The Spice Girls and "Spice Invaders"

About a week ago, if you had asked me about The Spice Girls, I instantly would have thought of “Wannabe” (of course), I would have known Mel B was one of the members, and I would have guessed that one of them had the nickname of “Baby Spice.” Now here I am, a week later, with a fairly decent knowledge of their music and their nicknames (Baby, Scary, Sporty, Posh, and Ginger).

Do I like The Spice Girls as a group? I...honestly don’t know. I unabashedly love “Wannabe,” but most people do, right? For a while, that was the only song of theirs I was familiar with. But I figured since I liked it so much and since The Spice Girls seem pretty cemented in the musical zeitgeist (even nowadays), there must be something to that, which meant it was time to dive into their discography. This wasn’t too difficult, as the group only released three albums, plus some singles.

Overall, I initially would have summed up what I found as “underwhelming.” There were a few songs that I liked, but in between those were songs that were either kind of boring or fit into that “90s pop ballad” genre that I’m personally not a fan of at all.

After adding the catchy ones to my playlist and listening to them a few times though, they really started to grow on me. “Stop” is a fun, upbeat song with a 60s Motown feel to it, “Say You’ll Be There” successfully combines a slick synthesizer with a harmonica solo (among other things), “Never Give Up On The Good Times” has a chorus that’s found its way into my head frequently over these last couple of days... and then there’s “Spice Invaders.” I can’t move on without discussing that one.

When the song “Spice Up Your Life” was completed and was ready to be released as a single, the only step left was making a B-Side. This was a bit of an issue, as all of the songs that had been produced were included on the group’s first album. There wasn’t enough time to come up with and produce another song, so The Spice Girls were tossed into a studio, handed microphones, given a backing track, and told to talk about whatever they wanted. The result is “Spice Invaders,” a song that is so extremely weird and at the same time, so intriguing.

To even call it a song might be a stretch. The only actual singing consists of one melody sung over and over, without any actual words. Between that, there’s whistling, yelling, PSA’s about going to the bathroom, and a lot of banter directed at Geri Halliwell (Ginger Spice)...maybe that’s part of the reason why she ended up leaving the group later.

Anyway, I can’t convince myself that I like this song so much just because it has a catchy melody; there’s something more to it. I think that “something” is the fact that it provides a glimpse behind the scenes. “Gonna Buy Me A Dog” by The Monkees operates under a similar concept. Two of the members spend half the time singing the actual song and the other half engaging in back-and-forth's, making jokes, laughing at each other, etc. For me at least, it’s cool to see the personalities behind the slick production and polishing of a regular song. It’s interesting to see the result once you get rid of that and just give them a backing track and a green light to joke around.

Or else that’s just how I’m trying to justify liking a song with a verse like this:

“This song is full of valid information, information like

Never wee with your knickers on

Hold- hold a minute, that's my phone

‘Hello, hello, um- about- I can't believe my- ahh’

It's um, it's a mad woman, get lost”

Anyway, thinking about it, I wouldn’t say I’m now a Spice Girls super fan or anything. Despite that, I think “Wannabe” is enough to justify all of the hype they have received and they had a few other songs that I liked as well.

“Spice Invaders” though? That’s something else. Give it a listen sometime.