Why didn’t Victoria Beckham’s solo career take off?

Talent, actual beauty, personal charm? Lack thereof.

I liked this one.

I also liked this one

Just not likeable and not beautiful enough to be an icon.

Oh come on. None of them were good. None of them deserve solo success. Plus she did something else post spice girls.

This was her first solo single and it is terrible.

I got the CD single autographed at Virgin Megastore in London because a friend wanted to go when we were at Cambridge. I knew who she was but had never heard of David Beckham at the time.

She was always the least interesting Spice Girl. Also can she even sing?

[quote]Why didn’t Victoria Beckham’s solo career take off?

She was a SPICE GIRL.

A manufactured non-entity entity.

R8 and? Hero’s debut single charted. Emma had a song or two that charted and so did Mel C.

I think Mel B did too but have to check.

“I Turn To You” was a #1 on the US Dance Charts

1. She was never comfortable singing even as part of an ensemble. She definitely did not have the confidence or ability to be a soloist. She barely sang with the Spice Girls compared with the others.

2. Some of the others could sing and none had much success going solo, anyway. I remember campy "Perhaps Perhaps Perhaps" and "It's Raining Men" singles from Geri and this fun but rather generic dance song from Sporty Spice and that's it.

It seems there wasn't a legitimate artist among them. Just women who were hired to be part of a produced group, like most boy and girl groups out there. Justin Timberlake lucked into a career with some soulful direction and a worked out body; otherwise, few manufactured groups split up and turn out like the Beatles.

I liked this Emma song

Dance charters rarely make successful vocalists in their own rights. People who are into dance music (as I was back then) pay attention to the producers—BT, Tiesto, Paul Oakenfold et al.—and not generally to the vocalists. There were some regular dance vocalists I liked, such as Kirsty Hawkshaw and Jan Johnston, but their vocals were incidental and they, like Mel C, never caught on as singers; they just leased their vocals to producers to engineer. I liked "I Turn to You" when it came out, but it seemed like a one-off novelty and it didn't make me want to buy an album by the former Spice Girl. If she had turned out to be a singer-songwriter, that would have surprised and intrigued me.

Amber is one of few electronic dance vocalists from the era I can think of who came to be known as an artist in her own right because she had so many hits, but even she didn't last that long in the pop current.

“Look At Me” is a terrible song.

However, Geri was always the hottest Spice Girl. She oozed of sexuality.

My mother always found Scary to have the prettiest face.

She looks like a walking advertisement for an expensive eating disorder, and like she is smelling something very bad at all times.

Vic might have been the glamour-puss and the one with ambition, but her persona wasn’t (and isn’t) emotionally-accessible. Though she’s humorous and known as a relatively nice woman, it comes across as if something brittle, cold, distant and affected about her, like she’s not fully in the room with you. Compare that to her sister Spices, such as brassy friendly down-to-Earth Mel B. and warm flirty bubbly Emma.

R13 ‘Look At Me’ is such a strange song. I find it somehow quite sinister. Maybe it’s the key?

Great vocals? Hell no. She was the least talented Spice Girl. She made Scary Spice look like Aretha Franklin. Bitch can't sing

A tangent, but when I was in England in 2000, I went to G-A-Y (a London club) and saw this boy group, A1, that I had never heard of. They did cheesy choreography but they actually sang and had really great voices. I thought they might catch on in the US, but nope, they were one of many groups at the time that just never caught on. And they had actual vocal talent—so I wouldn't expect much from the Spice Girls and especially Victoria in the music department since they were not great singers or charismatic on their own.

Mel B's biggest hit was 'I Want You Back' with Missy Elliott. Here in The States it appeared on the soundtrack to Frankie Lymon biopic "Why Do Falls Fool In Love".

Anybody remember this cheesy Europop group?

Sorry, but Posh just can't hold a candle even to disposable generic music like this.

I enjoyed her reality show.

