Before I say anything about Bananarama I want to make it very clear that I did not acquire this CD from buying a copy of The Mail On Sunday. Fuck the Daily Mail. Anyway, I used to work in a charity shop and from time to time customers would donate the CDs and DVDs that came free with their newspapers. We didn't sell them in the shop so they'd sit in the back room for the volunteers to sift through and take if there was anything they fancied, and then they'd be tossed in the skip. That's how I ended up with The Best Of Bananarama.
I know a handful of Bananarama hits but this is the first time I've ever sat down and listened to them at length. First off I want to say that I think Bananarama is a terrible name for a band. I also don't rate this cardboard sleeve very highly - what are those outfits meant to be? Lets talk about the music though.
1. Venus 🟢
As soon as this starts it sounds so 80s and so obviously produced by Stock Aitken Waterman. I'm going to complain about SAW a lot over the next 15 songs. One thing I've always wondered about Bananarama is why they always seem to sing in unison - it sounds like there's always three voices but they all sound the same with no harmony, which is kind of unusual. This cover isn't as good as Shocking Blue's original but it's out there doing it for the gay club. Every time they say "and Venus was her name" I think of "B-I-N-G-O and Bingo was his name-o" which is pretty annoying, thanks to my brain for that one. Since it's a cover of a Shocking Blue 60s hit, there's not much to move the song along so at 2:40 I was looking at the clock on the CD player thinking the song was starting to drag on a bit and there was another full minute after that of them repeating the chorus. And Venus was her name-o.
2. Love In The First Degree 🟢
Again, the SAW production hits you in the face. It sounds a lot like Kylie - you could imagine I Should Be So Lucky to follow the intro instead of hearing Bananarama. They don't sound like they're good singers - they're like a group of girls out on a karaoke night, but they sound like they're having a really good time doing it and I'm happy for them. Again, it has big gay club vibes.
3. I Want You Back 🟡
Sadly not a Jackson 5 cover like I was hoping, even though I could see the songwriting credit on the back of the CD case. The SAW production sounds so dated and so much like early Kylie, it's starting to get me down. No wonder Siobhan quit and formed Shakespear's Sister, I'd go goth from the misery of having to be in this sausage machine band-producer relationship. And once again, it sounds so g a y.
This is the first song on the CD that comes from before the link-up with SAW and there's a clear difference. The girls sing this song in a lower key which sounds easier for them and even though it lacks the hi-NRG beats, it sounds more fun. I'm not sure whether Robert de Niro would be seen as a weird crush in 1984 - a Google search suggests he was a decent-looking guy but I don't think hearing him "talking Italian" quite matches up to the dream of "kissing Valentino by a crystal blue Italian stream". Maybe this song is where genuine 1984 heartthrob Prince got the idea for that Manic Monday lyric, which might be the reason why I link Bananarama and The Bangles in my head. Would it be unfair of me to call Bananarama a Primark Bangles?
5. Cruel Summer 🔵
That marimba intro is instantly recognisable. Cruel Summer has such a good vibe - it's a summery dance song but it has this melancholy to it - it's up there in the tradition of Summertime Blues and Summertime Sadness as a reminder that sun doesn't always mean fun. The girls sing together again but there are some good harmonies and a cool guitar part in this song. Everything about this just sounds better than the SAW songs.
6. Really Saying Something 🔵
This is one of the Bananarama/Fun Boy Three collaboration songs. It's not as good as It Ain't What You Do, which unfortunately isn't on this CD, but it's still funky since it has the same sort of sound. Covering and updating a retro girl-group song really works well for the group here, there are great vocal harmonies that have been picked up from that tradition and they sound really cool. It's a real shame that SAW ironed all of that out of them.
7. Shy Boy 🟢
This opens with some 'shoop shoop' singing from the group. It's not a cover of a 60s girl group song, but it's got that vibe to it and it suits them. The song is average, but it's a good average.
