True Confessions is Bananarama's third album, and their last to be produced
by Steve Jolley & Tony Swain. Prior to the recording of this album,
Bananarama felt they needed a change of direction and began looking for
new collaborators to work with. Some songs were co-written with and produced
by Bishop & Seymour, but the outcome was still dissatisfactory. London
Records, concerned by the length of down time between singles suggested
returning to Jolley & Swain to record a new single, and start on their
third album. By the time of the release of Do Not Disturb it had been
ten months since their last single, and well over a year since their last
top twenty since. To accelerate their new direction, Bananarama chose
to "upgrade" their image, and moved away from the scruffy teenage
look that had served them well on their previous two albums. For the video
they tried for a more glamorous approach, but the lackluster single crawled
up the UK charts petering out in the low thirties.
This served to renew the bands feeling that a new direction was needed. In a bold move, they approached up-and-coming producers Stock, Aitken & Waterman who had recently had massive chart success with Dead Or Alive's "You Spin Me Round (Like A Record)". Bananarama loved the energy of the record and wanted to capture that new dance sound in their own records. They approached Stock Aitken and Waterman with the idea of reincarnating Shocking Blue's Venus a song which they'd been singing as a demo for nearly five years. Stock, Aitken & Waterman refused blank to redo the song, maintaining that they could not improve upon it. Bananarama persisted, and eventually arranged a time to record Venus in the studio. Unlike their labours under Jolley & Swain, Stock Aitken & Waterman got Bananarama to sing through the track twice, and then dismissed them. In great Bananarama fashion, they headed to the pub while Stock & Aitken worked on the backing track of the song. The result, was an NRG inspired rendition of Venus, which combined with a glamorous and sexy video catapulted the band into the Top 10 in most countries in 1986 and the coveted US#1 spot.
Propelled by this success, the True Confessions album - which featured 9 tracks written by Jolley & Swain, and two tracks by Stock, Aitken & Waterman received a US Gold Disc for sales (eventually selling over a million US copies). Momentum waned however, by Keren's pregnancy, making ongoing promotion in the US difficult. Their follow-up single, More Than Physical, now remixed from the meandering album version, scarcely made an impact on the UK charts, but fared better in the USA and Australia on Venus's coattails. In an effort to bolster lagging UK sales, Bananarama were persuaded to use their forth single Trick Of The Night for a BBC documentary on a novice's attempts to direct a pop video. The result, predictably enough, was a terrible video that Bananarama were stuck using on the BBC in the UK and the single, being a ballad, failed to make the Top 20.
True Confessions marks an important turning point in Bananarama's career, it started out as a clumsy attempt to move away from their charming teenage appeal, to a more sophisticated glamorous, and inevitably camp audience. While most of the album is produced by Jolley & Swain it really failed to musically move Bananarama into a more dance-oriented scene. While Siobhan loved their anti-establishmentary rebellion of their early days, they'd failed to really stand out from any other UK girl pop band, with their attempts at serious lyrics were obfuscated by hairspray and glitter. Their union with Stock, Aitken & Waterman transformed the band musically, from their now stale compositions with Jolley & Swain, but at the same time opened a new, blatantly commercialised era for the band. They were now greeted with huge commercial success, but at the cost of credibility - something that had been in short supply since "Shy Boy". As their union with Stock, Aitken, & Waterman continued this would produce increasing tension within the band during the recording of their fourth album WOW.
UK
Universal
Released: September 2001
UK chart position: 46
