Girlbands Forever overview – a thrillingly gobby slice of must-watch TV | Tv

As a pop-cultural second, the turn-of-the-millennium woman group growth hasn’t precisely been flooded with solemn appraisal and evaluation. Wisely, this fantastically entertaining three-part documentary doesn’t try to rectify that. Instead, Girlbands Forever reminisces in a way that’s equal elements meaty and frothy. And, sure, usually about as stomach-churning as that mixture sounds.

At the guts of this collection – the female-focused follow-up to 2024’s Boybands Forever – is lots of previous floor. Viewers of a sure age will know the trajectories retraced right here (the head-spinning arrival of Spice Girls, the scrappy ascent of Atomic Kitten, the existentially difficult lineup rotation of Sugababes, the talent-show conception of Little Mix) and the dominant themes (tabloid hell, cruel administration, relentless touring, intraband resentments) just like the backs of their faintly wrinkled arms.

Yet by way of a mix of telling particulars, ancient-yet-still-juicy gossip, offbeat archive footage, gratifyingly frank interviewees and hearteningly little narrative hand-holding – a mode recalling James Bluemel’s way more profound however equally zingy Once Upon a Time documentary strand – Girlbands Forever provides the angles that may remodel acquainted subject material into must-watch TV.

Episode one is the most effective, largely due to the humorous and candid contributions of All Saints’ Melanie Blatt (or, in her phrases, “Mel from the 1990s”). We kick off with the annus horribilis of 1992, whose Black Wednesday wretchedness was apparently alleviated by a tranche of ultra-cool R&B woman teams from the US. Producer Ron Tom noticed a possibility for a British model – “a twinge of London, underground, edge” – within the teenage Blatt and her pal Shaznay Lewis. Meanwhile, EMI have been cultivating gospel-vibed rivals Eternal. The latter had modest success, Lewis and Blatt didn’t. Both have been unimpressed when the nonsense-strewn Wannabe stormed the charts in 1996 (Eternal’s Kéllé Bryan presumed it was a leaked demo) earlier than woman energy’s empty rallying cry lassoed the zeitgeist.

Strangely, Spice Girls – instantly rewarded with the stardom that had eluded Blatt and Lewis – could be the making of All Saints, now with added Appleton sisters: the group’s smouldering, trendy trip-hop-adjacent R&B might be marketed because the hip, genuine various to Ginger and co’s cartoonish, generically rootless pop in a press-friendly Blur v Oasis-style rivalry. It was on this Cool Britannia bonfire that the tribulations of the trendy British woman group could be solid: the intrusive press commentary, the person-as-product mentality of the music world (in keeping with Bryan, bosses despatched the band to a camp the place they managed what they ate – though the pinnacle of EMI UK on the time denies any information of this) and the horrific therapy of members as soon as they grew to become pregnant. Blatt recollects a supervisor pressuring her to have an abortion; by the point Scary and Posh have been additionally with little one, broadcaster Robert Kilroy-Silk was severely asking whether or not these twentysomething ladies have been liable for encouraging tween followers to develop into moms.

After this primary wave of “unlikely musical disruptors” – as per the marginally over-egged voiceover – got here the girlband landfill. All these outfits could have been manufactured to some extent, however the short-lived likes of Girl Thing and Vanilla proved you couldn’t simply mindlessly run them off a manufacturing line.

Enter Orchestral Manoeuvres within the Dark’s Andy McCluskey, who was on the lookout for a second act after his synthpop heyday. He discovered it in a vivacious backing dancer known as Kerry Katona and lo, Atomic Kitten was born.

The early 00s additionally birthed Mis-Teeq, who gifted the charts with UK garage-inflected pop. The raucously gobby Atomic Kitten have been catnip for the period’s vicious gossip mags, main Katona to go away the band as soon as she thought she had discovered her fortunately ever after with Westlife’s Brian McFadden (a union she says despatched each bands’ labels “absolutely fucking apeshit”). Mis-Teeq, three elegant Black ladies, struggled to get a lot press protection in any respect and have been then – maddeningly – deserted by the trade simply after scoring a large world hit with Scandalous.

The ultimate instalment is the place the giddy nostalgia begins to peter out. In the late 00s, Sugababes’ lineup modifications blurred the road between band and model to a miserable extent, underlining that irrespective of how nice the music was (even Atomic Kitten had their fair proportion of licensed bangers), the girl-group industrial advanced was a brutal, soulless, opportunistic enterprise. Eventually, we attain the 2010s and Little Mix, scions of the talent-show-and-social-media period, who achieved essentially the most success with the least interesting music.

The coda acknowledges the current All Saints and Sugababes reunions, whereas interviewees categorical misguided optimism about the way forward for the British girlband – completely ignoring the very fact it’s extinct. In mild of this fascinating and righteously infuriating historical past of those younger ladies’s woes, it is probably not a loss we must always essentially mourn.