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Introducing The Sugababes

THE SOUL SOUND OF THE SUGABABES

By Chloe GilholyPublished 3 years ago 5 min read
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. Sugababes are a girl group that have been around since 1998, and they started releasing music in 2000. As of writing it has been 21 years since their debut album, One Touch was released. It won’t be long until their second album, Angels with Dirty Faces will also turn twenty. Writing this is starting to make me feel old. I was only a kid when all of these albums came out.

When I was a kid, Sugababes were my favourite band. There were plenty of girl groups and boybands to obsess over. Being a kid in the nineties was a crazy time. There was plenty of things that caused hysteria. The Spice Girls brought us girl power and embraced diversity. Pokémon got us wanting to catch them all. As record labels churned out countless bands that came and went, Sugababes came to stay. They changed their line-up several times, but the return of the originals brought hype.

I loved their voices and harmonies and felt that I could relate to a lot of their music. It was always a joy to hear their songs pop up on the radio or see their music videos on the music channel.

In their prime, they were a household name. If you would ask any British person to name 10 girl groups, you can guarantee that many of them will mention the Sugababes. They went on to release seven albums; four of which went platinum and one that many claim is not a true Sugababes album.

Before there was Little Mix, there was the likes of Spice Girls, Eternal, Girls Aloud, Atomic Kitten, Destiny’s Child and B*Witched. A lot of these bands already have a lot of books about them already. For some reason, I could only think of one biography about the Sugababes written by Emily Sheridan. When I tried to look up other books about the Sugababes, I got two things: music sheets for the One Touch album and a novel about a woman seeking a sugar daddy. Hopefully this will change some time in the future, as I feel the Sugababes have an interesting history that has been glossed over several times by the media.

There is a lot of elements that go into making a girl band. Some girl groups are made to look and sound alike, and some are designed for every girl to have their own personality. Sugababes is one that is the latter.

There is one thing that the Sugababes are famous for, and that is their line-up changes. One by one, the original members had left the band so by 2009, the band had no original members left. There is no doubt that Keisha’s departure caused outrage in the pop fandom.

In total, there were six official members of the Sugababes. The fact that there were six amuses me because that’s exactly how many wives Henry VIII of England had. At the time of conception, the original line-up of the Sugababes offered an organic alternative to the reality TV pop being churned out. There have been hiatuses, line-up changes and legal problems, but Sugababes went on to outlive all their rivals.

Sugababes have been a band that have always fascinated me. Ever since I first saw the music video to Overload as a young kid, I became fixated by them. The baseline and funky vocals were refreshing and something I had never heard of in a childhood of bubble-gum pop.

Like me, they were also young. At the time of their success, mental health issues were heavily overlooked at. There were rumours that Siobhan had left the band through a toilet window. And the rest of the band were accused of being bullies.

When I think of the Sugababes today. They may not be my favourite band anymore (it’s Depeche Mode in case you’re curious), Sugababes were the gateway to my love for music. If I hadn’t have gotten into Sugababes, I wouldn’t have gotten into Siobhan’s solo stuff which in turn introduced me to Kate Bush and Bjork.

Despite not having released a full-length album since 2010, Sugababes are still a band that many people talk about. Even if they do as little as drop a pin, they can find themselves in the newspapers. A lot of the old fan sites are still alive today and thriving off social media like Twitter and Instagram. Several new ones have also come to light in celebration of One Touch turning 21 this year.

The original line up had planned to reissue One Touch in 2020 in line of their 20th anniversary, but their plans were just a fraction of the many plans put aside and postponed thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic. This book aims to celebrate the diversity and talent behind the music as well as being enlightened by the rich history the band has and how they’ve changed the music industry.

The band had taken part in several charity singles, in which two of them topped the charts. At this moment in time, the final line-up which included Heidi, Amelle and Jade have been inactive since releasing Freedom as a free download. Heidi and Amelle have both said in interviews that they keep in touch.

Founding member, Keisha Buchanan has been incredibly open about the racial abuse she received by being the only black Sugababe and has been very brave out the whole ideal on her YouTube channel.

Maybe in five hundred years’ time, historians will be writing books called The Six Members of the Sugababes. Everybody knows the Sugababes as the band that always changed their members. This book was written to show you how the band lived and how they are about to rewrite and reclaim their history as one of the best girl groups of the age. Every Sugababes fan has their favourite era from the band. They were the mature alternative to their supposed rivals and even outlived many of them.

Despite the lack of official material released, the hype for the original Sugababes never truly faded thanks to entertaining memes, social media and most of all, the strong bond between Mutya, Keisha and Siobhan. Fans love decoding cryptic messages and their legal documents online.

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About the Creator

Chloe Gilholy

Former healthcare worker and lab worker from Oxfordshire. Author of ten books including Drinking Poetry and Game of Mass Destruction. Travelled to over 20 countries.

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