It was morning in the Cotswolds, as David Cameron sat fidgeting nervously by the telephone while Samantha made final adjustments to the hem of his ill-fitting Union Jack dress where it clung to his unshaven thigh. His old friend, Spice Girls manager Heath Bexley-Crumpet, had tipped him off as to impending announcement of the Girl Power™ group’s latest reunion, scheduled for the glorious post-EU summer of 2019, and Dave really, really, really wanted in.
Rumour had it that Posh – too preoccupied with designing clothes worn by nobody anyone has ever met – was out. In the cleft left by the rich one with the dim footballer husband, the ex-PM could taste the sweet taste of redemption and rehabilitation in the public eye at last. Arise, Posher Spice! Flanked by his equally clapped-out but unbowed bandmates, he would ride high on a new wave of Cool Britannia, as the UK ventured forth gloriously once more, unmoored at last from the tyrannical scourge of the foreigner.
When the call finally came, Samantha didn’t even need to ask what the verdict was, as the blood drained from cheeks which had been so fleetingly restored of their boyish glow. Casting his fiery wig upon the begonias and stomping off ridiculously across the garden in three-inch platform trainers, slamming the door of the designer shepherd’s hut behind him, David retreated to his private sanctuary to scream the eternal Brexit scream once again and forevermore. “Zigazig aaaaaarrrrggghhhh!” he cried.
Preferring to strike out as a sans-Victoria four-piece this time, without resort to replacement for Posh (sorry, Dave), the Spice Girls are back. Is their impending stadium tour precisely the concert experience Brexit Britain deserves as we’re hurled into a weird vortex of vacant sloganeering, patriotism and nostalgia after March 29? Sensing their moment, are we witnessing a cynical cash-grab from four artists whose solo careers have between them yielded about as much success as David Davis’s busted-flush stint as Britain’s negotiator-in-chief? Or am I being brutally unfair, and are the Spice Girls actually a fun and important pop band meriting of a timely return to the limelight (with no relevance to Brexit whatsoever)?
Will renewed vows hold in the heat of the moment or be conveniently forgotten, like so many commitments to an Irish backstop?
Costing well upside of £100 a ticket to attend, the Spice World 2019 shows will take placefrom the end of May, which if apocalyptic No Deal forecasts prove true means it’ll be around the same time that we’re reduced to fighting our neighbours over dead rats for sustenance. Just the ridiculously expensive light entertainment relief we’ll all need, then (dead rat burgers £15 at stadium catering). Spice Girls’ previous comeback tour in 2007-8 started out strongly with a blockbusting 17-night stint at the O2 in London, but eventually hit the skids as old tensions reemerged and everyone fell out. Their relationships bound together again with Blu Tack, kirby grips and Sporty’s old judo belt, will renewed vows hold in the heat of the moment or be conveniently forgotten, like so many commitments to an Irish backstop?
