michelle formed the group Touch, as in "you can look, but don't touch." Michelle soon quit the group due to an illness in her family and a practical desire to go to college. (If you listen closely, the sound of her kicking herself can still be faintly heard across the Atlantic.)
From here, the Spice Girls' history gets a bit convoluted. Victoria claims that she then brought Emma into the group, although Bob Herbert says that Emma was recommended by a singing teacher and that she and Victoria didn't know each other. The girls claim that they were given songs to sing and coerced into wearing matching outfits; Herbert says that they were never told to dress the same—he felt that their diversity was their key selling point. One point that is not disputable, however, is the showcase performances that the Herberts set up to present the girls to songwriters and publishers. Through the events, the girls made the songwriting contacts they had been looking for and began trying their collective hand at writing with studio mavens Richard Stannard and Matt Rowe (who co-wrote "Wannabe") and Eliot Kennedy (who co-wrote "Say You'll Be There"). As the quintet refined their songwriting skills, they also began to exercise their emerging autonomy. First, they dropped the Touch moniker and changed their name to Spice Girls (as, of course, girls are sugar and spice and everything nice). Then, when Bob Herbert had thoughts of getting rid of one of the five who he felt wasn't talented enough, the victim found out, the girls bonded, and the first true act of girl power took place—the Spice Girls fired Herbert and his son, and took off on their own.
They spent the next year "writing, recording, dancing, and eating toast" and eventually hooked up with a management company run by Annie Lennox's manager, Simon Fuller, in March 1995. With Fuller's help, they signed a record deal with Virgin in August. Working with Stannard and Rowe and the production duo Absolute, the Spice Girls recorded their debut, Spice, a feisty album of grooving bubblegum pop and hip-hop-inflected old-school R&B.
In their native U.K., the Spice Girls' first single, "Wannabe," reigned at No. 1 on the pop charts for seven weeks in 1996, and topped the charts in 22 other countries. Both the album and "Wannabe" reached No. 1 in America in early 1997, but the U.S. was lagging far behind the rest of the world in its Spice adulation. Though the winsome quintet was successful Stateside, they were absolutely, overwhelmingly famous in the rest of the world. The first four singles released in the U.K. all topped the charts: "Wannabe," "Say You'll Be There," "2 Become 1," and a double A side, "Mama" and "Who Do You Think You Are."
Posh Spice, Ginger Spice, Scary Spice, Baby Spice, and Sporty Spice were fast becoming household names. Strange thing is, neither the Spice Girls nor anyone associated with them made up the silly aliases that became part of their trademark. British teen magazine Top of the Pops invented the names during an editorial meeting and published them with an illustration of the cheeky gals and a spice rack—the names caught on and will probably never go away.
The Spice Girls' leap to pop stardom has been so quick, and the media saturation so great, that for months they have appeared daily in the British press, in news and gossip items both real and invented. On the love-life front, none of the girls has been spared: At least 13 different boyfriends have kissed and told to the British tabloids. In April, the fivesome infuriated Maori leaders when they performed an impromptu native war dance in jest while on a promotional tour of Bali (in Bali, women aren't even allowed to perform the dance in earnest). And in May, the girls made a ruckus again when they preened and flirted with Prince Charles after performing three songs for his Prince's Trust charity concert. Geri (Ginger Spice) left a landmark lipstick blotch on the Prince's right cheek and pinched his royal bum. So far, all five are single, though Victoria (Posh Spice) is engaged to British soccer star David Beckham, while Scary is betrothed to Jimmy Gulzar, one of the group's back-up dancers, affectionately dubbed the Spice Boys.
While critics may think the gals are just a flash in the pan, some major corporations appear to disagree. The British pop princesses inked a worldwide deal with Pepsi to sing cola jingles and appear in TV commercials, and landed dozens of endorsement deals in the U.K. At the end of 1997, the Girls released their second album, Spice World, as well as a feature film by the same name. In early 1998, shortly after they fired manager Simon Fuller (electing to represent themselves instead), they were recognized as the top-selling group in the U.S. for the previous year, having sold more than 5.3 million copies of Spice alone. Although they were snubbed when it came to Grammy nominations, the Girls spiced up the American Music Awards, taking home three of the little statues. In April, they announced an extensive U.S. tour.
Still, all is not sugary sweet in Spice Land. As the spring of '98 wore on, Ginger missed several appearances, and finally announced her resignation as a Spice Girl on the last day of May. The group decided to continue as a foursome, with the media electing Scary Spice as the new leader of the pack (and blaming Ginger's split on a rift between the two). The odds of a breakup following the U.S. tour appear to be about even, and speculation has begun as to which Girl will have the most successful solo career. After professing over and over that friendship would keep them together, it remains to be seen if even Girl Power can keep the Spice Girls intact.
