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BuzzJack Music Forum _ Spice Girls _ Geri Halliwell - 'Passion'
Posted by: Jay* 23rd December 2020, 10:45 AM
https://www.steveyb.co.uk/wp-content/gallery/Geri-Halliwell/GeriHalliwell-03Passion.jpg https://www.steveyb.co.uk/wp-content/gallery/Geri-Halliwell/GeriHalliwell-03PassionPromo.jpg
'Passion'
6th June 2005
1. Passion
2. Desire
3. Love Never Loved Me
4. Feel the Fear
5. Superstar
6. Surrender Your Groove
7. Ride It
8. There's Always Tomorrow
9. Let Me Love You More
10. Don't Get Any Better
11. Loving Me Back to Life
12. So I Give Up on Love
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A thread dedicated to discussion about Geri Halliwell's third album 'Passion'!
Following the release of the second album 'Scream If You Wanna Go Faster' in 2001, Geri explored other career opportunities in 2002 and 2003 - including the release of her second book 'Just for the Record', a role as a judge on the ITV show Popstars: The Rivals and a cameo in an episode of Sex and the City.
Geri was finally ready to return to music in 2004. The first single 'Ride It' made it to #4 in the UK chart in November of that year, making it her 6th Top 10 hit as a solo artist. This disco-flavoured pop song was intended to be the first taste of an album with similar dance-pop material, however Geri and EMI decided to make changes to the project. A few songs were scrapped, and Geri returned to the studio to write and record new songs - but this caused a six month wait for the follow up single 'Desire' (May 2005) and the eventual release of the 'Passion' album (June 2005). Unfortunately both releases were commercial disasters, reaching #22 and #41 respectively - her first releases to miss the UK Top 10 singles and albums charts. What went wrong? Perhaps the four year gap between albums had been too long, and a sizeable chunk of her fanbase had moved on. Arguably an ill-fated TV documentary which didn't exactly show Geri in the best light to the general public was harmful as well. To date it remains Geri's final commercially released studio album.
What are your thoughts and opinions on this album? Which tracks do you like, love, hate? What's your favourite? Were the singles the correct choices? Rate the tracks in order of favourite to least favourite.
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https://www.steveyb.co.uk/wp-content/gallery/Geri-Halliwell/GeriHalliwell-Sing08RideIt.jpghttps://www.steveyb.co.uk/wp-content/gallery/Geri-Halliwell/GeriHalliwell-Sing09Desire.jpg
Posted by: schizo_spice 23rd December 2020, 03:34 PM
It took many years of being her last album for Passion to really grow on me, I now quite enjoy it even if it does feel very disjointed.
My instant faves from the start were the singles, Love Never Loved Me, Feel the Fear and Let Me Love You More. The Ian Masterson tracks are the strength of "Passion".
Superstar, Surrender Your Groove and Dont Get Any Better were the three weakest links of the record for me then and still are now. Not that I dislike any of them just meh.
Would've been interesting to see how the original 2004 album would've been like /been received before she returned to the studio with Korpi and Blackcell.
Posted by: Pearll 23rd December 2020, 03:44 PM
Love Never Loved Me is still bangs so hard!
I love her vocals on this album. Seriously, she has come so far vocally. This genre was hers!
I still bop to Ride it occasionally. It's so camp, so Geri! She was such a promising solo artist! I remember watching her in that awful documentary. It was so obvious that she fed up with the industry.
I'm not sure if Europop lead single was a good choice in 2004 either...
Posted by: Tawdry Hepburn 23rd December 2020, 04:30 PM
I think by that point she didn't really stand a chance, the second album was a bit of an underperformance and that was a HUGE gap since. I think 'Ride It' only peaked that high due to the small amount of hype of it being her comeback before dropping down like it had a brick tied to it.
She really should have released 'Love Never Loved Me' though, what a huge mistake (although I'm not convinced it would have made much difference).
Posted by: Mr.X 23rd December 2020, 04:38 PM
I have never listened to the full album, but will give it a go this Christmas. The only songs I have heard have been the singles, So I Give Up on Love and Love Never Loved Me. The singles were bad, her worst at the time, and the other two songs didnt particularly grab me, personally, so I didnt bother with the rest of the album. Shall give a proper review in a few days, and hope this is a pleasant suprise like when I listened to Schizophonic again this year and was surprised I liked it more than I remembered ah
Posted by: tommie 23rd December 2020, 04:47 PM
She really should have released 'Love Never Loved Me' though, what a huge mistake (although I'm not convinced it would have made much difference).
I think she was also at that odd phase in her career where she wasn't seen as hip enough to be on Radio 1, but not old enough to fit in at Radio 2. The airplay for Desire was a disaster and a half, so it never stood a chance. Personally, I think it was wrong to ditch the Disco Sister concept - it worked a few years earlier for Kylie, so I think for Geri it could've been a solid concept rather than the mixed bag that ended up being "Passion".
Posted by: spiceboy 26th December 2020, 05:24 PM
I actually really like this album, it’s a bit disjointed but then Schizophonic is also quite disjointed so I don’t see it as a bad thing.
Really stupid not to have released LNLM first obviously should have been released in place of Ride it and the album off the back of it but then that would have been the Disco Sister album and not passion.
I think this album has the strongest songs she has done with LNLM and let me love you more and there’s always tomorrow and feel the fear, not to mention loving me back to life which I think is the best solo song she ever did. Apparently Feel the fear was a contender for the CIN single that year but Girls Aloud I’ll stand by you for the spot, a shame as that could have gotten Geri another hit.
I think it deserved to do a lot better than it did in the charts #41 was a real shame. Also don’t care what anyone says Ride it is a bop, really cringe but gets stuck in your head.
Ranking
1. Passion 7/10
2. Desire 9/10
3. Love never loved me 10/10
4. Feel the fear 10/10
5. Superstar 7/10
6. Surrender your groove 6/10
7. Ride it 8/10
8. There’s always tomorrow 10/10
9. Let me love you more 10/10
10. Loving me back to life 10/10
11. So I give up on love 6/10
Posted by: spiceboy 26th December 2020, 05:25 PM
Oh I hope you like loving me back to life it’s my favourite song by her
Posted by: Mr.X 26th December 2020, 09:02 PM
I shall report back but if it is anywhere near the quality of the other 4, Im not confident at all
Posted by: spiceboy 26th December 2020, 09:06 PM
Posted by: Piers 27th December 2020, 11:53 PM
Honestly, I've never understood why people didn't like it so much. I think the reviews of the time were so needlessly nasty that it somewhat tainted the perception. Yahoo's review called her a bronchial sea lion. As per usual with solo Spices, the write-ups made it sound like the music was shockingly inept..without showing much evidence they actually listened to the album at all.
My thoughts? I think Love Never Loved Me is the best thing she ever did solo. I like it even better than the similar Sorry by Madonna...which would land at #1 a few months after Passion was released. I think the title track is the best Geri ever sounded...and is a better, more flattering showcase for her voice than Mel B or Victoria ever got to have in their solo careers. After that, I think Feel the Fear and Let Me Love You More are very strong...and Ride It is extremely likable. I even think Superstar (which seems to be universally disliked by everyone except for...me?) has a classic pop chorus. There's a little fluff (Surrender Your Groove), but I don't think any of it's bad.
I'll defend the album, but there are things about the era that I don't love. The Ride It video and performances were amateur-hour. Most of her previous singles honestly did have well-thought out campaigns...especially Look At Me and It's Raining Men. But Ride It was content to have people just doing silly choreography in bargain bin afro wigs. Her GAY performance of Ride It, in particular, was a mess...with her spending half of it fiddling with a microphone that wasn't even on anyway. Desire's video fared a little better...but it was a pretty weird decision to base it off Catwoman...which had been the previous year's biggest critical and commercial flop. So. Yeah. The music I like, but the others elements weren't clicking.
Posted by: spiceboy 28th December 2020, 03:04 AM
My thoughts? I think Love Never Loved Me is the best thing she ever did solo. I like it even better than the similar Sorry by Madonna...which would land at #1 a few months after Passion was released. I think the title track is the best Geri ever sounded...and is a better, more flattering showcase for her voice than Mel B or Victoria ever got to have in their solo careers. After that, I think Feel the Fear and Let Me Love You More are very strong...and Ride It is extremely likable. I even think Superstar (which seems to be universally disliked by everyone except for...me?) has a classic pop chorus. There's a little fluff (Surrender Your Groove), but I don't think any of it's bad.
