Virgin
Pop, 2001

Baby Spice Emma Bunton takes her turn in the solo limelight. Unlike Mel C who screeches out some hybrid pop/rock tunes or Mel B who goes heavy on the R&B (with her heavy Leeds accent making many go “Huh?”), Emma Bunton decides to head the modern-adult-pop tune road.

But Shania Twain and Faith Hill need not order less revealing dresses yet. While Ms Bunton’s sweet, sometimes sultry vocals are pleasing to the ear, none of the songs here actually stick to my mind. Yes, it’s strange and even inexplicable, but the songs in A Girl Like Me are mostly forgettable, pleasant tunes that just diddle and piddle along. Hence songs like High on Love, the title track, A World Without You, et cetera just meanders on: sweet, pleasant, and instantly forgettable.

The only memorable tunes are We’re Not Gonna Sleep Tonight, an otherwise average girlfriends-on-a-night-out anthem and What Took You So Long? (great guitar licks). And her white-bread note-by-note cover of What I Am, in collaboration with Tin Tin Out is pleasant too.

But that’s just it: this album is pleasant to the point of being nondescript. It takes me three listens to even get the tune of What Took You So Long?. Unless Baby Spice gets some decent, killer tunes fast, she’s on her way to being Hookless Spice.