‘It was just a wall of screams and hormones…’
I’d kinda forgotten before watching this documentary but I really fucking hated boybands back in the day. They awaken the inner music snob in me. I try to be generally tolerant of other people’s pop culture opinions but if I met someone who told me their favourite band was Westlife, I would never speak to that person again. And yet, they walk among us. That made watching this documentary an odd experience. Sure, I appreciate that many of the young men in question were young and naive and undoubtedly exploited by the music industry, but at the same time, they were also actively responsible for creating music that dumbed down music culture for a generation. Buy the ticket, take the ride…
This three-part cautionary tale from the BBC focuses on the British wave of boy bands that followed in the wake of their American counterparts New Kids on the Block at the start of the ’90s. Members of Take That, East 17, Westlife, Boyzone and more reminisce about their mercifully brief time as the rulers of the British charts and while the boom and bust nature of many of the ‘bands’ makes for a compelling narrative, there aren’t many surprises here. Gary Barlow is an insufferable dickhead. Robbie Williams thinks that he is profound and likeable but he is neither of those things. Everyone from East 17 is bitter and washed up. This is not new information. That being said, like a car crash that also includes an excruciating key change, it’s impossible to look away.
While I sympathise with anyone who has struggled with addiction and mental health issues, it’s difficult to see why these multi-millionaires (in most cases) are more deserving of sympathy than the rest of us. Putting that aside, however, as pure entertainment, Boybands Forever is intensely watchable and a source of some of that sweet, sweet nostalgia.