I'll defend the album, but there are things about the era that I don't love. The Ride It video and performances were amateur-hour. Most of her previous singles honestly did have well-thought out campaigns...especially Look At Me and It's Raining Men. But Ride It was content to have people just doing silly choreography in bargain bin afro wigs. Her GAY performance of Ride It, in particular, was a mess...with her spending half of it fiddling with a microphone that wasn't even on anyway. Desire's video fared a little better...but it was a pretty weird decision to base it off Catwoman...which had been the previous year's biggest critical and commercial flop. So. Yeah. The music I like, but the others elements weren't clicking.
I agree with all of this. Album is good, videos (and album artwork) are not so much (although I love the Australian cover). I also think Geri has never looked better than she did during the Desire era, everything was just wow!
Posted by: tommie 28th December 2020, 08:09 AM
I think the biggest issue with the album is that it ends up being very disjointed - as I said, I think she would've been better off going with the Disco Sister concept, especially with the silliness of the Ride It video. Then all of a sudden she came out with Desire (6 months after Ride It!), which was a clear attempt at her trying to recreate Some Girls. Then you had tracks like So I Give Up On Love and no clear real theme of the album. I can see why the reviewers went the easy route with reviewing the album because with an album name like "Passion" you end up asking yourself what her passion is and what it's meant to represent?
Posted by: Mr.X 28th December 2020, 12:16 PM
OK I had a listen to the album last night and I think it isnt as bad as I thought it would be. There are some nice moments in it, with Love Never Loved Me being the obvious stand out.
I think a good single mix of LNLM would have been more successful than the singles she ultimately released out of this and probably would have gone down very well with her target audience. Whilst it is an uneven album, I do appreciate the breath of diversity of genres in there (the quality of those, however, is another matter). Also, I think Geri does sound better than ever on it.
Let Me Love You More is cute, although it does sound like she was trying to do a companion song to a previous song of hers from the first album, a mix between Sometime and Let Me Love You. It's here, I think, she sounds the more comfortable both lyrically and vocally. Not sure about some of the lyrics, but it's ok overall.
The main issue on the album seems to be that it's full of a lot of good intentions but it doesn't sound honest and it all amounts to very little, to me. Lyrically, it's very stale which is a shame as Geri always framed herself as a song-writer. Whilst this was perceived as true during the hey days of the Spice Girls and her initial solo career (and she does love to take credit for the hits), I think her writing became very stale somewhere around the Scream album release. By the time this album comes around, most of its lyrics are quite bland and the word play it's cute at first but there is only so much you can bare of the same 'silly' and 'quirky' type of lyrics over a full album. Some songs, like Feel The Fear, are basically filled with the type of positive messages you find in fridge magnets: cute but full of clichés and meaningless at the end of the day...
Geri isnt the only one suffering from this (Melanie C is basically a walking, singing fridge magnet herself) but ultimately it comes across as insincere here as there are so many platitudes one can handle without rolling our eyes and tuning off. But songs like Superstar for example, are so ridden with clichés that you wonder if Geri ever actually experienced celebrity lifestyle at all, and she sounds like she just read about it on a magazine.
The other big issue is the production values, both musically and the visuals of the era. As Piers said and well, it all seemed quite lame. Musically, she is dabbling in genres that she doesnt grasp at all, nor does she sound like she fits them. So I Give Up on Love and Passion are examples of this. Both songs are trying very - very - hard to sound like old school big band numbers but they just come across as middle of the road productions overall (and the awful lyrics on both don't help!). The production on Feel The Fear, for instance, is of the standard of the LA State of Mind iamspamspamamirecordings 
Plus, she sounds BORED on it... I can see why it wasn't a single. The lyrics are so saccharine she would have been mauled by the press if it was a single at all.
Ride and Desire work well in the context of the album. They are definitely two of the strongest singles and I wish she would have done more with the videos and promotion for them...
Ultimately, you can tell the album was done by committee. A shame she didnt go the full Disco Sister approach as it could have been interesting and you can see where she was going with it. But even then, I am not sure she would have been well received with it, as Geri was never the most DANCE artist out there... Not to say that she couldnt do it (hello Dua Lipa and them bad moves!!) but I do think it would have been more interesting than what we got.
I dont think I will be revisiting much of this album, unfortunately, though I have a new appreciation for Let Me Love You More and Love Never Loves Me.
Posted by: Sideout 29th December 2020, 01:30 AM
My instant faves from the start were the singles, Love Never Loved Me, Feel the Fear and Let Me Love You More. The Ian Masterson tracks are the strength of "Passion".
Superstar, Surrender Your Groove and Dont Get Any Better were the three weakest links of the record for me then and still are now. Not that I dislike any of them just meh.
Would've been interesting to see how the original 2004 album would've been like /been received before she returned to the studio with Korpi and Blackcell.
I agree, the Ian Masterson and Hannah Robinson tracks are the best on Passion (Love Never Loved Me, Let Me Love You More, There's Always Tomorrow). I would love to hear the two unreleased songs they did for the album (Disco Sister Music, Geri's Got Her Groove Back).
Posted by: spiceboy 29th December 2020, 10:35 AM
Geri's got her groove back sounds dreadful based on the title
Posted by: spiceboy 29th December 2020, 10:35 AM
I think a good single mix of LNLM would have been more successful than the singles she ultimately released out of this and probably would have gone down very well with her target audience. Whilst it is an uneven album, I do appreciate the breath of diversity of genres in there (the quality of those, however, is another matter). Also, I think Geri does sound better than ever on it.
Let Me Love You More is cute, although it does sound like she was trying to do a companion song to a previous song of hers from the first album, a mix between Sometime and Let Me Love You. It's here, I think, she sounds the more comfortable both lyrically and vocally. Not sure about some of the lyrics, but it's ok overall.
The main issue on the album seems to be that it's full of a lot of good intentions but it doesn't sound honest and it all amounts to very little, to me. Lyrically, it's very stale which is a shame as Geri always framed herself as a song-writer. Whilst this was perceived as true during the hey days of the Spice Girls and her initial solo career (and she does love to take credit for the hits), I think her writing became very stale somewhere around the Scream album release. By the time this album comes around, most of its lyrics are quite bland and the word play it's cute at first but there is only so much you can bare of the same 'silly' and 'quirky' type of lyrics over a full album. Some songs, like Feel The Fear, are basically filled with the type of positive messages you find in fridge magnets: cute but full of clichés and meaningless at the end of the day...
Geri isnt the only one suffering from this (Melanie C is basically a walking, singing fridge magnet herself) but ultimately it comes across as insincere here as there are so many platitudes one can handle without rolling our eyes and tuning off. But songs like Superstar for example, are so ridden with clichés that you wonder if Geri ever actually experienced celebrity lifestyle at all, and she sounds like she just read about it on a magazine.
The other big issue is the production values, both musically and the visuals of the era. As Piers said and well, it all seemed quite lame. Musically, she is dabbling in genres that she doesnt grasp at all, nor does she sound like she fits them. So I Give Up on Love and Passion are examples of this. Both songs are trying very - very - hard to sound like old school big band numbers but they just come across as middle of the road productions overall (and the awful lyrics on both don't help!). The production on Feel The Fear, for instance, is of the standard of the LA State of Mind iamspamspamamirecordings
Plus, she sounds BORED on it... I can see why it wasn't a single. The lyrics are so saccharine she would have been mauled by the press if it was a single at all. Ride and Desire work well in the context of the album. They are definitely two of the strongest singles and I wish she would have done more with the videos and promotion for them...
Ultimately, you can tell the album was done by committee. A shame she didnt go the full Disco Sister approach as it could have been interesting and you can see where she was going with it. But even then, I am not sure she would have been well received with it, as Geri was never the most DANCE artist out there... Not to say that she couldnt do it (hello Dua Lipa and them bad moves!!) but I do think it would have been more interesting than what we got.
I dont think I will be revisiting much of this album, unfortunately, though I have a new appreciation for Let Me Love You More and Love Never Loves Me.
The fact there is no mention of loving me back to life does not bode well
Posted by: Mr.X 29th December 2020, 11:02 AM
Let me just say that I didnt think it was worth a mention?
