Girls Aloud – AO Arena, Manchester (25/5/24)

Depending on where you draw your musical borderlines, since starting this blog my posts have mainly focussed on what would generally be described as indie/alternative/rock. The absence of a write up of anything regarded outright as pop hasn’t been some sort of snobby reflection on my views – after all, when done well pop music brings more joy than any other genre. And never was this more prevalent than the 2000s when the Xenomania writing team produced solid gold hit after hit, especially when they combined with Girls Aloud.

At the peak of it all I was a student with too much time on my hands and somehow briefly entered the world of Girls Aloud. I won’t go into all of my escapades with them, but the definite highlight was spending an utterly brilliant day filming an MTV special with them down in London. I’m not going to claim that the girls and I were really good friends, although those were the words Nadine once used to describe our relationship!

Having disbanded in 2013, the announcement of a reunion tour a decade later left me with mixed feelings and I was initially undecided about attending. Asides from the slightly extortionate ticket prices and lack of new music to back up girls getting back together, these were to be the first shows since the sad passing of Sarah Harding. Could they possibly be the same without Sarah and her manic energy on stage?

But then a couple of things happened. Somehow footage of me chatting with Cheryl from almost twenty years previously went viral on TikTok, leading to a variety of friends and colleagues messaging me to see if it was actually me. And then due to struggling ticket sales Ticketmaster launched a half price flash sale. I’m not saying which was more persuasive in my decision to get tickets, but seats at the front of the second block were duly purchased.

After the disappointing decision not to have a support act, the curtain dropped to reveal Cheryl, Kimberly, Nadine and Nicola perched atop podiums and launching into Untouchable – a slightly surprising opener considering it was one of the group’s least successful singles. But then the big guns were wheeled out, with The Show, Something New, Love Machine, Can’t Speak French and Biology performed in succession, the only concern being that they had thrown too much top quality material too early and that the set pacing would suffer as a consequence. Turns out there was no need to worry as they had far more massive crowd pleasing hits than any group should do.

Early on during the show I have to admit that I would regularly scan the stage, notice the location of the four girls and then try to spot where the fifth was. Handling the loss of a band member is never easy and finding the balance between paying homage and becoming overly sentimental is a hard trick to pull off. But as the first act of the show drew to a close the perfect tribute was played. Having performed the majority of Whole Lotta History the group and dancers departed the stage, leaving the audience to watch a video of Sarah singing the outro. The line “And it may sound crazy but your voice still leaves me all funky” took on a whole new emotional meaning in this context than it had when the song was originally released.

If there is one way to return to stage after such a sombre moment then it clearly is with the group perched precariously on flying motorbikes with the thumping intro of Wake Me Up ringing through the arena. This set the tone for the second act, with Sound of the Underground, No Good Advice and most gloriously of all Graffiti My Soul performed demonstrating the group’s underappreciated heavier sound. I’ve always wanted to see Girls Aloud embrace this and do a ‘garage rock’ tour of their hits (look here at the crowd’s reaction to The Last Dinner Party‘s cover of Sound of the Underground), although sadly one feels that Sarah would have been the main instigator of such an happening.

If act two was the rock section of the show, act three focussed on any genre that ‘electro’ could be added to preface; whether it was the electropunk of Nazareth sampling Sexy! No, No, No, the shimmering electroballadery of Call The Shots, the electropop of not-Van Halen Jump or the electrodance of 2012’s hidden gem of On the Metro. And then to close off the section it was the electro-everything banger Something Kinda Ooooh, complete of course with Kimberley taking great delight in delivering her iconic “Oh boy I can’t tell you how sad I feel…” line.

And all that left was a single encore, running through the final number one of their career, The Promise. With a final tribute to Sarah the song came across as a celebration of all that the group had managed to achieve during their career. And then, after a quick bow to the audience, the girls awkwardly shuffled off stage, a rare mis-step during the evening, with the feeling that a better planned farewell would have been fitting.

Girls Aloud had delivered what they’d promised for the evening – eighteen singles that had helped shape the UK pop music scene in the 2000s (along with a handful of album tracks), performed in an energetic and sometimes emotionally touching style. Twelve years since their final release the world of ‘pop’ has changed – groups are out in favour of solo performers and fun seems to have been surpassed for the need for credibility. I’m still to be convinced that that makes for a more interesting world.

***

Girls Aloud performed:

Untouchable
The Show
Something New
Love Machine
Can’t Speak French
Biology
Whole Lotta History
—
Wake Me Up
Sound of the Underground
Girl Overboard
No Good Advice
Graffiti My Soul
Long Hot Summer
I’ll Stand by You
—
Sexy! No No No…
On the Metro
Jump (For My Love)
Call the Shots
Something Kinda Ooooh
—
The Promise

***

Youtube Highlight of the Evening: I may have mentioned flying motorbikes once or twice, so here they are, courtesy of xFinalzx, as the second act of the show opens up with Wake Me Up.

What’s this? A bonus photo gallery as I took so many pictures and a surprisingly high number came out looking good? Oh, go on.