All Saints ‎– All Saints

And we’re back to 1990s pop. Although, at this point no-one should be surprised about this. I don’t know if it is a good or a bad sign that nobody else writes about this stuff. I probably have carved out a nice little niche for myself in blogland by now, but then again there remains the possibility that noone gives half a fuck. Nevertheless I shall merrily continue down this path as straightfromthecrates.com is mostly about occupational therapy for this reviewer anyway.

All Saints is a group that was formed in 1993 in London by Shaznay Lewis, Melanie Blatt and Simone Rainford under the name All Saints 1.9.7.5., because the group hung around near All Saints road apparently. Oh, well. That’s as good a reason for a band name as any, I suppose. In that year the original threesome were signed to ZZT records as studio backup vocalists but also managed to record a few entirely unsuccesful singles, after which they were off course dropped by their label and Rainford left the group. In 1996, the year that the Spice Girls made it big they were joined by Canadian sisters Nicole and Natalie Appleton making them a four-piece. Because the Saints consisted of three white girls and a tan one, and because of the timing of their rise to stardom it is oft assumed that they were wannabe(ha!)-Spice Girls. That is incorrect, they were actually going for Eternal. That same year they met producer K-Gee, not to be mistaken with Naughty By Nature’s crew DJ who goes by the same moniker, who recorded an demo of their song I Know Where It’s At with them and convinced London Records’ John Benson to sign them. And then the hits, the platinum plaques and the awards, (although to my best knowledge not much in the form of critical acclaim) kept coming until in 2001 they broke up for whatever reason (although in 2006 they had an unsuccesful attempt at a comeback, unsuccesful, I think because they recorded and released an entire new album rather than perform the past-glory material that might ring some bells with us 1990s hipster children, like Spice did.) All Saints was their late-’97 debut album, has gone platinum both in the US and the UK as well as in many other countries, spawned three UK #01 singles and two more more in the top 10.

Was any of this success justifiable?

[read the rest of my review on: www.straightfromthecrates.com/2011/11/21/all-saints-all-saints/ and like my website on facebook here http://www.facebook.com/pages/straightfromthecratescom/230354327015145 ]

On the back of cd it is written Made in Germany!