Maybe I am a cold hearted bitch but by the time that song came along I was too bored to care for any more clichéd lyrics and bored singing
Posted by: spiceboy 29th December 2020, 11:15 AM
Maybe I am a cold hearted bitch but by the time that song came along I was too bored to care for any more clichéd lyrics and bored singing
Omg you took the words right out of my mouth describing you...
Posted by: Fleetwood Maz 29th December 2020, 01:10 PM
Feel The Fear is one of m favorite Geri ballads ever. i relistened to this album over the summer and i think it's not as bad as people make it out to be though the Disco Sister album idea excited me more.
Posted by: Sideout 29th December 2020, 09:37 PM
Honestly, almost half the album is b-side material. Superstar, Don't Get Any Better, Passion, So I Give Up On Love and Surrender Your Groove does nothing for me. Can't believe 100% Pure Love and Set Me Off were left off the album.
Posted by: schizo_spice 29th December 2020, 10:06 PM
I agree those two tracks were much more in tune with the original feel off the direction she was going in with the album.
I recall her saying in the documentary that they were choreographing her for 100% PL to be the single but she felt like they were putting her in the sausage machine.
I think she thought they wanted her to be a covers artist after the huge success of Its Raining Men. Given Geri's strong writing talent I can understand why that would annoy her.
Posted by: sammy01 29th December 2020, 11:18 PM
This album is absolute shit. Sorry Geri, Schizophonic was actually surprisingly good and varied, but Passion is just dire. It's my least Favourite solo album along with This Time and Stages.
Passions as an era was truly awful too, Geri was on the edge mentally, looked terrible the 2 singles videos were tacky as hell. An absolute era to forget.
Posted by: -Jay- 29th June 2021, 01:03 PM
The topic of her 2005 tour was raised in the Throwback topic. It's an interesting moment that sadly marked the beginning of her solo downfall.
Here's everything I can found about it, including two articles that definitely take pleasure in the tour not doing well. Both reference it being postponed, but I can't find anything about it being outright cancelled.
Geri Halliwell
The Live Tour 2005
Tour Dates
May 03, 2005: Dublin, Ireland - The Point
May 04, 2005: Belfast, UK - Waterfront Hall
May 06, 2005: Glasgow, Scotland - Clyde Auditorium
May 09, 2005: Edinburgh, Scotland - Edinburgh Playhouse
May 13, 2005: Aberdeen, UK - Aberdeen Exhibition Centre
May 14, 2005: Manchester, UK - Carling Apollo Manchester
May 18, 2005: Birmingham, UK - NIA Academy
May 21, 2005: Plymouth, UK - Plymouth Pavilions
May 22, 2005: Brighton, UK - Brighton Centre
May 24, 2005: London, UK - Carling Apollo Hammersmith
May 27, 2005: Doncaster, UK - The Dome
May 28, 2005: Blackpool, UK - Opera House
May 29, 2005: Cardiff, UK - Cardiff International Arena
https://britneyinternational.tripod.com/tourdates101/id220.html
Byline: WITH JESSICA CALLAN, EVA SIMPSON AND CAROLINE HEDLEY
GERI Halliwell's desperate attempts at reinventing herself to revive her ailing pop career have not gone to plan.
Confusing the few fans she has left, 32-year-old Geri ditched the camp vamp Christina Aguilera look and decided to rebrand herself as a serious singer-songwriter, like Dido.
But nothing seems to work.
Earlier in the week she ditched her manager. And last night she put on hold a 13-date tour of England and Ireland, after failing to sell out a single venue.
The gigs, planned for May, were to coincide with the release of her third solo album.
But her bosses at Innocent Records are said to be unhappy with it and have ordered her back in the studio to come up with new material.
"The plan was that Geri would release a single this month and put the album out in March," says our spy. "But they dropped off the release schedules.
"She's been working on her second solo comeback for more than three years now. It was scheduled for release last summer, there's no point her touring with just one single out."
It had all started so promisingly for Geri. She left The Spice Girls in 1998 and a year later released Schizophonic. In 2001 she put out a second album, Scream If You Wanna Go Faster.
Then it all went quiet.
She pulled out all the stops to relaunch her solo career last November.
To promote the camp disco single Ride It, she cantered through Soho on a horse before cavorting on stage at G.A.Y with barely-clad dancers. But it only sold 41,000 copies.
"She did a fantastic performance at G.A.Y in December dressed in a toga with half-naked dancers in an orgy-style setting," says our source.
"This has now all stopped. She has decreed that she wants to be taken seriously.
"But she's Geri Halliwell, not Dido! She should stick to what she does best, which is tongue-in-cheek, kitsch music and videos."
Geri has now parted company with manager Richard Thomp-son after six months and signed to Paul Conroy, who oversaw the launch of The Spice Girls. She has also turned to songwriters/ producers Korpi & Blackcell who have worked with Dannii Minogue. Ominously, Dannii parted company with Warners last May after her Neon Nights album failed to set the world on fire.
A spokeswoman for Geri said: "Currently in the midst of finishing her forthcoming album, Geri's new team have advised her to postpone her May UK tour.
"Innocent are excited about the new album and look forward to being able to promote it properly before Geri embarks on the tour."
We're not holding our breath.
https://www.thefreelibrary.com/3am%3a+GERI+NO+DATES%3b+She+postpones+poor-selling+tour.-a0128504179
https://www.femalefirst.co.uk/music/musicnews/Geri+Halliwell-3422.html
Posted by: Mr.X 29th June 2021, 03:18 PM
Yeah, I mean the press were at their most vile back then in regards to teh girls so no surprise that they treated this as a way to beat her with another stick!
Personally, Geri's fortunes had kind of already been decided after It's Raining Men, since her sales and charts had started to dwindle quite a lot. I mean, the Scream album sold poorly in comparison to her previous and that is after such a massive hit with IRM.
One could argue that after the year 2000, apart from the odd release that saw success, they as a whole were very much done too as pop artists who had 'chart success' and sold considerably. Throughout 2000 with so many solo projects and a fumbled release of Forever, maybe they just lost the appeal.
Obviously WTYSL and IRM did quite well. One could suggest that is because WTYSL is a bloody BOP and IRM was a cover of a highly successful song included in one of that year's biggest films promotions! Cos apart from those two, most of their songs failed to make much of a dent on the charts and sales wise...
ANYWAY!!! I dont think I would have ever attended a solo Geri concert but I would have loved to see videos/footage afterwards, for sure! Im sure she would do something interesting with it.
Posted by: schizo_spice 29th June 2021, 05:16 PM
Didn’t the Brighton date sell out or did I imagine that? I am sure that’s a denden memory.
I think this tour was too ambitious and her management mishandled it badly. It should’ve been shorter maybe 5 or 6 dates just to test the waters.
The Tickled Pink gig seemed like a taster of what was going to happen, I’m sure it would’ve been fabulous 
Posted by: Mr.X 29th June 2021, 05:29 PM
I dont remember any selling out, much to the contrary, it was really low sales. Like, it was too ambitious.
For comparison, the Brighton date was scheduled for the Brighton Centre, which is a big place. Like, Lorde and big touring stars play there, so I am surprised that she thought she would sell it at all ah
I would have hoped she would have focused on theatres at least for a first tour, with some festivals attached to it as well. But she wanted to go all out and it fell flat...
Posted by: spiceboy 29th June 2021, 05:46 PM
I think the problem is Geri would easily have sold out those dates during her first album era and likely during the Scream era too... they approached it as if Geri was still on that level which of course she wasn't by this point...
Again this ties into the not expecting such a drastic fall to occur (for all the girls not just Geri). I mean all of Geri's, Emma's and Melanie C's albums by this point had gone Gold or Multi Platinum by this point and Mel B's and Victoria's were pretty much at the Silver marks... I think we all expected that Geri, Mel and Emma would continue to certify their albums and not go down to selling less than 20k.
Posted by: Mr.X 29th June 2021, 06:11 PM
I honestly dont think she would have sold out these venues even in the eras before. She wasnt known as a great singer nor as a great performer, so it's not accurate im afraid, specially after 2000/2001.
Mel C was able to tour successfully during Reason because she really built that audience and her career as a touring act back then. She toured so much with Northern Star - part of the reason as to why Reason took so long to release. But she did the ground work. She did the festivals, the theatre venues, etc.
Geri just assumed that she could jump into big venues, which is silly!
Posted by: -Jay- 29th June 2021, 06:39 PM
I'm not sure what Geri spent her time doing between Bag It Up and It's Raining Men (other than working on the second album of course, but that surely didn't take a whole year). I feel like 2000 was the year for her to put her toe in the water of touring, even if it had just been smaller venues. Melanie C definitely approached this correctly.
