C99 GO!

She looks a bit like Iggy, has been hanging around the Viper Room of late and
now Mel C is stepping out of Spiceworld to become Indie Punk Spice for V99.
But can this sleek, professional, multimillionairess megastar really cut it
in snobby Indieworld?

The haircut says Iggy Pop circa hard drugs and self-mutilation.  The music
shuddering through this north London rehearsal studio says Garbage with a side
order of Hole.  The speaker cases say 'The Verve' in carefully stencilled
letters.  But NME looks up and says, "bloody hell!  It's Punk Spice!"
The new-model Melanie Chisholm is shock-haired, wire-thin and titanium-taut.
She's a T-1000 Terminator Spice: part superwaif, part tattooed kickboxer and
part Lara Croft.  androgynous, coiled, razor sharp.  And she's refusing to
tilt her head back for NME's snapper because "it makes me look like Iggy
f****** Pop."

One of the richest women in Britain, with an estimated personal fortune
somewhere between £10million and £20million, Sporty Mel drove directly here
from the plusher environs of Abbey Road, where the Spice Girls are working
on their new album.  She came alone, no bodyguards, no entourage, no airs or
graces.  Indie Spice in full effect.
Spice Girls may be her day job, but these days Melanie just wants to indie
rock all night.  She's got the songs for it too, especially the techno-grunge
juggernaut of her debut solo single, 'Going Down'.  But in conversation, she's
barely indie at all; sharp, fast-talking, professional, punctual.  No Robbie-
style walkouts or moody silences.  Just plenty of New Labour spin, smoothing
out potential sleights, smiling away bad vibes.  Chatty warmth on the surface,
steely determination beneath.
She can even do reality.  Os is that insecurity?

Sporty has always been the coolest Spice.  No vulgar mansions, public therapy
sessions, Tory-voting declarations or lame cover versions for her.  Not yet,
at least.  You certainly never feel the urge to hang her from the nearest
telegraph pole and pelt her with half-bricks like the obscenely, uselessly
beautiful Posh'n'Becks.
What do you get the woman who has everything?  Her own hobby rock band,
perhaps.  But does one of the decade's biggest pop stars really need NME's
approval as well?  Or do we need hers?  And as Punk Spice gears up to rock
V99, is this the beginning of the end for Spiceworld as we know it?

Recently, Melanie has been notching up rock-chick airmiles in some unlikely
company.  Holed up in LA for much of the early spring, she recorded a solo
album with help from former Def Jam boss Rick Rubin and Blur/Madonna producer
William Orbit.  She lunched with Maddy herself and stepped out with Red Hot
Chili Pepper Anthony Kiedis.  Oh, and she also rocked the Viper Room with
ex-Pistol Steve Jones and his all-star dad-punk combo.  Deep strangeness ahoy.
"I didn't even know who Steve was," says Melanie, who was barely out of
nappies when 'Never Mind The Bollocks' came out.  "But it turned out he's got
this new band, the Neurotic Outsiders, which is him, John Taylor from Duran
Duran, and Matt Sorum and Duff from Guns N'Roses.  They had a residency at the
Viper Room and Steve said, 'You should get up onstage and sing with us'.  And
I'm one of those people who's, like, any excuse to sing, especially if I've
had a bevvy.  So I went to see them the next week and they were f******
brilliant!  They're quite punk, pretty hardcore.  So I just got up and did
'Pretty Vacant', 'Anarchy In The UK' and 'White Wedding', and it went down a
storm.  They were f****** rocking!"

