Learn English with "Wannabe" by Spice Girls

"Wannabe" was the debut single of the Spice Girls, released in the UK on 8 July 1996 (it had appeared slightly earlier in Japan) ahead of the group's first album, Spice. It was written by all five members together with producers Matt Rowe and Richard "Biff" Stannard, and famously recorded in under an hour at Strongroom Studios in London in December 1995 — a session so quick it became part of the group's origin story.

The song's chart run was extraordinary. It entered the UK Singles Chart at number 3 and climbed to number one the following week, where it stayed for seven weeks. In the US, it debuted on the Billboard Hot 100 on 25 January 1997 at number 11, the highest chart debut by a British act at that time, before reaching number one on 22 February 1997 and holding the top spot for four consecutive weeks.

Commercially, "Wannabe" became the best-selling single by a girl group in history, certified 4× Platinum by the BPI in the UK and Platinum by the RIAA in the US. It picked up British Single of the Year at the 1997 Brit Awards, International Hit of the Year and Best Selling British-Written Single at the 1997 Ivor Novello Awards, and Best Dance Video at the 1997 MTV Video Music Awards. A 2014 University of Amsterdam study even found it to be the most recognisable pop song of the previous 60 years among young English speakers.

Much of the song's cultural punch came from its music video: a single continuous take filmed by director Johan Camitz inside London's Midland Grand Hotel at St Pancras, showing the five members bursting energetically through the building. Its raw, spontaneous feel helped the video take off on British music television and turned the group into an overnight press sensation months before the single itself topped the charts.

In this catalogue, "Wannabe" is the loudest, fastest and most chant-driven entry in British English: five different England accents — Leeds, Liverpool, Essex, Hertfordshire — layered into one anthem, next to a rapid spoken-word verse that rewards close listening. It sits at the opposite end of the British spectrum from the slow, gentle diction of Ed Sheeran's Perfect or Sam Smith's Stay With Me.

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