If OnlyFans were around back then, which members of the Spice Girls, Backstreet Boys and NSync do you think would have put their naked pics on it after the groups fizzled but before their 15 minutes were up?

Obviously Lance Bass, but who else?

R12 Thanks for that flash back! Loved that dance music from the nineties. Brings me right back to the clubs we used to go to and dance all night to. I was never a Spice Girls fan, but Amber was great.

Amber wasn’t a Spice Girl.

“I Turn To You” was a massive hit in NYC dance clubs.

I would rank the Spice Girls' solo output as follows:

Emma Mel C Geri Mel B Victoria

R24 Making Mel C a one-hit wonder

In the states. She had a handful of hits in the UK.

I admit, I liked Mel B’s song “Feels So Good”. It has good, upbeat positive energy.

Emma at least recorded material that seemed like music she personally liked rather than just churning out whatever was in the charts the previous month. Always thought this was a good pop record.

R28 Emma’s got really cool vintage taste. She loves ‘60s pop culture & music, and it shows. I think she’s better-read in the genre than many pop stars both then and now.

Remember when they changed their sound to more urban to mature their sound and appeal to older people too, after Geri left (or got kicked out, whatever)? It didn’t work but the song is better than a lot of the other output.

Much preferred all saints to the spice girls. Spice girls were always naff.

All Saints were indeed way cooler.

‘War Of Nerves’ is still one of my all-time favourite R&B pop songs, and favourite music videos. Such a vibe, even now.

I have no idea what was happening in the UK Market at that time, but I can give my thoughts as a teen/young adult in the US who listened to Top 40, went to clubs and purchased the bulk of my Pop Music/Top 40 junk during that period (1995 to 2005). None of the Victoria Beckham tunes posted here are bad. I think the "problem" was Vickie's singing & appearance.

Although her vocals aren't bad, they were much too soft, milquetoast & vanilla to fit the R&B-Pop she was trying to push. Just take a look at her competition at that time. Britney Spears had equally thin vocals but her voice is extremely distinctive. Jessica Simpson & Christina Aguilera on the other hand could (love it or hate it) seriously belt it out. The closest to Victoria in terms of vocal style was probably Mandy Moore; but Mandy Moore was a cute, blonde teenager. Which brings me to Vicki's appearance....

Bland vocals can be acceptable coming from a cute teen girl who's pushing Image above anything else. But no one wants to hear them from an obviously adult, sophisticated woman with odd plastic surgery.

Bottom Line, a Victoria Beckham Pop Music solo career couldn't have made sense to an American Market. It's easy to see why she found no success here; if her music was even released here at all. I'm glad that she triumphed elsewhere.

[quote]she had great vocals

No.

She was the Lance Bass of the Spice Girls. Background filler with zero musical ability.

The British media hyped a huge chart battle between Victoria's "Not Such an Innocent Girl" and Kylie's "Can't Get You Out of My Head". Posh & Becks were the UK's biggest power couple at that point, and she was (and still is) the only Spice Girl not to have had a number one single. "Not Such an Innocent Girl" got to number six, while "Can't Get You Out of My Head" spent four weeks at number one. Twenty years later, the latter is remembered as one of the most popular songs of the 00s.

Have you just shoehorned a reference to your (supposed) attendance at an elite educational institution into a conversation about the post-Spice Girls career of an untalented WAG, R6?

She has made a career of looking sullen and wooden. She projects zero charm and or personality. The only reason her name still pops up is likely because of her much more personable husband. (Who, unlike his wife, has actually been photographed smiling with teeth showing.)

"Midnight Fantasy" would have made a better single than "Not Such an Innocent Girl".

R38 David is actually a cunt under all the dopey smiles and the nice cosmetic enhancements and the good tan, though. Let’s not forget that.

Yeah she seems awful. Boring control freak, the kind of woman who forces you to sympathize with a cheating douchebag husband like Brainless Beckham. Their kids look to be well on their way to being vapid, second-rate, untalented "influencers" as well and there's frankly no goddamned excuse for that with all the $ their parents have.