Celebrity karaoke is all very well, of course, but the real deal now looms.
This weekend, Melanie and her new band make their live debut at V99.  It will
either be a Robbie-style mass conversion, like V98, or a baptism of fire in
the flames of indie disdain.  In a very real sense, it's up to you, the
discerning pop punter.  Which is why Punky Spice is on the verge of soiling
her tracksuit trousers.
"When it was first mentioned to me, my initial reaction was like, 'F***,
yeah!'" says Sweary Spice.  "But a lot of my friends go to festivals and
went to V98, and I just thought, 'Do these people really want to see a Spice
girl onstage?'  So God knows what's going to happen, but the music's right,
so hopefully it will go down well.  I know I can do it, it's just whether I
s*** my pants."
You realise everyone will be judging you against your Spice past?
"Exactly.  But the thing is, I wouldn't be able to be up on that stage if I
hadn't been a Spice Girl.  I hope people are open-minded enough to just take
it as it comes rather than having preconceptions,  It's a weird one because
I think the Spice Girls have got a lot of respect, but then again you always
get cynics.  Like, it's taken a long time for Robbie to be respected as a
solo artist, when he was great from the word go."
People might just dismiss you as a millionaire megastar trying to prove you
have indie-rock credibility.
"Which is crap, isn't it?  But you know what?  I really don't care.  That's
their problem and they can deal with it.  I'm not really trying to prove
anything.  I'm just doing what makes me happy.  Whether it's gonna be
successful or not is another matter."

So just how 'indie' is Indie Spice anyway?  She admits she was a hardcore
clubber in her late teens, blissfully ignorant of rock until a friend
converted her to Blur and Happy Mondays.  She went to Blur's 'Parklife'
jamboree at Mile End Stadium but found the "indie politics" of the we-saw-
them-first brigade off-putting.
More recently she has been namechecking Hole, Suede, Garbage, Oasis and The
Cardigans.  The last gig she went to was in LA, and was "probably Robbie or
Blue.  And I saw Alanis Morissette as well and she blew me away."
Oh dear.  On her in-car CD player, Melanie listens to the Chili Peppers,
Hole, Nirvana and vintage David Bowie.  "'Diamond Dogs!'" she gushes.  "F***
me!"  A highly astute critique.  Does she also sing along to all that
interchangeable sub-Spice teen-slop?
"What, by choice?  Heehee!  No, I listen to it if it's on the radio.  We're
partly to blame for this, but with the huge success of the Spice Girls, the
market has been absolutely saturated and now there's just so much s*** out
there."
Indeed.  So would you honestly listen to the Spices if you weren't one of
them?
"Erm... b-b-b... ch... God, I don't know, that's a weird one.  It's really
hard to disassociate yourself from it in any way.  I'll tell you when I
really love our music; if I ever go out with my mates and we walk in a club
or something and the DJ thinks it's really funny to put 'Who Do You Think
You are' on, I f****** love it!  It's really good party music, isn't it?"
Smooth, spin, slide.  You skilfully avoided answering the question, Melanie.
"I think I did, didn't I?"

Right.  Here's some questions you can't dodge; the NME Indie Quiz.  Time to
discover whether Mel C is punk to her peroxide roots or Totally Fake Spice.
Firstly, name Hole's debut album...
"Was it 'Live Through This'?"
Wrong!  It was 'Pretty On The Inside'.  Who drums for Oasis?
"F***!  Is it Tony McCarroll the one that went to court?"
OK, we'll give you that, although it's Alan White now.  What band was Shirley
Manson in before Garbage?
"Ohhh!  I saw this in an interview a few months ago... S***!  I dunno."
It was Goodbye Mr Mackenzie.  Who sings with The Cardigans?
"Oh my God, I don't know her name!"
Nina Persson.  Name Suede's original "genius" guitarist?
"Brett Anderson, is it?  No, s***, f***... Butler!  Bernard Butler!"
Correct.  Which of these is NOT a Blur album title: 'Leisure Noise',
'His'N'Hers', 'Dog Man Star'?
"Eh?  None of them!"
Alright, it was a trick question.  But you, Melanie, have scored... erm, not
many points at all.
"I don't claim to be an anorak," she sniffs.  "I'm not trying to be Indie
spice, I'm not trying to be cool, I'm not trying to be anything - I'm just
doing what I enjoy doing.  Whether this album sells five or five million -
and of course I'd be happier if it sells five million - I just love music.
And especially this, being my own thing.  Much as I love the Spice Girls,
this is just brilliant."
S***.  Your correspondent folds away his remaining smartarse questions about
Mogwai and Pavement, feeling like a pompous indie snob.  Hmmmm.  Who's the
real loser here?

