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Wannabe

They told us what they wanted...

Fact title Fact data
First released:
8th July 1996
Written by:
Spice Girls, Matt Rowe, Richard Stannard
First recorded by:
The Spice Girls
Cover versions by:
De Heideroosjes, The Glee cast, London Double Bass Sound, Walt Ribeiro, The Thurston Lava Tube

Synopsis

Reading the Wikipedia entry for the song 鈥榃annabe鈥 (linked to below) without ever hearing it, you may come away thinking that its cultural and musical importance are second only to the works of Beethoven. Even the description of its construction seems remarkably detailed for a 鈥榤ere鈥 pop record:

I'll tell you what I want, what I really, really want...
'Wannabe'

Apparently it is 鈥溾ritten in the key of B major, it is set in the time signature of common time and moves at a moderate tempo of 116 beats per minute.[21] It uses the sequence B鈥揇鈥揈鈥揂鈥揂鈾 as its chord progression during the refrain, the chorus, and the bridge, and F鈾揋鈾痬鈥揈鈥揃 for the verses.鈥

However most British members of the public remember it as the joyous, shouty first single by The Spice Girls: a celebration of friendship over heterosexual relationships, and the place where the world learned the phrase: 鈥渮igazig-ha.鈥 Held as being a keystone of the Girls鈥 鈥楪irl Power鈥 philosophy, nearly 20 years on and in the light of the various members subsequent 鈥榗areers,鈥 it does, unfortunately, seem to have been a little less important than the UK media took it to be at the time.

This isn鈥檛 to decry the importance of 鈥榃annabe鈥 for a whole generation of teenage girls who not only related to the individual personality types of 鈥楽porty鈥; 鈥楽cary鈥; 鈥楤aby鈥; 鈥楶osh鈥 and 鈥楪inger,鈥 but also to the idea of female role models who preferred having a laugh to getting a boyfriend and promoted ideas of loyalty and feminine power. But the feminism of 鈥榞irl power鈥 was, in truth a ragbag of media soundbites (cf: Geri Halliwell鈥檚 quote about Margaret Thatcher being a role model) disguising what in retrospect now seems like the beginning of the X-factor generation.

The Spice Girls were, after all, a manufactured girlband, put together by male svengalis and whose originally mooted debut single was a song called 鈥楩eed Your Love鈥: an ode to oral sex, of all things. Of course, that鈥檚 not to say that 鈥榃annabe鈥 shouldn鈥檛 take its place amongst all the other People鈥檚 Songs: for what better illustrates the New Labour era of British boom and Union Jack waving ethos than the words: 鈥淚'll tell you what I want. What I really, really want鈥?

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