R40 is right, David is a cunt. A proper one, too. Victoria is just uninteresting and dull.

David is a CHEAT

Does she still have her clothing line?

She always has that hard tranny look to me, not attractive at all.

R44 yes, but it’s haemorrhaging money and lapsed into obscurity. If it weren’t for David’s endorsement deals and brand merchandising as well as his money from work with MLS propping it up, it would have collapsed long ago.

They both got very lucky escaping harsh fines and penalties for that fiasco over the illegally-contracted Inter Miami player a few years back.

I'm a little baffled by Jessica Simpson mentions by Americans. I was studying in Cambridge in 2000, and while I was at the gym one day an old John Cougar Mellencamp song came on, except it wasn't. It was a young blonde singing a pop confection over his song's music. I thought it was a little odd sounding but a cure concept. As the video ended, the screen said Jessica Simpson, and I had heard her name a couple of times but never heard her music or saw her. I just assumed she was British because I was very into pop music at the time and somehow she never made it to radio here. This was the same summer as Madonna's "Music."

For Americans who were familiar with Jessica Simpson before her reality show with Nick Lechey, did you actually hear her music on the radio and see her videos on TV? Maybe she was just never played in the DC market for some reason?

R47 back then, a little. She was never that big until the show and then it died off after a couple of years.

R48 But she was big in the US from the reality show and not because of her music, right? I get the sense she had a presence in mainstream pop radio play in the UK. I don't quite get why she'd have been popular there and not here.

I know Atlantic Records shipped Tori Amos to the UK and packaged her as a Kate Bush type because they figured she was too avant garde for the US and wouldn't take off here but had a chance there. That of course backfired early on with a lot of Bush fans thinking she was a cheap copy of Kate, while in the US she took off because she was so original and not many people were familiar with Bush so there were fewer derogatory comparisons. But Simpson's music didn't seem particularly better suited to British radio than to US radio to me.

Simpson got a good bit of radio play in the US at first. But she came six months to a year after Britney, and she just wasn't as popular.

Britney was the blueprint for that era’s pop girls. Every girl was compared to her and every label had their own version of her, only none ever were as successful. Even Christina has sold half the amount of albums as Britney.

Jessica was more B list than A.

Posh has a face like a pig. People just couldn't get past it, no matter how much surgery she had.

She has always seemed vacant to me....most interesting thing about her was her husband.

There's a certain " type" that became huge in the U.S. as pop stars, generally speaking. Blonde suburban " sweet" girl next door types. Ultra smiley ( even if they are a bitch on wheels behind the scenes). Beckham was too reserved and disliked smiling and didn't quite capture what Americans went for during the late 90s early aughts.

R47 yes I heard that awful song with the Mellencamps keys played again and again and again until I wanted to box my own ears. She wasn't as big as Spears but she was fairly well known. She also had a brief movie career, she did Daisy Duke and some crapfest with Dane Cook.

Music was awful in the 00s anyway. She could choose to take it as a compliment that hers failed.

R56 culture was so unpleasant during the early 00s. The music was grotesque and tv was dominated by ugly and lurid crime shows.

I always liked Geri the most.

Apparently her fashion line is insanely successful, so Posh has that going on for her I guess...

Her net worth is allegedly $450 million. Things worked out OK for her.

Insanely successful, R59? When I was studying at Oxford in 2019, the master of Balliol College (who frequently requested my company when dining) told me Victoria Beckham's fashion line was deep in the red. I didn't know what to make of it!

R61 ummmm sure.

R30 I actually like that song. With the production and sound I swear it could have been a Destiny's Child song (without the auto-tune of course)

Speaking of Amber a month ago I heard this horrible remake of No More Tears.