8. Na Na Hey Hey (Kiss Him Goodbye) 🟡
Bingo adverts have ruined this song forever. They do a good job of this cover - the crescendo of the refrain is really smart and has a football chant feel to it, although I can't picture straight men listening to Bananarama. I'd probably rate it higher if I could separate the song from the connotation but I can't listen to it without hearing a jingle for a bingo website interrupting whatever show I'm streaming.
9. Love, Truth and Honesty 🟠
After that respite, we're plunged back into SAW-land. Compared with what has gone before, this just sounds really shit and badly-produced and like every other SAW song of the time. The group aren't the strongest singers and this production highlights their limits rather than making the most of their abilities. I don't like to be one of those people who say they liked a band's old stuff better - but Bananarama were so much better before they linked up with these garbage men!
10. I Heard a Rumour 🟡
This is a bit better and sounds like the production team has put a little more effort in. The vocals sound stronger in the verses, but the chorus lets everything down by sounding half-arsed. There's a bit in the chorus melody that reminds me of Teardrops by Womack & Womack and I wish I was listening to that instead.
11. Movin' On 🟠
This is the most modern song on the CD, having been released in 1992, and they're trying to sound a little bit Eurodance. It's not as good as what was coming out of Europe though - they kind of sound like Steps. There's a piano part, which sounds like ABBA; a guitar solo, which sounds a bit like ABBA; and lyrics which aren't too far away from ABBA either. However, it's got this relentless sub-Eurodance beat under it all which sounds horrible. Bananarabba? Abbananarama?
12. More Than Physical 🟢
This is... funky? Even... sexy? The vocals are sung almost in a whisper along with a funky bass that sounds like the sort of thing you might hear in a cool 80s club. I was really impressed with this until I placed why the 'oooh yeah' part sounds familiar - it sounds exactly like the one in the chorus of What Have You Done For Me Lately by Janet Jackson, which came out the same year. In fact, all of this has a Janet vibe - would it be rude of me to call Bananarama a Primark Janet Jackson? The back of the CD case doesn't credit SAW with this one so I looked it up online to see if maybe it was produced by Janet's people, but Wikipedia reckons this is a SAW production after all.
13. I Can't Help It 🟠
Now, this is unmistakably a SAW production and I cringe at how predictable they are. Without the cheesy drum beat and brass sounds that they throw into every song, this could also have been a sexy and cool pop song, but that's not the track that the producers from hell wanted to make. I wonder whether Bananarama were impressed by the sound of More Than Physical, and the success of Venus, and signed their souls away to this team expecting more good results, but then immediately had this utter dogshit production shoved onto everything they wrote forever.
14. Only Your Love 🟢
Something edgy?! It's 1990, and Bananarama have been to a rave! And they've ditched SAW and made something that sounds good!! Wikipedia says this samples both Loaded by Primal Scream and Fools Gold by The Stone Roses, which I think makes them the coolest indie band around? I think if they'd given this to Rowetta or Denise Johnson it would have sounded better but it's a good effort. Bananaramadchester.
15. Rough Justice 🟡
We end with something from earlier in their back catalogue and what appears to be socially-conscious Bananarama. I couldn't make out enough of the lyrics to truly work out whether there was a narrative but the chorus goes on about children starving in the streets and you know Bob Geldof was taking notes (there are only four women on Do They Know It's Christmas?, and 3 of them are in Bananarama). It's fine and makes sense as a final song, but it's not a banger.
Overall I was kind of disappointed by this set of songs. I was hoping to find more gems as good as Cruel Summer and It Ain't What You Do but instead I was assaulted by the insistent drum machine and fake brass and stripping out of harmony that is Stock Aitken Waterman. The most interesting Bananarama songs are the ones they didn't get to touch and I hope I don't have to spend a lot more time with their production house as part of this project. I won't be throwing this CD out because I have rated about half of them as above-average, but there's nothing here that would come close to being my favourite song.
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