{"id":826546,"date":"2026-08-26T15:02:09","date_gmt":"2026-08-26T15:02:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/826546\/"},"modified":"2026-08-26T15:02:09","modified_gmt":"2026-08-26T15:02:09","slug":"review-bananarama-true-confessions-superdeluxeedition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/826546\/","title":{"rendered":"Review: Bananarama \/ True Confessions \u2013 SuperDeluxeEdition"},"content":{"rendered":"

In a parallel universe, Bananarama<\/a> had the most impressive backstory in pop, steeped in rock credibility and indie cool. In that world, Sarah Dallin, Siobhan Fahey and Keren Woodward were friends with half of Sex Pistols<\/a>, lived in the Pistols\u2019 Denmark Street rehearsal rooms, released as their debut single an obscure French club hit, were spotted modelling sportswear in The Face and were invited to sing with the Fun Boy Three\u2026<\/p>\n

In fact, as keen-eyed readers may already know, all that happened. Bananarama were friends with Steve Jones and Paul Cook, did release \u2018Aie a Mwana\u2019 (originally recorded by Black Blood), and recorded with the Fun Boy Three (\u2018It Ain\u2019t What You Do (It\u2019s The Way That You Do It)\u2019 and \u2018Really Sayin\u2019 Something\u2019). All they needed was a contract with Rough Trade and a John Peel session and they could have been the new Raincoats. But instead of following the new pop route of ABC<\/a>, Scritti Politti<\/a> and Heaven 17<\/a> \u2013 where they pretended to satirise the music industry while embracing the music industry and made great pop but in inverted commas (literally in the case of Scritti\u2019s The \u2018Sweetest Girl\u2019) \u2013 Bananarama just became a great pop group. They released some inspired covers (the aforementioned \u2018Really Sayin\u2019 Something\u2019, \u2018Na Na Hey Hey (Kiss Him Goodbye)\u2019 and some even better originals (\u2018Cruel Summer\u2019, \u2018Robert De Niro\u2019s Waiting\u2026\u2019) and, uniquely, managed to make glorious shiny chart pop while appearing entirely shambolic with their untutored vocal stylings \u2013 not so much harmonising as all three singing the same words at the same time \u2013 and not entirely professional dance routines on Top Of The Pops.<\/p>\n

\u00a0In their early years, Bananarama\u2019s work with producers Jolley and Swain, who also worked with Spandau Ballet<\/a> and Imagination, was fantastic \u2013 it put the Rams in \u201cramshackle\u201d \u2013 and gave the trio pop hits as well as critical approval. They may have been a huge chart act but they were also the girl next door, except there were three of them and they clearly did not give a fig about anyone else (in 1988 they blithely told NME\u2019s Jim Shelley, \u201cOne more hit and we\u2019ll pass The Supremes. Sad, isn\u2019t it?\u201d)<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

The Rams (as Smash Hits inevitably and irreverently called them) were successful right from the off, but by the time of their third album \u2013 this one, True Confessions \u2013 there were signs of tiredness.\u00a0 The chirpiness of the earlier songs was giving way to mid-fame melancholy and a distinct lack of fizz. There was the single \u2018Rough Justice\u2019, a tribute to a friend killed by the British Army. There had been the downbeat (and brilliantly named) \u2018Cheers Then\u2019, and, on True Confessions, there were songs like \u2018A Trick Of The Night\u2019 and \u2018Do Not Disturb\u2019 B-side, \u2018Ghost\u2019: the LP was not a jolly knees-up or something that would be much fun at parties. Like other bands of the post-punk, post-2 Tone era (in particular Madness<\/a> and the Fun Boy Three<\/a>, who had both succumbed to gloom), Bananarama were heading into a contemplative slump.<\/p>\n

Not that this is a bad album: far from it. It\u2019s just quite moody. From the rare solo vocal on the gorgeous \u2018Ghost\u2019 (an extra track on the reissue) to the social commentary of \u2018A Trick Of The Night\u2019, True Confessions could have been Bananarama\u2019s Beatles for Sale \u2013 fame and fun sliding into a trough of tiredness and melancholy \u2013 but Bananarama were wise and knew something had to change. There was a record in the charts that they liked. It was by a former Goth band from Liverpool called Dead Or Alive<\/a> and its title was \u2018You Spin Me Round (Like A Record)\u2019.\u00a0 And it was produced by Stock Aitken and Waterman, a trio of producers and writers who had had some hits with Divine and Hazell Dean but nothing like the success they were now enjoying. \u2018You Spin Me Round\u2026\u2019 was a relentless monster of a record, whose claptraps and hooks never stopped for the entirety of singer Pete Burns\u2019 howling tornado of a performance.<\/p>\n

\u00a0At this point in their career, Bananarama could have gone darker. They could have demanded to be taken seriously and released albums of grey mistiness. But they weren\u2019t The Cure<\/a>, they were Bananarama and, instead of going darker \u2013 they went brighter. Despite having an album\u2019s worth of material produced by Jolley and Swain, they went to see SAW and took along the song they wanted to record with them: an old 1960s hit by Dutch band Shocking Pink called \u2018Venus\u2019 \u2013 and the rest was hysteria.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\u2018Venus\u2019 in its new version, with Bananarama\u2019s chanted lyrics and SAW\u2019s grenade of a production job, was fantastic: urgent, daft, thrilling and catchy as anything. It went to number one all around the world, including the USA. It gave Bananarama\u2019s career a boost, it led to the trio working with SAW full-time, and it diverted them once and for all away from the melancholy in their pop star souls (although some of that was to resurface when Siobhan left the band and formed the fantastic, none-more-melodramatic Shakespears Sister).<\/p>\n

Bananarama without Stock Aitken and Waterman would quite possibly have run out of steam early, which would have been a massive shame. The second wind SAW gave them resulted in some great singles \u2013 \u2018I Heard A Rumour\u2019, \u2018Love In the First Degree\u2019, \u2018I Can\u2019t Help It\u2019, \u2018I Want You Back\u2019, the arrival of Jacquie O\u2019Sullivan, Help! with French and Saunders\u2026 and an entry in the Guinness Book of Records as the all-female group with the most UK chart entries ever. And, with just Dallin and Woodward remaining, the world\u2019s greatest 1980s girl group is still going. Meanwhile, there\u2019s the cornucopia of True Confessions to enjoy: extra tracks, remixes, Radio One jingles: a decent package for a decent album.<\/p>\n

Review by David Quantick. True Confessions is reissued on Friday 28 August 2026, via London Records.<\/p>\n

Official Bananarama Shop<\/a> Highlights<\/p>\n

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