Au contraire, R61. I have it on excellent authority that Mrs. Beckham's fashion line is doing quite well. Word in elite circles is that David's wife is a woman of extreme modesty, long known to let terrible rumours go unanswered in an (oft vain) attempt to avoid attention. Where do I hear these fascinating whispers, you ask? Why the streets of New Haven, Connecticut, where I am studying at Yale Law.

She recorded an entire second album that got shelved when her label went under, but it was actually really good! Better than her first album.

Well she has such charisma!

The epoch of WAG supremacy in our culture is over. She’s a relic of a bygone age.

I think Victoria wanted to be the British J Lo, but the singles she picked just weren't that memorable.

Geri's solo stuff seemed like a continuation of the Spice Girls' albums, but even camper and more bubblegum. She really went for the gay market, filling her videos with scantily-clad men and even releasing "It's Raining Men" as a lead single.

Emma's first album was sugary teen pop, but not as camp as the Spice Girls. She found the sound that worked for her with her second album.

Mel B went for the R&B market, but a Spice Girl was always going to have difficulty being taken seriously in that genre.

Mel C seemed determined to hit all bases, releasing rock, pop, R&B and dance singles from her first album. She mostly stuck with soft rock after that, occasionally shedding her Credible Spice persona to release stuff like her "I Want Candy" cover.

R57 and r56 she was part of that unpleasant culture! She did more than her fair share of making celebrity trashier with her stupid brand beckham shit.

I remember when they moved to America and all these American celebs were swarming around them trying to be photographed with them and probably wondering what the big deal was. I also remember them appearing at an mtv awards show soon after presenting some award, and David beckham saying something like: we have travelled far to be here tonigt - and all I could think was that the audience probably didn’t give a shit who they were or where they came from- these two tireless self important assholes treated like royalty just because…

I’d love for Kate beckinsale to do a Miriam Margoyles and candidly spill on Victoria’s and her friendship which seems non existent now. I always thought that was an odd forced friendship of convenience.

She was never strikingly beautiful, the most glamorous and high class. She was an average dancer, she seldom dressed well, she occasionally had great vocals.

That should nicely answer your question.

[quote] these two tireless self important assholes treated like royalty just because…

Would you just fuck off! Oh, sorry....you weren't talking about my husband and me.

Funny r73 I’m sure the beckhams are the model that Harry and Meghan are trying to replicate.

[quote]The British media hyped a huge chart battle between Victoria's "Not Such an Innocent Girl" and Kylie's "Can't Get You Out of My Head". Posh & Becks were the UK's biggest power couple at that point, and she was (and still is) the only Spice Girl not to have had a number one single. "Not Such an Innocent Girl" got to number six, while "Can't Get You Out of My Head" spent four weeks at number one. Twenty years later, the latter is remembered as one of the most popular songs of the 00s.

Victoria's musical output was defined by chart duels. The first was when Out Of Your Mind was up against Groovejet (If This Ain't Love) which remains one of the finest dance songs of the century.

None of VB's songs were bad but they just weren't memorable. I love A Mind Of Its Own, but it should have been on Wilson Phillips' first album, not a solo Spice record.

VB's public persona is very different to what she's like when the camera is off, very funny, dry sense of humour and very warm and friendly - and very, very generous. A family friend fundraising for their disabled child was contacted by VB's team and given far more support (not just financial) than they would have ever expected, but they had to agree they would never speak to the media about it.

I think it's a matter of public record that Victoria's fashion line consistently makes a loss and has been propped up by her and her husband's vast fortune for a number of years. It's just not profitable and never will be, but she's too stubborn/proud to close it.

I was a Spice Girls fan in their hey day and Victoria was my favourite, but even I never bought her album and I think her debut single was shite. Mel C has had by far the best discography of any of them.