Melanie Jayne Chisholm was born in Rainhill, a fringe suburb of Liverpool
famous for its mental asylum, in January 1974.  Raised in Runcorn and
Widnes, she says her working class roots made her "very ambitious, very
hardworking, very determined".  Her parents separated when she was seven and
this left lasting scars.
"Now I think I'm lucky because I've got two mums and dads," she nods, "but
when I was a kid I was quite bitter about that because all the other kids had
a 'real' mum and dad.  It really did affect me.  My dad's got another family
now and so has my mum, and I feel part of both.  But as a child I just felt
like I was in the way, and I had to make my own life and be independent."
Even now, Melanie claims to be crushingly shy.
"I'd be more comfortable now with 1,000 people in this room than sitting
talking to one person," she says.  "Onstage in front of tens of thousands of
people, I've got all the confidence in the world.  But when I finish the gig
and go backstage and there's meet'n'greet stuff afterwards, I just feel like
a complete twat."
Melanie says she was always well-behaved, never in trouble, hates
confrontation.  And yet she's the only Spice so far to be stitched up by the
tabloids for pre-fame drug-taking.
"That was blown out of all proportion," she shrugs.  "I was at a party and
somebody was doing coke behind me, the next thing you know I'm a f****** coke
addict!  It's bollocks!  I was a kid at college, I tried a spliff, then the
next thing you know...  The way I feel about drugs now is, like, I worry
about so many things and all that drugs do - maybe when you're doing them
you're having a great time - but all they do is cause you problems.  The
smallest problem that you may have, if you're going out and doing drugs, it's
just going to make it seem so much worse."
Soothe, smooth, spin, smile.  Melanie's caught between a rock and a hard
place again here.  One whiff of druggy gossip and hypocritical tabloid scum
doorstep her family and friends.  But she's in NME, where even the lowliest
indie nonentity spills a chemical anecdote or three.  And surely, during her
clubbing days, Melanie must have necked the odd E...?
She folds her arms, zips her mouth and smiles serenely.  We have our answer.
That fence looks damn comfortable.

So, the next tabloid target is Sporty's sexuality.  She is, of course,
secretly gay.  Like all pop stars.  Probably.  The only problem is, she keeps
going on dates with men to throw reporters off the scent.  Men like Robbie
Williams, for instance.  Is there no end to Melanie's self-sacrifice?
"The first time I heard I was gay was on the internet a few years ago," she
says.  "Apparently me and Victoria were lesbian lovers, which made us giggle.
Maybe people think that of me because at first I had quite a tomboy image, and
also because I'm not really seen to have a boyfriend.  Do you think I'm gay?
I just wonder because I'm not prudish, but I am straight.  I like men and
that's it.  I don't like girls.  Girls are beautiful, I can appreciate them,
but it doesn't do anything for me.  I find it funny when people assume I'm
gay, but it doesn't bother me in the slightest."
How true are your rumoured romances with Robbie Williams, Anthony Kiedis and
teen-pop hunk Kavana?
"Not very.  There's nothing to tell, really.  I'm so boring.  But the LEAST
true is Kavana.  Heehee!"
If you could shag David Beckham without Posh finding out, would you?
"I think David is absolutely beautiful but he's not my type.  And we may as
well have all shagged him anyway, we get all the ins and outs.  Heeheehee!
No, not really.  David's lovely but he's too quiet for me.  I like bolshy
blokes.  Victoria's the boss there."