Sadly Geri's sudden ambition to become a live act was way too late.
I'm pretty sure her tickets were under £20, which wasn't unusual in those days, tickets were generally far cheaper than they are nowadays. I wish more information about that tour was accessible, but I guess it died with the deletion of DenDen (just like so many other random old bits of solo Spice news!). I seem to remember that some (or all?) fans weren't refunded, there was definitely some controversy on DenDen about it.
Posted by: schizo_spice 29th June 2021, 06:55 PM
I recall her saying during the Schizophonic times that she wanted to tour but wanted to wait until she had released a second album so she had more material to work with.
Of course by the end of 2001 she was “spent” with the music industry so a tour in 2002 was sadly not going to happen.
Posted by: -Jay- 11th February 2023, 10:12 AM
A fan made documentary… 2 hours long(!):
Posted by: tommie 11th February 2023, 10:25 AM
Love that Gerita still incites such PASSION among fans x
Posted by: Jessie Where 11th February 2023, 12:46 PM
That time away between album 2 era and 'Ride It' felt like forever, I guess because 2002 and 2003 were such crucial years in pop where so much changed in the landscape. It felt like somebody from yesteryear attempting a comeback.
Posted by: Mr.X 11th February 2023, 04:35 PM
I was going through insomnia last night and had a little watch of this. It was sad how uninspired she was with this record, you could tell she was trying to establish herself as an artist that she is not, and fell flat on her face.
The 'An Audience with' interview was so sad cos you could tell she wasn't happy at all with how the record and herself were being received.
I think she, like the rest of the Spices, were kind of done in the public's eyes by the end of 2001. The only one who managed a bit more attention and appreciation from critics and the general public was Emma in 2003/2004 but even she fell flat too afterwards (and the increase in success wasnt that much bigger anyway!).
Posted by: Last Dreamer 31st March 2023, 09:07 AM
It's my favourite Geri's album and "Desire" is my favourite her single.
Posted by: schizo_spice 31st March 2023, 05:14 PM
Ian Masterson should’ve produced the entire album. Outwith the Absolute team he really knew what worked for Geri.
I’d love to hear more unreleased Masterson stuff from this time.
Posted by: tommie 31st March 2023, 05:26 PM
She probably would've had more success if she went with the original Disco Sister idea, but then again everything was just a mess with Passion.
Posted by: sammy01 31st March 2023, 07:11 PM
Whilst it is custom now for an artist to vanish for a couple of years after a 'flop' to get the comeback feel and tag. In the early 2000s the longer you were away the more forgotten and over you were.
In hindsight after Scream underperformed she should have been out with the next album 6 months after calling or at least the first single with a new sound and catchy song.
Posted by: Equinox8 31st March 2023, 08:23 PM
I just watched the documentary for the first time, and it's intriguing to see Geri's demeanor at different points within it. In the sit down interview with the audience, you can really see how defeated she felt when she got questions and compliments about Love Never Loved Me. You could tell she wasn't backing an album she was proud of. However, I appreciated her honesty about not "feeling" 100% Pure Love as a single because while the original is such a classic, her cover version would not have added anything new to it. Geri says so many times in this documentary how she didn't want to be a product of the sausage machine; she wanted to be different. Fully respect that. I just find there to be such irony that her third album called Passion (inappropriate title because she didn't seem to have any for that body of work) kind of went belly-up like the Spice Girls' third album (equally inappropriately called Forever).
Posted by: -Jay- 1st April 2023, 01:53 AM
^ I also remember seeing that sit down interview and how she came across like she was just done with it all, it was sad to see.
I agree that she left it too long between album eras. Ride It came 3 years after Calling, and Passion came over 4 years after Scream If You Wanna Go Faster (the album). That was a long time for her to put her solo music career on hold.
Having said that I think she did very well to get to #4 with Ride It after all that time away, quite a solid return and surely something that could have been built on. But then the next single didn't come until 6 months later... I think that was the nail in the coffin. Once they (management/label/Geri) had committed to her return with Ride It, it should have been full steam ahead after that, no indecision and changing the direction of the album. I might be misremembering but didn't she change her management between Ride It and Desire? The next single should have been no later than 3 months after Ride It. Also whoever advised her to do a documentary at that point in time really did not have her best interest's at heart. If it was Geri herself who pushed for that documentary, that was sadly a mistake.
Posted by: tommie 1st April 2023, 06:01 AM
There's Something About Gerita is one of my favourite mid-00s pop artifacts along with Totally Scott-Lee.
Posted by: Mr.X 1st April 2023, 09:40 AM
I agree that she left it too long between album eras. Ride It came 3 years after Calling, and Passion came over 4 years after Scream If You Wanna Go Faster (the album). That was a long time for her to put her solo music career on hold.
Having said that I think she did very well to get to #4 with Ride It after all that time away, quite a solid return and surely something that could have been built on. But then the next single didn't come until 6 months later... I think that was the nail in the coffin. Once they (management/label/Geri) had committed to her return with Ride It, it should have been full steam ahead after that, no indecision and changing the direction of the album. I might be misremembering but didn't she change her management between Ride It and Desire? The next single should have been no later than 3 months after Ride It. Also whoever advised her to do a documentary at that point in time really did not have her best interest's at heart. If it was Geri herself who pushed for that documentary, that was sadly a mistake.
The fact that Ride It 'only' got to #4 (and was out of the charts and sold less than any of her previous albums' singles), together with the absolute lack of interest in her tour which lead to it being cancelled, probably hurt Geri personally and professionally more than anything at the time.
It was why everything got delayed, wasn't it? So that she could record new songs for the album to move it away from its dance focus which led to Desire and Passion being the mess they were.. It was pretty obvious she wasn't happy either with herself and the documentary at the time showed that as well.. The documentary was baffling because it showed Geri pretending to be happy throughout when she is clearly not.
The commens about the 'sausage machine' have always been funny to me, because it was like she was rebelling 'against the machine' whereas clearly she was just pissed off that the machine wasn't keen on her anymore... Had Ride It gone to #1 and the tour didn't flop, she would have felt on top of the world and carry on. The album is very 'machine ready' and some of those songs are clearly the 'frankfurters' of her discography. In fact, she had been the ultimate 'sausage machine' pop star for such a long time, doing high profile appereances and interviews, scandal after scandal, without any touring or that many gigs during her solo peak (not talking about one offs like that awful army show or some tv appereances, I mean her doing shows herself with her own crowd).
Posted by: colinn 2nd April 2023, 02:09 AM
I still can't believe she done nothing with the Popstars: The Rivals gig. She made great connections with ITV (even featuring in the indents at the time) and didn't think to launch a new campaign off that?
Posted by: -Jay- 2nd April 2023, 05:54 AM
Do we know if she’d already started recording just before or during Popstars The Rivals? It does seem strange that she didn’t utilise that prime time TV slot to benefit her music career. I suppose the Just for the Record book was timed to take advantage of it, but it would surely have been a good idea to have had a single (and ideally an album) to go alongside all of that attention. Yet it took her until 2 years after. Kind of funny that Girls Aloud, who Geri had had a hand in creating on the show, were #1 in the singles chart in the week that Ride It got to #4 (and that was their 7th single, which kind of further highlights just how long Geri spent away from the charts, given that Ride It was only her 8th single!).
Mr.X mentioning the tour - that was another hugely damaging aspect to this era, the flopping of that. That has to be one of the worst timed & misjudged moments of her whole career, to try and attempt that at that moment. She had *so* much groundwork to do to come close to making that more viable. I’m not sure what she or her team were thinking!! It’s nice to be ambitious but sadly that was pretty much delusional. I wonder if the tour cancellation & the bad press surrounding that had any part to play in radio stations becoming cold to her and refusing to support Desire? Because maybe they saw her solo career as a sinking ship and didn’t feel enthused to support her.
Posted by: One_For_Sorrow 2nd April 2023, 09:43 AM
I did not know all this re: Passion. I’ll Ned to see if I can find the documentary somewhere.
Posted by: spiceboy 2nd April 2023, 11:11 AM
Dear god don't watch the documentary it is a total car crash! She is bordering on insane throughout the majority of it, 'schizophonic' was definitely the right idea for her first album title
Posted by: dancinqueen 2nd April 2023, 01:11 PM
That documentary - unfortunately - made me hate her attitude and personality. And I’m sure I wasn’t the only one.