Vic is quite a cool celebrity/socialite/fashionista in her moody polished-chavette way, and she’s known to be a charitable woman and a generous employer (albeit with an obliviousness about sustainability), but she really shouldn’t ever have had any involvement with performing arts. She’s talentless as an entertainer & recording artist, much like her pretentious son is a talentless designer and photog—both are made to be clothes-horses and useless C-list partygoers.

David is the opposite, in that he has (or had) an incredible career talent (almost an underrated one) to go with his star power, but behind-the-scenes he’s a lame sleazy dope and an ungracious bastard who doesn’t handle his fame well.

I never think Victoria really wanted a solo music career, just didn't what else to do?

She won't even take part in the Spice Girls reunion tours now.

Everyone knew who they were when they moved here but I found it funny how everyone went nuts that they decided to move to the states

Since Victoria never smiled, a friend of mine in the UK always called her "Glum Spice"

Mel B's first marriage was so short that she released her first solo single as Mel B, second as Mel G, and third as Mel B again. There were rumours that her husband Jimmy Gulzar (one of the Spice Girls' backing dancers) was gay.

Class, vocals, dancing... Not sure about those but she was the most adorable kittenish presence on television I've ever seen. A total delight. I giggled watching her.

R81 I never got why she married Rupaul.

Mel C had quite a bit of solo success including 9 top 10s plus an Olivier (equivalent to a Tony) nomination for her work in the musical Blood Brothers. She was also great in Jesus Chrust Superstar on stage.

I don’t understand why none of the Spice Girls solo singles were released in America, or if they were, why they didn’t get much promotion.

By the time she "arrived" in the U.S., she had become very surly and was past ingenue phase. Nobody bought her "image' whatever she was trying to serve up. Though, I do have to say she was much more impressive than the current Meghan Markle impersonation.

I wrote somewhere above - and not well. I was dismissive of all the spice girls solo career as I thought their singing was beside the point. I decided to quit the snark & watch the posted videos: who knew?!? I like solo Baby Spice. That song Maybe is catchy. I like the bossa nova songs Baby has recorded & now following her on spotify. The others not so much but ginger is pretty in the look at me video (not such a pretty song) Thanks OP

Top 10 solo spice songs.

1. Maybe - Emma

2. Mi Chico Latino - Geri

3. I Turn To You (Ibiza mix) - Mel C

4. Love Never Loved Me - Geri

5. No Sign Of Life - Emma

6. Ride It - Geri

7. I Want You Back - Mel B

8. Northern Star - Mel C

9. A Mind Of Its Own - Victoria

10. First Day Of My Life - Mel C

R85 Because their record labels did NOT want to flush money down the toilet.

Mel C.'s "Never Be The Same Again" is the best solo Spice song. As for Victoria having great vocals -- um...no.

For Emma's unsuccessful third album she covered Mono's Life In Mono, which was used in the 98 Great Expectations movie.

The song itself sampled The Ipcress file score throughout.

No "Never Be the Same Again" or "Breathing", R88?

Emma had the most shitty and boring solo songs of all of them IMO.

[quote]For Emma's unsuccessful third album she covered Mono's Life In Mono, which was used in the 98 Great Expectations movie.

Emma was so unoriginal. She also covered “What I Am” and “Crickets Sing for Anamaria.”

[quote]No "Never Be the Same Again" or "Breathing", [R88]?

I picked my picks. I chose my choices. I CHOOSE MY CHOICE.

Emma's Mischievous (co-written with Cathy Dennis) is another lovely wah wah bah bah pop song.

[quote]No "Never Be the Same Again"

See R90.

Victoria retweeted this video. She would have found it genuinely hilarious.

^^“What’s your favourite colour?” “See-through.”

“And your favourite flavour?” “Water.”

“Hidden talent?” “I used to be able to count.”

Because she was the least talented? I noticed in their video for Wanna Be she was barely shown.

Mel C actually just released a new song 5 days ago, and I like it a lot, shockingly

R100 It would be great if it wasn’t for all the horrible effects put on the vocals.

