New Girl Bands on the Block

There are lots of new girl groups coming out at the moment, so here is my verdict on a select few, marked in Spice Girls out of 5…

Representing the UK: Mini Viva
At last the Mini Viva campaign is properly kicking into gear, and if all goes well they’ll soon be the pop superstars they have the potential to become. Of course, such potential is not always filled, and the music industry is a very unpredictable one, but if I had to bet on one of Girls Can’t Catch and Mini Viva being the next big girlband, I’d definitely go for Mini Viva. I’ve been listening to their debut single for a while and its poptasticness hasn’t worn off at all, so it’s nice to get a video to go alongside it. The song is more dancey than GA or The Saturdays and this is perhaps a good key to getting Radio 1 on board, since they always seem to fall for the old trick of “it’s not pop, it’s (insert cooler genre here)!” The video is as sparkly and exciting as the song and the girls themselves, and wouldn’t be out of place on The Box ten years ago, so Mini Viva are definitely a throwback to the good old days of girly pop bands. I don’t think they’re the next Spice Girls, but they’ll do a great job of filling in while GA are on hiatus.

Representing the USA: Care Bears on Fire
When I heard their name and saw a photo of this new girl group, I immediately laughed. They look extremely amateurish, but in fact they are probably the most realistic bunch of teenage girls out of any of the new girl bands. If you picked a random group of 3 female friends from an American high school, there’s a good chance they’d resemble these three. As for the name, it is a bit stupid (even Camden has stopped selling ‘Barbie is a slut’ t-shirts by now) but again it is likely that the girls thought of it for themselves. They do seem to have acquired some credibility, with slots at Lollapalooza festival this year and a pretty good video, although their recent appearance on Nickelodeon suggests they’re not ruling out becoming the female Jonas Brothers if no-one over the age of 15 turns up at their gigs. I’ll be interested actually to see which previous teenage girl-rockers’ route they’ll end up following… Lillix, the Donnas, or will they be no more than the new Clique Girlz? In fact I wonder if they’re more like the Dollyrots, especially after hearing this song which brought back my giggles, but for a good reason.

Representing the Netherlands: Monroe
After realising it was not in fact a misspelling of Monrose, I thought this was quite a good name, until I remembered that the last girl band named after the surname of a Hollywood legend was Hepburn. Oh well. Monroe are not dissimilar to Monrose, in fact, as they do seem quite blank and boring but could release something ace if they wanted to (like Monroe occasionally do). Unfortunately I don’t think they want to, as they seem to be heading in the same unoriginal, retro direction as Queensberry, and The Real Thing isn’t even as good as No Smoke. It’s fun and at least aims to be poptastic, unlike much of the music coming out of the Netherlands at the moment, which has been disappointing considering they have such a great track record. However, I can’t help thinking of Coca Cola when I listen to it. Maybe they’ll make some money by putting it on a Coke advert.