It’s a pity considering Geri is an intelligent person. She did signed for a car crash and she has never recovered since then.
My fave documentaries:
1. Victoria Beckham - Coming to America
2. Melanie C - Northern Star
Posted by: Equinox8 2nd April 2023, 01:27 PM
It’s a pity considering Geri is an intelligent person. She did signed for a car crash and she has never recovered since then.
My fave documentaries:
1. Victoria Beckham - Coming to America
2. Melanie C - Northern Star
Posted by: Maz! 2nd April 2023, 01:30 PM
I had tickets to see Geri in London , when she had cancelled i decided to cancel the trip (which made me have a fall out with the guy i was going with cause he wanted to see Melanie C instead on that day oop) and then college scheduled an exam on that day so maybe i was lucky it was cancelled. Still a shame it didnt go ahead.
Posted by: tommie 2nd April 2023, 01:57 PM
Gerita would've put on a great show - unlike Emma who would've mimed behind a Christmas tree (that happened, oh yes)
Posted by: Mr.X 2nd April 2023, 07:34 PM
You really think a Geri Halliwell concert would be live?
Posted by: One_For_Sorrow 3rd April 2023, 07:49 AM
Hahaha I’ll probably give it a miss then. Thanks.
Posted by: tommie 3rd April 2023, 03:16 PM
She would've sounded exactly like on record - she's just that flawless x
Posted by: Piers 8th April 2023, 02:26 PM
I would support any of them touring...and in Geri's case, I think she would've had the material to potentially make a really fun setlist. I'll admit that I was nervous at the time about THAT era of Geri touring. After making pretty solid decisions about collaborators in the first few years of her career, she'd hired a friend to direct the Ride It video...and...to me, it showed. The Ride It performances never seemed like they'd been rehearsed much. When she performed her past hits around that time, it was with minimal choreography. It seemed she wanted to just stand around bow-legged and make a few gestures with her arms. Nothing seemed especially focused...and I'm not sure how a tour would have fared, springing from that.
I actually feel the prime times for her to tour would have been right after the Bag It Up release...or launching after the release of It's Raining Men. Both of these eras showed a Geri who was willing to go for broke. That Geri would flood the BRITS stage with men in pink underwear...or parade out so many IRM dancers at Party in the Park that you weren't sure which side was the stage and which side was the crowd. That Geri needed to stage a show.
Posted by: Equinox8 8th April 2023, 06:52 PM
I actually feel the prime times for her to tour would have been right after the Bag It Up release...or launching after the release of It's Raining Men. Both of these eras showed a Geri who was willing to go for broke. That Geri would flood the BRITS stage with men in pink underwear...or parade out so many IRM dancers at Party in the Park that you weren't sure which side was the stage and which side was the crowd. That Geri needed to stage a show.
Fully agreed!Posted by: Mr.X 8th April 2023, 07:52 PM
I actually feel the prime times for her to tour would have been right after the Bag It Up release...or launching after the release of It's Raining Men. Both of these eras showed a Geri who was willing to go for broke. That Geri would flood the BRITS stage with men in pink underwear...or parade out so many IRM dancers at Party in the Park that you weren't sure which side was the stage and which side was the crowd. That Geri needed to stage a show.
Bang on, but I do think even in the Bag It Up and Its Raining Men eras, it would have still been a stretch for her to do arenas then. Geri just never felt comfortable on tour, and she wasn't exactly known for being a live act at all even then and was known as the worst singer in the Spice Girls.
Maybe if she had started with some theatre shows during the Schizo era, it would have started to build some ground up. Mel C toured for two years during the NS era and that did her wonders.
Posted by: spiceboy 8th April 2023, 08:17 PM
Maybe if she had started with some theatre shows during the Schizo era, it would have started to build some ground up. Mel C toured for two years during the NS era and that did her wonders.
She had arenas planned?? Wow did not know that! I had tickets to Blackpool which was winter gardens a theatre.
Posted by: Mr.X 8th April 2023, 08:28 PM
It was to a mix right? I remember that the Birmingham venue was a 20,000 capacity and it had barely sold anything at the time...
Posted by: Voodoo 8th April 2023, 09:08 PM
These were the planned tour dates:
The Live Tour 2005
May 03, 2005: Dublin, Ireland - The Point
May 04, 2005: Belfast, UK - Waterfront Hall
May 06, 2005: Glasgow, Scotland - Clyde Auditorium
May 09, 2005: Edinburgh, Scotland - Edinburgh Playhouse
May 13, 2005: Aberdeen, UK - Aberdeen Exhibition Centre
May 14, 2005: Manchester, UK - Carling Apollo Manchester
May 18, 2005: Birmingham, UK - NIA Academy
May 21, 2005: Plymouth, UK - Plymouth Pavilions
May 22, 2005: Brighton, UK - Brighton Centre
May 24, 2005: London, UK - Carling Apollo Hammersmith
May 27, 2005: Doncaster, UK - The Dome
May 28, 2005: Blackpool, UK - Opera House
May 29, 2005: Cardiff, UK - Cardiff International Arena
Posted by: Yobnedor 8th April 2023, 10:22 PM
The smallest arenas then! Wasn’t NIA academy basically the NIA at half occupancy?
Posted by: -Jay- 8th April 2023, 10:34 PM
A shame she wasn't able to do well in venues of those capacities, but it really was the wrong era for her to give it a go. The groundwork for touring should have been done far earlier, as has been pointed out, for sure.
Posted by: dancinqueen 10th April 2023, 11:08 AM
This is - together with This Time, Stages, LA State of Mind, A Girl Like Me, and all VB discography - the worst when it comes to Spice Girls music.
It’s not even camp, fun, anything she was meant to be. The album cover says boring, the documentary says annoying, the music is basically AI generated content with no soul.
IMHO, her second album is the best.
Posted by: spiceboy 10th April 2023, 11:27 AM
Poor Geri, I actually really like Passion think it is her most cohesive work.
The ballads Feel the fear, Let me love you more, Loving me back to life and There's always tomorrow, are all beautiful songs. To be honest the only songs I am not hugely keen on are the opening and closing tracks, I just don't think she can really pull off the Jazz / blues style she was attempting. Otherwise I think every other track is decent.
Posted by: Piers 15th April 2023, 02:35 PM
This story has kinda faded into obscurity over time...but does anybody else remember Girls Aloud doing some interviews, offering Geri to tour with them? This would have been just after she cancelled her tour amidst the low ticket sales story, I think. What I don't remember is how serious Girls Aloud were about it. It may have been as simple as some off-handed remarks..."oh, she'd be welcome to tour with us" or something.
Anyway. Let's say for the sake of argument, they were serious. Would that have been a good idea? I'm sure it would have been a blow to Geri's ego...having had a very impressive chart run at one point...and then not being able to headline a tour a few years later. But. I don't know. I know a lot of people would find this to be a horrendous idea, but I think maybe a two-act tour would have genuinely helped Passion and given Geri a little more longevity? I'm sure Geri would have essentially been the opening act, but billing it as co-headliners would perhaps make it go over better. There does exist a connection there with Geri having played a certain role in the creation of the group. Maybe Girls Aloud could have come out to perform a Spice Girls medley with Geri? I do realize this arrangement's very lopsided. Geri would have significantly more to gain from it than GA.
Posted by: tommie 15th April 2023, 02:44 PM
Gerita is such a true talented artisté unlike OTHER people *cough* Emma *cough* Melanie C *cough* Melanie B *cough* Posh *cough*
Some people have VISIONS over their solo careers, others will just release things and hope it sticks!
Posted by: Last Dreamer 16th April 2023, 07:24 AM
My favourite tracks : "Desire" and "Passion"
Least favourite tracks : "Ride It" and "Surrender Your Groove"
Posted by: schizo_spice 16th April 2023, 09:13 AM
Love Never Loved Me truly is the song that got away for her from this project.
I have no idea how well it would've performed in 2005 as it seems that was a major solo spice backlash going on at that time however it just had all the ingredients of what Geri was about. Desire isn't a bad song its just not Geris style.
Posted by: Piers 16th April 2023, 01:57 PM
I have no idea how well it would've performed in 2005 as it seems that was a major solo spice backlash going on at that time however it just had all the ingredients of what Geri was about. Desire isn't a bad song its just not Geris style.