I agree about the annoying vocal production

I think only Mel C and Geri had good enough voices to even consider making it on their own. They apparently did most of the vocal heavy lifting (like Justin and JC for NSync).

R94 Doing a cover does not mean that you are unoriginal. The Beatles did covers. Dusty Springfield did covers. Aretha Franklin did covers. Aretha Franklin covered Dusty Springfield. You sing a song because it works for you, whether someone else sang it first or not.

"Crickets Sing For Anna Maria" worked for Emma's Sixties Brazilian sound because it was from the Sixties and it was Brazilian. She had a fun video for it and promoted Jake Canuso from backup dancer to featured "love interest".

Geri was the weakest vocalist r103

All the Spice Girls are pretty lousy but nobody ever liked Posh. She was boring and seemed stiff.

R103 when Victoria has to record your verse for the single version because you can’t sing it live, you’re a bad vocalist.

I didn’t know they released a song for their first big reunion tour. It came up on a playlist and I liked it! I was shocked. The video is stupid but the song is actually sweet and pretty and they sound great.

Maybe because she cannot sing. She never sang anything on SG's albums.

Vic must have been getting a cascade of weepy beggy arselicking SOS messages all last week from poor little reserve WAGgabee Sasha Atwood.

Wonder what Queen Victoria told her to do about her philandering baller-bf Jack? Guessing it involves a custom Eternity ring, joint merch, and selling GQ the exclusive to a trashy McMansion wedding.

^^^Ah-ha, what did I tell youse?😏😅

She’s been looking pretty lately

Zero charisma.

She’s ugly with a pig nose and can’t sing.

Why? Average looking, charisma free, lack of talent. The kids are the same.

hideous, anorexic and blank in the eyes.

Always thought this Geri single was nice

If you are interested in the Spice Girls, I suggest reading the book "Wannabe: How the Spice Girls Reinvented Pop Fame" by David Sinclair (also titled "Spice Girls Revisited"). He gives the most in depth look at the group from their formation in 1994 until their official split in 2001 and then there is a bit of focus on each of their solo careers from the late 1990s-mid 2000s. With the Spice Girls, the British press has been notoriously hostile, though initially this was not the case. If I remember correctly, in Sinclair's book he talks about how the group's manager Simon Fuller was really savvy with promoting the group during their debut and he struck some kind of deal with some of the British press, giving them exclusive stories in return for exposure and mostly positive press coverage. This helped once they really took off internationally in the music scene, the British papers were able to sell lots of copies with stories on the group and each member individually. But this ended up causing a great deal of backlash and overexposure very quickly in their home country. The media throughout the rest of the world, such as other parts of Europe, the Americas and Asia, had (and still have) a relatively positive/neutral outlook on the Spice Girls, but also much less constant press coverage. The same cannot be said about the press in the UK.

Anyway, the whole point of that is to say that Victoria had this against her when starting her solo music career, coupled with the fact that she was the wife of David Beckham, arguably one of the most well-known athletes, not only in Britain, but in the entire world. Being a Beckham put a much brighter and harsher spotlight on her. She was also the last of the Spice Girls to release any kind of material outside of the group, each of the other four members put out singles in the UK before Victoria did her first solo release in 2000, a collaboration with True Steppers and Dane Bowers.

None of Spice Girls were remarkable solo. At least Vic married up and had babies after the marriage to secure it. Unlike Mel B who has babies with every man she fucked.

I should also add that, prior to the formation of the group, none of the Spice Girls had major aspirations to be musical artists except for Melanie C.

Victoria, Mel B, Emma and Mel C all went to stage school where they trained in singing, dancing and acting, and Geri did a few acting and TV presenting jobs, so they all wanted to have careers as performers, but not specifically as recording artists. It wasn't until the group was formed that they all wanted to be a successful in music. Once they all went solo, Geri and Melanie C were the only ones who really dedicated a lot of time and effort into their music careers and tried to establish themselves as solo artists.