Boybands Forever - BBC Documentary series

he/him
Girlband version of this series is confirmed now. Wonder who will appear out of the bands listed in the press release.

Girlbands Forever (3 x 60”) tells the inside story behind the success of some of the UK and Ireland’s most celebrated popstars during the 90s and early 00s such as the Spice Girls, Eternal, Girls Aloud and Atomic Kitten.
Let's hope its more Louise and Kelle than Fester and Ernie.
 
I was finally able to find a way to watch these outside the UK! Feel free to DM me if you'd like *instructions*.

Just finished this last night so perfect timing for the girl group announcement.

I thought it was a super well done documentary - did a good job showing the different sides and it really is a similar story for all. The managers/labels failed to understand that overworking and lack of mental health support is the biggest downfall.
 
Also it was an age where pretty much all promo had to be done physically and in-person. Local/regional radios weren't pooling interviews across networks - you had to speak to every single breakfast show and drive time show one, one by one - for example. Even if you weren't being bussed in person you were sitting in a room or on a bus doing the chats one after the other on speaker phone. School Tours were still a thing especially for new acts. There were magazines and TV shows that have long since ceased to exist.

So the run up to release and release week schedules for acts labels wanted to get into the top end of the Charts had to be bonkers by design. And with the amount of money being spent labels were going to make acts so whatever was required to try and recoup it.

It was an amazing, but absolutely brutal, era for commercial pop acts.
 
I miss the days of a brand new photoshoot and interview for each outlet. Now all 20 press features are the same photo session and different paragraphs of the press release. I don't think that zoom chats have the energy of an in-studio and i have no impulse to ever rewatch any.
 
The managers/labels failed to understand that overworking and lack of mental health support is the biggest downfall.
Mental health as we discuss it now just wasn't a thing back in the nineties. Especially in men. We just didn't have the general awareness we do now. I think people were grateful to be in a pop group, at first, because they were sold a dream until reality hits.
 
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Island

Staff member
I recall most flop 90s and 00s girl groups even if just by name, but don't recall Truce!
The closest comparison to them would probably be Xscape. They had an album out in 1995 that didn’t really do well but they managed a top 20 single in 1998 before they split up. Michelle Escoffery was in Truce!
 
I’m surprised that All Saints weren’t mentioned in the press release. I hope they cover the explosion of girl bands at the turn of the millennium. There’s a brilliant Andi Peters documentary about it from the time which someone here posted (I forget their PJ username) and is worth a watch ahead of this!

 
I’m surprised that All Saints weren’t mentioned in the press release. I hope they cover the explosion of girl bands at the turn of the millennium. There’s a brilliant Andi Peters documentary about it from the time which someone here posted (I forget their PJ username) and is worth a watch ahead of this!


This documentary is just great! A faithful snapshot of the time when it was released, capturing the essence and context of that era.

Another one I love is this BBC doc, from 2012 I think, called "I'm in a girlgroup" (they also have a boyband and a solo stars version).
 
I’m surprised that All Saints weren’t mentioned in the press release. I hope they cover the explosion of girl bands at the turn of the millennium. There’s a brilliant Andi Peters documentary about it from the time which someone here posted (I forget their PJ username) and is worth a watch ahead of this!



I LOVE Madasun. So nice to see them on this. They were great girls.
 

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