Eighteen months ago, Melanie and her fellow Spices tried to become tax exiles
be temporarily relocating to Ireland.  Unfortunately, the Chancellor
scuppered them with new laws.  "Halfway through it all got bolloxed," she
sighs.  "We only saved six months of tax."
Poor you.  How much is that in Spiceworld, two million quid?  Three million?
"Well, the papers do tend to exaggerate, but we did lose a lot of money.  The
tax rules have all changed now, which I agree with.  Because I'm from a
working class background, it's quite weird to have all this money and be in
the highest tax bracket.  But I think if you've got a f***load of money you
should get taxed to the hilt!  I believe in that principle."
It's called socialism.
"Yeah, and I'm a socialist.  A left-wing socialist."
Really?
"I dunno.  But I was brought up very anti-Thatcher, of course, living in
Liverpool..."
Did it piss you off when the Spice Girls were labelled Thatcherites?
"Yeah.  Some of the girls really didn't care, but I was freaked out because
I could not walk around Liverpool after that.  Thankfully it got resolved.
It's nice in Liverpool because people are really proud, so when I go home I
really get looked after.  I can go out clubbing and I don't get any trouble."
These days, Melanie the millionaire punk socialist is offered endless
sportswear sponsorship deals.  She turns them down.  "People say they'll send
you stuff and that's great, but when I want something I want to just go and
buy it now.  And you feel a c*** anyway, because I've got all this money now!
I'll go out and buy it thanks!"

Melanie C will be touring virtually nonstop for the next two years, either
with her new band or with the Spice Girls.  The third of the five Spice
albums stipulated by their Virgin contract is already in the pipeline, with
a new 'mature' direction promised.  So will Punky Spice soon have to swap her
peroxide spikes for an official third-album haircut, rather like the cast of
Friends at the start of each series?
"No", she shrugs.  "People talk about my 'image change', but the truth of the
matter was, I wad fed up of having my hair black so I bleached it blonde, and
that f***ed it up so I had to cut it all off.  That's the way things go in
Spiceworld.  If someone wants something, we just get it.  There's nobody
saying, 'No, you can't wear high heels because you're Sporty'."
What about the sinister backroom Svengalis who rigidly control the collective
hive-mind of the Stepford Spice androids?
"But no-one tells us what to do, that's the scary thing.  The record company
work for me!  They're the ones with the big bucks, but bloody hell, the Spice
Girls are the ones who gave them the big bucks!  We're the ones who make the
decisions, they just guide us."
Are all the songs on the new Spice album about babies?
"No.  They're still about men."
You and Mel B/G are the hard Northern scally wing of Spiceworld.  Aren't
you ever tempted to beat up the other two just for being soft Southern
cream puffs?
"Heeheehee!  No, because the truth is I'm as soft as s***e and Emma's tough
as nails!" says Terminator Spice.  "That's the truth, she is a hard woman.
Not in a scally way, she's just f***ing tough.  Don't mess with Emma."
Did you get into trouble with the other three when you called Spice Girls
a "hobby" recently?
"Well, I do bloody get into trouble when that gets taken out of context!  No,
they know me and they know the press.  If anybody knows the media, the Spice
Girls know it.  But, yeah, that came over really wrong.  What I meant was,
it's fun.  You only do a hobby because you really enjoy it."

Smooth, spin, soothe, smile.  You're such a professional diplomat, Melanie.
But in five years or so, after the legally binding secrecy contracts that all
teen-pop bands are obliged to sign expires, what monstrous secrets will ooze
from the Spice vaults?
"I'll tell you in five years time!  Heehee!  No, I don't think there are any
terrible secrets.  There's lots of mysteries, but they are mysteries to me as
well, like the whole Geri thing.  Everyone's got their own story, and I don't
know the truth behind it."
You've been quite nasty about Geri recently, dismissing her album as "cotton
wool".  Miaow!
"I wasn't nasty, I was just honest.  You know, I love Geri, she was one of my
best friends, but unfortunately I've not been able to keep in contact with
her much since she left the band.  Bit I was just shocked.  She left the band,
I thought, to pursue other areas of her career.  Then I found out she was
making a solo record and that hurt, because I thought she was leaving because
she didn't want to do music."
But bitching about Geri is hardly a great advert for 'Girl Power', is it?
"Well, walking out on your mates isn't a very good advert for Girl Power, is
it!?"

In the long term, surely your solo project is an escape route from all things
Spice?
"I'm not looking for a way out of the Spice Girls, I'm just looking to be
fulfilled," says Indie Spice.  "The Spice Girls is good fun, but I'm 25 now,
and some of the girls are married and have children.  Well I've got nothing
but my career - and obviously my family and friends, but I'm very
career-driven.  I'm just greedy, I want a little bit more - and not in the
money respect.  I want to do something that makes me happy."