12 things we learned from Melanie C's Desert Island Discs

Melanie Chisholm was one fifth of the Spice Girls – the biggest-selling female group of all time. Their 1996 debut single, Wannabe, was number 1 in the charts in 31 countries and they went on to have nine UK number 1 hit singles. Melanie, better known as Mel C or Sporty Spice, has gone on to success as a solo artist and in musical theatre and has intermittently returned to touring with the Spice Girls since they originally went on hiatus in 2000. Here are some of the things we learned when she spoke to Lauren Laverne for Desert Island Discs.

1. As a child she was 'incredibly competitive'

“In fact I was obnoxious,” she admits. “I remember dancing competitions, and my friends who are listening will laugh, because if I’d been placed in the competition and I thought it was unfair because I was better – I was better than them! – I would be really vocal about it!”

We never started out with the mission to talk about ‘girl power’

2. Her mum had a record contract in the 1970s

Melanie always wanted to make a career as a singer, but her mother’s experiences initially put her off even trying. “My dream always was to work in music. I wanted to be a recording artist, and I knew that was really hard,” she says. “My mum had experiences, she was signed in the seventies to [record label] Decca with a band, and that hadn’t worked out for her.” Instead Melanie thought it would be “much more realistic” to get a role in West End theatre: “Little did I know to get a job in the West End itself is really hard,” she says. “It’s a super competitive environment; there’s loads of super talented people everywhere. So when I left college and started auditioning I wasn’t getting that many call-backs. I didn’t get a great job.”

3. She found out about the Spice Girls auditions after trying out for a job on a cruise ship

“I’d done my audition, I was sitting in the café with my friend and I was handed a flyer,” she recalls, noting that it asked: “Are you 16-24? Can you dance, sing? Are you fun?” When she realised it was for a girl band she immediately knew it was for her. “I turned to my friend and I said: ‘That’s it. That’s what I’m going to do!’ And it went on to be the Spice Girls.”

4. She was nearly kicked out of the group

Melanie recalls an incident in the early days of the Spice Girls when she nearly lost it all. “We were at the Brits, Take That were there, it was all really exciting. On the way out there was a little scuffle between me and Victoria. We can’t say this on air, but I asked her to ‘go away’,” she laughs. “I was told if that behaviour ever happened again then I’d be out. What made it so devastating was how important it was to me to be part of the band and to achieve the things that we wanted to achieve – that I wanted to achieve from being a kid – and to think I could have messed that up and lost it all. I began to be very hard on myself. I think that is where the start of some of my problems came, because I had to be very, very strict with myself. I couldn’t allow myself to relax because if I did I might mess it all up.”

5. ‘Girl power’ was a direct response to the sexism the Spice Girls encountered

The Spice Girls will be forever associated with their ethos of ‘girl power’, but they didn’t set out with that intention. “We never started out as a girl band with the mission to talk about ‘girl power’,” says Melanie. “We started out as a girl band wanting to get on stage, wanting to have fun, wanting to travel, wanting to meet people. And we were faced with sexism quite quickly.” The quintet were told that girl bands didn’t sell records or magazines because the girls who bought them wanted boybands. “So that was where the mission began,” she affirms. “We were like: ‘You know what? We want to be a girl band for girls. We have a point to prove.’”

6. Geri Halliwell hid Spice Girls demo tapes in her underwear

“It’s Carry on Spice Girls, innit?” Melanie laughs as she recalls how the Spice Girls evaded their very first management company and made off with their early demo tapes. “We had this plan worked out: we packed up everything from the house – was Victoria [Beckham] gonna be the decoy? – Geri was going to take the tape. She either shoved it in her bra or her knickers: it was some kind of underwear; I don’t know why her pocket wouldn’t do. And then we were to meet her on a roundabout. So I was in Victoria’s car and we went to meet Geri, and Geri was literally on the roundabout. That was the caper of escaping our management."

7. Tabloid scrutiny led her to anorexia and depression

Looking back at the intense scrutiny she was under from the tabloid press. Melanie says: “I think I was described as ‘the plain one at the back, who doesn’t really do much, doesn’t really say much,’ and that’s really hurtful when you’re a young, aspiring pop star. That hurts.” In response she succumbed to a series of eating disorders. “I tried to make myself perfect; however I deemed perfect to be. I ended up making myself really ill. I was anorexic for a few years, I was exercising excessively. I ended up being incredibly depressed.”

8. Then she spent the turn of the millennium binge eating in LA, but finally got medical help when back in the UK

"I think my body actually took over my mind. I went from being anorexic to having Binge Eating Disorder,” she says of her period of severe depression. “I was in LA for the millennium and I was with my mum, my step-dad and my brother and I’d sneak off to binge: it was like this gaping hole you just can’t fill. No matter how much food you eat you can’t fill this hole. Obviously my appearance started to change, which was the biggest fear: 'The media are going to criticise me because I’ve put on weight.'”

When she was back in the UK she sought the professional help she needed to start getting better. “I went to my GP and I was diagnosed with depression. It was such a weight lifted off my shoulder,” she says, breaking down in tears. “It was such a relief because I thought: ‘Oh my god, there’s a name for it, and I can be helped.’ So that was the beginning of my road to recovery, which took a really long time.”

9. She had an apple core (and more) thrown at her at a music festival

Still a Spice Girl, Melanie launched a solo career in 1999 and performed at a rock festival: “V99,” she recalls. “Wait until you hear the line-up: I was on after Faithless and before the Manic Street Preachers. So I went into it completely naively. I thought, ‘I’ve got a great record, I’m really good live, I’ve got an amazing band: we’re going to rock it!’” Things didn’t go to plan. “I had that thing of everything on Earth being chucked at me,” she says noting they included “bottles of things” but had to laugh at one moment: “I had a lyric that went ‘take another bite of the apple’ and an apple core hit me in the chest. So yeah, that really was a baptism of fire.”

10. Success on the West End stage won her newfound respect

Melanie earned rave notices when she finally appeared in the West End production of Blood Brothers in 2009. She had to audition for renowned stage impresario Bill Kenwright: “My first audition since being a Spice Girl. It was terrifying!” she remembers. She got the role and Kenwright himself called her the morning the reviews came out to tell her to “get down the shops” to see all newspapers. “I went down and we had five star reviews across the boards,” she says. “To get those wonderful reviews in broadsheets… to be embraced by the theatre community… it was amazing. And I did think people started to look at me a bit differently. I felt there was a newfound respect.”

11. Billie Eilish's fans remind her of the Spice Girls'

Melanie presented Billie Eilish with the award for Best International Female Solo Artist at this year's Brits, and she picks the Billie Eilish song Everything I Wanted to take to her desert island. “I was lucky enough to see Billie Eilish at Shepherd’s Bush Empire last year," she says. "It was completely sold out, it was full of predominantly young girls – teenage girls – and they were screaming for her and singing every word, every ad-lib. It kind of took me back to the Spice Girls days, and I think often with music it’s young girls screaming for guys, and to see all these girls screaming for another girl; it was quite powerful.”

12. She’s still Sporty

These days Melanie trains hard and competes in triathlon. “I got my PB (personal best) at London a few years ago, and in my age category I think I came second,” she says proudly. “I would love to compete for Team GB – age category – one day. I’d have to train really hard. I might have to give up the music! I’d have to train properly. That’s on my bucket list of things to do. I just want the tri-suit with ‘GBR Chisholm’ on it.”