2000 S Club 7: Never Had A Dream Come True

After the cheery, candy striped bounce of 'Bring It On Back', S Club 7 seemingly age ten years in the space of one by serving up a more 'serious' ballad of broken hearts. But in so doing, their earlier funsized pop persona works against them, making it as hard to take this new maturity any more seriously than it would to hear Little Jimmy Osmond (circa 1974) singing 'My Way'. Which is a bit of a shame on one level - lead Clubber Jo O'Meara handles the "There's no use lookin' back or wondering how it could be now or might have been" with enough wistful force to hold the attention and the rest of the gang link arms behind her for strength, but Cathy Dennis's song never quite catches fire with emotion enough to smoulder, let alone burn and it fails to rises above the generic. And given just who made up S Club 7, that title is clearly not true. Maybe a solo voiced, paired down arrangement would have salvaged something, but this is all a bit too 'Kids From Fame' talent show audition fodder for my liking.