Right. Even though I firmly believe Love Never Loved Me is Geri's best solo song, I do wonder what its reputation would be today if it were the song that tanked on the charts instead of Desire. It's been so many years that I think some things get forgotten...but a large part of Desire's problem was the total media blackout. I remember it actually doing well enough in video plays on various pop sites...but completely lacking radio support was going to sink any song...especially in that era.
Also. Let's not forget that fans were given the choice between Love Never Loved Me and Desire as the next single...and Desire got the vote. The general public may not have known about the vote, but the hardcore fans certainly did. Now. Granted, to my memory, what we heard of both songs were earlier demo versions...and Love Never Loved Me didn't sound to the full perfection that the final version would be. I remember still preferring Love Never Loved Me...but also, I wasn't mad that Desire got the vote. I liked both. And Desire's one of the *many* solo Spice songs that I remember the fanbase liking a whole lot better before the chart position came out.
But. Anyway. A media blackout happened because people just found Geri so outrageously annoying because she rode a horse down a city street or something. Everything she did for promotion seems so quaint and non-offensive to me...especially when stacked next to antics of certain reality show star/social media-clout-chasing celebs of today.
Posted by: tommie 16th April 2023, 02:34 PM
Gerita decided not to release Love Never Loved Me just so that we could have these discussions!
God, what a visionairy, unlike that bully Emmarrr.
Posted by: -Jay- 16th April 2023, 04:08 PM
I agree that Desire definitely got the fanbase treatment of "low chart position = it's a bad song = we hate it now!" reaction back in the day, lol. The same most definitely happened with Melanie C's On the Horizon and I'd dare to put Emma's We're Not Gonna Sleep Tonight in that category too because I don't recall negativity towards it before its release week.
Geri's radio blacklisting was a shame. Rather unwarranted and petty too. 2005 was a difficult year for pop generally, in my view, save for some notable exceptions like Sugababes.
Posted by: ChrisJK 16th April 2023, 04:38 PM
Do you know what... I'm gonna say it... I LOVED Ride It.
The song and the video were such light-hearted pop that didn't take itself seriously. Geri visibly laughs throughout and is totally over the top.
It was colourful, camp pop and it was certainly better than, say, Bag It Up.
I do remember Geri being quite a Madonna fan, and she does come across as trying to be a UK version, but not quite coming close to making the grade.
And yes she was as annoying as hell... but which pop star isn't when trying to show their personal life but actually hamming it up for the entire time?
Posted by: spiceboy 16th April 2023, 06:50 PM
Ride it is fun and catchy it’s not the best pop song but it’s far from the worst too!
Posted by: Yobnedor 16th April 2023, 06:55 PM
Spice Girls fans are the WORST for bad positions = mind change on the song!
Posted by: J00prstar 16th April 2023, 07:47 PM
This was such a fascinating read. Since I wasn't a pop fan at the time, what would you say were the big gamechangers of 02 and 03?
I agree that Geri's 2005 comeback felt like a relic. I had no idea at the time she was only early 30s! I think she was styled or presented older.
Posted by: Piers 16th April 2023, 07:49 PM
Yeah, definitely those two. It took me years to warm up to Here It Comes Again...so at the time, I thought On The Horizon was getting things back on track for Mel. Admittedly, I wanted Emma to release High On Love or Better Be Careful for her next single. But. Geri'd had a big hit with a Latin-tinged single...and Mel C had a big hit with a remixed single...so...We're Not Gonna Sleep Tonight seemed like a good release to me at the time.
I also remember the fanbase being pretty enthusiastic about Not Such An Innocent Girl before the release...and (perhaps the most significant change in fan perception that I remember) Calling. There were A LOT of fans claiming that song was Geri's best single leading up to the release. After the release, seemingly no one was saying that anymore.
I wouldn't say we were never critical of a release. I think we always knew If That Were Me and Lullaby were mistakes...largely because both Mels had such better songs to choose from.
Anyway. Getting back to Geri and Passion. I don't feel the fans dislike Ride It today, per se. But I do wish it were generally better regarded. Fans seemed to really, really like it when the clip first got out there.
Posted by: tommie 18th April 2023, 10:40 AM
I think there were just so much going wrong with Gerita at the time of "Desire"'s release that it was hard to work up any sort of enthusiasm; the disaster with the tour, the There's Something About Geri documentary, the story about her trying to get "Some Girls" from Richard X which made people make unfavourable comparisons because it does very much come across as a "I can't get the track I want so give me something similar" and of course the lack of playlisting and overall promotion. It was just like they entirely gave up; considering how they went all out for "Ride It" it was very underwhelming.
I never liked Here It Comes Again and On the Horizon (the Reason era is definitively her coffee table era); I do however remember how enthusiastic the fanbase was at the latter as a single and how it was going to turn it around for her... only for it to come in at #14 and then obviously it's a bad song all of a sudden.
Posted by: Voodoo 18th April 2023, 10:55 AM
There's a difference between a bad song and a bad single choice. A good song can be a bad single choice.
Posted by: Jessie Where 18th April 2023, 11:18 AM
Like any other single choice would have done better for her at that point though.
Posted by: Voodoo 18th April 2023, 11:33 AM
At that point she was still getting airplay, so yes, a different single could have done better.
Posted by: Jessie Where 18th April 2023, 11:44 AM
Not from that particular album.
Posted by: Babyboy 6th June 2023, 07:06 PM
It's Passion b-day today.
Posted by: ___∆___ 6th June 2023, 08:03 PM
Iconic times!
Still not over it’s #41 peak
Posted by: ___∆___ 6th June 2023, 08:13 PM
My rate - this deserved to be a multi platinum seller with a 10 week run at #1
5.5 Passion
9.5 Desire
10 Love Never Loved Me
8.5 Feel The Fear
10 Superstar
7.0 Surrender Your Groove
10 Ride It
8.5 There’s Always Tomorrow
7.5 Let Me Love You More
7.5 Don’t Get Any Better
10 Loving Me Back To Life
7.0 So I Give Up On Love
Posted by: spiceboy 6th June 2023, 09:10 PM
I actually really liked Passion, over the years it hasn't aged as well as the other two albums did but I still think it's a strong album that deserved far more than #41!
Posted by: Mr.X 6th June 2023, 09:27 PM
So I am feeling a bit like a terrorista (im high) and decided to give this album a listen.
It's... not great but I enjoyed some parts of it. She sounds great, probably her best ever. The lyrics are cringe for the most part but whatever. She should have stuck to the disco sister concept, as those are the strongest songs and the rest make the album feel a bit lost.
But ultimately, Love Never Loved Me is a bop. She missed out on that one, big time! She should have led with it. I never quite enjoyed Ride It back then but I guess it makes sense in an album context, just wish that would have been the second single (and with a better video, please...). Surrender Your Groove is also a bit of fun.
Superstar is... well... a very Geri Halliwell song. It's fun but not in a 'its great' way. I don't know... 'I wanna shake your celebrity'? It's just a bit too naff.
The run from There's Always Tomorrow to Don't Get Any Better is not good though. I truggled through it and was deeply bored. I wish she was more serious with her craft here. Maybe some interesting ideas but overall, just too bland and naff...
Loving Me Back To Life is ok
So I Give Up On Love is classic Geri too. Too naff and unserious to be interesting. I know she loves this genre but she just doesn't do it very well when she wants to be funny with it. She did better before, I guess but big band isn't quite what we want from Geri, I think...
Overall? It sounded like she had kind of given up... the quality just isn't there, I guess and it is too naff. She sang great though, I'll give her that!
Posted by: schizo_spice 6th June 2023, 10:47 PM
Hard to believe its 18 years since I bought a Geri album.
I wonder if I'll ever get to experience this pleasure ever again.
I love her as an artist.
Posted by: Mr.X 6th June 2023, 10:51 PM
I wonder if I'll ever get to experience this pleasure ever again.
I love her as an artist.
You will be able to buy her next album Forever25
Posted by: dancinqueen 7th June 2023, 05:02 AM
Worst album alongside LA State of Mind, Melanie’s Reason to VOM eras, Emma’s AGLM, and VB discography. It doesn’t even sound like it’s a Geri’s album. It’s lazy, and not in a AGLM kinda way, more like she recorded those songs in her pijamas after a long nap. You can say whatever you want about Geraldine, but she had ideas, and this record lacks that. The cover is meh, the singles choice is nope, the “live” performances, and documentary scream DISASTER. Thanks God there wasn’t a follow up to this record.
Posted by: Babyboy 7th June 2023, 12:10 PM
I like the ballads and her voice improved.
Posted by: spiceboy 7th June 2023, 03:54 PM
1. Passion - 6/10 - Geri sounds great on this song, it's a big band opener and works well, not one of her best though.
2. Desire - 8/10 - Catchy electro-pop number which sounds like it could easily have been a Kylie song.
3. Love never loved me 10/10 - Excellent song, really deserved it's moment to shine
4. Feel the fear 8/10 - I used to adore this, I still think it's a great chorus but the verses are a little boring.
5. Superstar 8/10 - Another catchy chorus one, a little cheesy but works
6. Surrender your groove - 8/10 - I can see a whole disco album working for Geri this flows on well from Superstar
7. Ride it - 8/10 - It's a bop, so catchy I don't care what anyone says
8. There's always tomorrow - 9/10 - A lovely chilled song, her voice sounds really good in it too.
9. Let me love you more - 9/10 - A second strong ballad
10. Don't get any better - 10/10 - I actually ADORE this track now, it's such an in your face take it or leave it track! Should have been a single!
11. Loving me back to life - 10/10 - My favourite track on the album, Geri sounds great, it's lyrically really sweet and I love the piano
12. So I give up on love 6/10 - Similiar feedback to first track, could do without the show tunes on the album tbf.
I'd say overall it's a solid 8/10 record.
Posted by: -Jay- 7th June 2023, 06:14 PM
I find the album to be a mixed bag. It's like she couldn't land on one direction and then run with that to the best of her ability.
Posted by: dancinqueen 8th June 2023, 07:01 PM
To me, this record is Geri’s version of A Girl Like Me. Bland, drafts of songs, meh lyrics, nothing interesting vocally. At least, Emma’s had the amazing WTYSL. People wanted It’s Raining Men pt. 2, not this.
Posted by: tommie 8th June 2023, 07:13 PM
Pretty much - I feel like once they scrapped the Disco Sister direction she had nowhere to go; which is a shame really, because I feel like people were clearly receptive towards upbeat fun Geri. I don't think any of the Spice's would've been hugely successful at that point, but with a solid direction and singles I could've seen her having a moderately successful run for a solo Spice album. It's just weird to me how Ride It going in at #4 basically sent them back to the drawing table.
Posted by: Voodoo 8th June 2023, 07:18 PM
Because it was an underperformance. For a #4 single it didn't sell very well. Her previous lead singles were much bigger hits.
Posted by: schizo_spice 8th June 2023, 07:20 PM
I think by this point Geri was growing out of the camp pop/dance sound. This is also evident by the Man on the Mountain tracks in subsequent years.
The more mellow tracks from her first two albums have always been the ones she's praised the most on a personal level also.
These songs aren't what the majority of her fanbase want from her though. Kylie learnt this when she changed her style in the 90s only to return to what her fans wanted in 2000 and big success to go with it.
Posted by: tommie 8th June 2023, 07:44 PM
It wasn't a massive hit, but it was hardly a "cancel-all-other-plans" sort of performance. It fell hard in it's second week, but managed to stay in the top 40 for seven weeks, which wasn't awful in those days (for comparison - Free Me and Maybe stayed in the top 40 for six weeks and I'll Be There for four). I think they had far too big expectations if a top five was a disappointment.
Posted by: spiceboy 8th June 2023, 08:29 PM
Yeah Ride It hitting #4 was actually the highest peaking solo single since Free Me wasn't it? They should have just stuck to their guns and released the 'Disco Sister Music' album that was planned, it was clearly her market at the time. Delaying it and releasing the following summer off a totally different style just told the public they were not confident enough in her material, so why bother?
Posted by: Jessie Where 12th June 2023, 09:00 PM
Yeah, many years previously! I think after such a long time away, it did the most a Geri single was going to do at that point.
That gap at the time really felt like one of yesteryear's popstars making a comeback after a lifetime away, and the entire landscape had changed in those pivotal years. Plus let's not forget her second album wasn't exactly a blockbuster success.
Posted by: Sideout 12th June 2023, 11:27 PM
I think Passion could have been somewhat successful with better single choices and release strategy.
Ride It - August 2004
Love Never Loved Me - November 2004
Passion album - November 2004
Let Me Love You More - February 2005
Set Me Off - May 2005
Desire and Surrender Your Groove could have been the two new tracks included on a greatest hits album. Both of those tracks were recorded in early 2005.
Desire - November 2005
Greatest Hits - November 2005
Posted by: ___∆___ 13th June 2023, 09:56 AM
^^ We we’re robbed of a Geri GH - definitely could/should have been a thing if ‘Passion’ had been more successful.
Posted by: vibe 13th June 2023, 05:48 PM
The love never loved me song is so overrated in the fanbase!
Desire is better!
Posted by: spiceboy 13th June 2023, 05:57 PM
Desire is better!
I like Desire but... No!
Posted by: ___∆___ 13th June 2023, 08:02 PM
Desire is better!
It’s an anthem - definitely should have been a single, I’m certain it could have gone some way to saving the ‘Passion’ era if it had been.
Posted by: Mr.X 13th June 2023, 08:38 PM
Desire is better!
Posted by: schizo_spice 13th June 2023, 08:56 PM
It’s an anthem - definitely should have been a single, I’m certain it could have gone some way to saving the ‘Passion’ era if it had been.
I'd like to think so however 2005 was a toxic time for them. The media was gunning for them as individuals and their influence was strong.
Then the Live 8 reunion drama, it was everywhere for weeks and resulted in nothing. In hindsight it was a good thing but at the time no one knew the 2007 reunion tour was ever going to happen so them not reuniting gave them another ton of bad press.
Posted by: Last Dreamer 29th March 2024, 09:55 PM
"Desire" spent 8 weeks at # 1 in my chart and became SOTY of 2005 year.
Posted by: spiceboy 30th March 2024, 05:32 AM
Geri was offered a GH release from EMI after passion but she turned it down.
Posted by: Piers 5th April 2024, 03:26 PM
I've always liked Desire...but I would say there's a pretty distinct lack of punch for an album launching single. Every other album launching single Geri was connected with (group and solo) kinda came flying out the gate and commanded attention...both the song and the video. Desire, I think, does sound like a single...just not the album launcher. What was there to grab attention? It does give Geri a somewhat modernized sound...but she was always genre-hopping anyway. I wouldn't call it a bold new direction. And the video taking inspiration from Catwoman is a bit of a head scratcher...as that was probably the previous year's most notorious flop.
Now, all that said, it was clearly the media blackout that was most responsible for Desire's failure. But it is interesting to me that given the focus and drive Geri brought to her previous album launching singles...Passion's launch was so...comparitively subtle?
Posted by: Piers 5th April 2024, 03:26 PM
I guess there was one attempt at controversy with Desire, now that I think of it. Weren't there two cuts of the video? Wasn't the uncut version where she licked the dude's face or something? It all seems so...quaint...by 2024 standards...
Posted by: Jessie Where 5th April 2024, 06:29 PM
I think honestly, 'Ride It' went top 5 because it was a "comeback" and she pushed it so heavily but it fell down the chart like it had a brick tied to it. It had no airplay and felt at the time like it had made next to no impression, by the time she came back it felt like she'd been gone a lifetime. A lot had changed in the world of pop between 2001 and 2004.
Second singles nearly always don't perform as well as the predecessor, and in the case of Geri she had no hope as the hype or interest just wasn't there and neither was the airplay. Plus it was months later for some inexplicable reason.
Posted by: Sideout 5th April 2024, 09:42 PM
Geri should have stayed on course with the Disco Sister Music album. The album probably would have performed much better had the release schedule been
Ride It - Aug 2004
Love Never Loved Me - Nov 2004
3rd Album - Nov 2004
I feel the one, two punch of Ride It and Love Never Loved Me would have set the album up for more success.
Posted by: spiceboy 5th April 2024, 11:26 PM
Ride It - Aug 2004
Love Never Loved Me - Nov 2004
3rd Album - Nov 2004
I feel the one, two punch of Ride It and Love Never Loved Me would have set the album up for more success.
I completely agree with this. She waited too long, which killed any hope for the album/.
Posted by: Anita Hanjaab 6th April 2024, 12:55 PM
Shewaa over by then, and Love Never Loved Me isn't good. Ir's like Britnwy fans with Radar, which is also tripe. Radar flopped too when shw bowed ro fan pressure and released it.
Posted by: Jessie Where 6th April 2024, 01:06 PM
But to be fair, 'Radar' was the 4th single from the NEXT studio album. What do you expect?
I seem to remember the fans were against it being a single at that point in time, and the only reason it happened that late in the day was some contractual agreement with the producer. It should've instead been the 3rd single from Blackout.
Posted by: Anita Hanjaab 6th April 2024, 02:06 PM
I seem to remember the fans were against it being a single at that point in time, and the only reason it happened that late in the day was some contractual agreement with the producer. It should've instead been the 3rd single from Blackout.
It was an awful, robotic song ans wouls have floppwd whenever it was released.
Posted by: schizo_spice 6th April 2024, 04:28 PM
It’s a shame she didn’t release something during her turn on Popstars the Rivals.
I understand her wanting to put all her focus in judging and mentoring though.
Posted by: spiceboy 6th April 2024, 04:45 PM
I understand her wanting to put all her focus in judging and mentoring though.
She definitely missed a trick not having an album out then during that period, she likely would have had another Gold album to her name if she had.
Geri was also a contender for the CIN single during this period, Feel the fear was one of the options but they went with Girls Aloud's I'll stand by you which became their second #1. Would have been very interesting to see how Geri would have fared if she had been selected as the CIN singles were still good charters at that point
2000 - S Club #1
2001 - S Club #1
2002 - Will Young - #2
2003 - Shane Richie #2
2004 - Girls Aloud #1
2005 - Liberty X #6
2006 - Emma Bunton #3
2007 - Spice Girls - #11
2008 - McFly #18
2009 - Peter Kay #1
2010 - JLS #1
(Really puts Headline's flop in perspective gawd, they should have done the download and physicals in the same week would have guaranteed them #3 at least)
I reckon Geri would easily got another top 5 hit from it had FTF been selected and then perhaps the album in January with LNLM for that higher chart placement could have worked?
Posted by: -Jay- 7th April 2024, 12:27 AM
No Sir! x
Posted by: -Jay- 7th April 2024, 01:25 AM
I agree that Geri ideally would have launched a new music era in 2002. She left it far too long between Calling and Ride It It, three years felt like an eternity in the pop music world then. There were countless artists who'd debuted and become successful in those years, it was like a whole new music landscape, like Aly said. Geri almost came across as a bit of a throwback artist, which really shouldn't have been the vibe for what was only the start of her third album era. Plus it would have made so much sense for the third album era to coincide with Popstars: The Rivals and her book release.
Humour me because this post is a bit crazy but I had fun with it. A reimagination of Geri's career following Calling...
Geri would have returned to the studio in early 2002 to work on the third album, but wouldn't have totally abandoned the second album quite yet:
Early March 2002 - Circles Round the Moon - 4th single (from 2nd album Scream If You Wanna Go Faster)
Then continued work for the 3rd album, while signing up for the judge role on Popstars: The Rivals.
Early August 2002 - 1st single (from 3rd album)
September 2002 - Just for the Record book
Late October 2002 - 2nd single (from 3rd album)
Early November 2002 - 3rd album
Late January 2003 - 3rd single (from 3rd album)
Early April 2003 - 4th single (from 3rd album)
This would have left most of 2003 and 2004 for her to do the other TV/acting ventures that she was interested in at that time.
Then I'd follow what Sideout planned out, but in this fantasy it's actually her 4th album era:
Late August 2004 - Ride It - 1st single
Early November 2004 - Love Never Loved Me - 2nd single
Mid November 2004 - Disco Sister - 4th album
And then:
Early February 2005 - Feel the Fear - 3rd single
Late May 2005 - Desire - 4th single (the first from album re-release)
Mid June 2005 - Disco Sister (Passion Edition) - 4th album re-release
...but that's not all!
Early November 2005 - 1st single (from Greatest Hits)
Mid November 2005 - Greatest Hits album
Mid December 2005 - 2nd single (from Greatest Hits)
Then leave it there, because of her pregnancy.
Beyond that, I'm imagining a 5th studio album coming out in 2008, following the end of the Return of the Spice Girls era - which in my fantasy would have given Geri the bug to return to music. Then a 6th studio album era in 2012/13 (she was actually working with Absolute in this year, wasn't she?) and 7th studio album in 2016 - which would have been the Man on the Mountain material.
Posted by: Yobnedor 7th April 2024, 01:40 AM
Silly cow x
Posted by: Yobnedor 7th April 2024, 01:41 AM
Humour me because this post is a bit crazy
but I had fun with it. A reimagination of Geri's career following Calling...Geri would have returned to the studio in early 2002 to work on the third album, but wouldn't have totally abandoned the second album quite yet:
Early March 2002 - Circles Round the Moon - 4th single (from 2nd album Scream If You Wanna Go Faster)
Then continued work for the 3rd album, while signing up for the judge role on Popstars: The Rivals.
Early August 2002 - 1st single (from 3rd album)
September 2002 - Just for the Record book
Late October 2002 - 2nd single (from 3rd album)
Early November 2002 - 3rd album
Late January 2003 - 3rd single (from 3rd album)
Early April 2003 - 4th single (from 3rd album)
This would have left most of 2003 and 2004 for her to do the other TV/acting ventures that she was interested in at that time.
Then I'd follow what Sideout planned out, but in this fantasy it's actually her 4th album era:
Late August 2004 - Ride It - 1st single
Early November 2004 - Love Never Loved Me - 2nd single
Mid November 2004 - Disco Sister - 4th album
And then:
Early February 2005 - Feel the Fear - 3rd single
Late May 2005 - Desire - 4th single (the first from album re-release)
Mid June 2005 - Disco Sister (Passion Edition) - 4th album re-release
...but that's not all!
Early November 2005 - 1st single (from Greatest Hits)
Mid November 2005 - Greatest Hits album
Mid December 2005 - 2nd single (from Greatest Hits)
Then leave it there, because of her pregnancy.
Beyond that, I'm imagining a 5th studio album coming out in 2008, following the end of the Return of the Spice Girls era - which in my fantasy would have given Geri the bug to return to music. Then a 6th studio album era in 2012/13 (she was actually working with Absolute in this year, wasn't she?) and 7th studio album in 2016 - which would have been the Man on the Mountain material.
Never change Jay x
Posted by: -Jay- 7th April 2024, 01:44 AM
I can guarantee that I never will
Posted by: spiceboy 7th April 2024, 06:24 AM
Humour me because this post is a bit crazy
but I had fun with it. A reimagination of Geri's career following Calling...Geri would have returned to the studio in early 2002 to work on the third album, but wouldn't have totally abandoned the second album quite yet:
Early March 2002 - Circles Round the Moon - 4th single (from 2nd album Scream If You Wanna Go Faster)
Then continued work for the 3rd album, while signing up for the judge role on Popstars: The Rivals.
Early August 2002 - 1st single (from 3rd album)
September 2002 - Just for the Record book
Late October 2002 - 2nd single (from 3rd album)
Early November 2002 - 3rd album
Late January 2003 - 3rd single (from 3rd album)
Early April 2003 - 4th single (from 3rd album)
This would have left most of 2003 and 2004 for her to do the other TV/acting ventures that she was interested in at that time.
Then I'd follow what Sideout planned out, but in this fantasy it's actually her 4th album era:
Late August 2004 - Ride It - 1st single
Early November 2004 - Love Never Loved Me - 2nd single
Mid November 2004 - Disco Sister - 4th album
And then:
Early February 2005 - Feel the Fear - 3rd single
Late May 2005 - Desire - 4th single (the first from album re-release)
Mid June 2005 - Disco Sister (Passion Edition) - 4th album re-release
...but that's not all!
Early November 2005 - 1st single (from Greatest Hits)
Mid November 2005 - Greatest Hits album
Mid December 2005 - 2nd single (from Greatest Hits)
Then leave it there, because of her pregnancy.
Beyond that, I'm imagining a 5th studio album coming out in 2008, following the end of the Return of the Spice Girls era - which in my fantasy would have given Geri the bug to return to music. Then a 6th studio album era in 2012/13 (she was actually working with Absolute in this year, wasn't she?) and 7th studio album in 2016 - which would have been the Man on the Mountain material.
YASSSSS
Dreams huh. MOTM so deserves a proper release it's her best album
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