Review: “Make It Come True” by Girlfriend (CD, 1992)

Today’s Pop Rescue from a fate unknown, is the 1992 debut album Make It Come True by Australian pop group Girlfriend. Will this album be one to take home to mum and dad, or is it just full of Bad Attitude? Read on…

Girlfriend - Make It Come True (1992) album — Girlfriend – Make It Come True (1992) album

The album opens with a flourish of harp before a ‘1-2-3 Kick It!’ from singer Robyn Loau who lead us into second single Girl’s Life. The track is a wash of beats that would not sound out of place from a Paula Abdul or Dannii Minogue track of the same time. There’s also bags of attitude here in this track, with rap and spoken moments alongside the slightly feminist lyrics. It’s a really quite catchy song that flows effortlessly and allows the different members to show off their vocal skills. The single did touch the UK charts, but stalled at #68.

Next is the album’s lead single Take It From Me, with Robyn and Melanie Alexander on lead vocals. Musically, there are a lot similarities between this track and the previous one – down to the choice of instruments, record scratches, and at times the melody too, making it feel almost like a megamix or a seamless flow of tracks. That said, it sounds quite light, bouncy, and the chorus allows the vocal harmonies to shine. At times, this could almost be an early Spice Girls album song. The song entered the UK chart in early 1993, giving them a disappointing debut at #47.

That’s followed by Without You which stood as the group’s third single, and gives Robyn another lead vocal (she’s also a co-writer here too). The tempo is down, allowing for swathes of synth strings and piano to drop in and give us a heartfelt reflective ballad. Right after Robyn’s expertly delivered big note, there’s a strange sound that reminds me of a cross between my grandfather’s crazy doorbell meets my parents ridiculous tinny landline ring tone – it belongs in another realm, but the song carries on back as normal, giving us this big schmaltzy track. No, you’re crying…. unless you’re in the UK, as you probably never heard it.

All Or Nothing follows that, and this time Lorinda Noble manages to grab the microphone. This song is a bit more muted. Again, we’re treated to lots of funky brass stabs, record scratching, and a slew of beats, mixed in with the pretty catchy vocals from the group. The chorus is fairly catchy and again the harmonies work well here, but the vocals stay safely within a fairly tight range.

Bleeping synths lead us into Go For It almost making a promise of dance or disco, but no, we’re into shouty crowd rap, but then suddenly we’re into slightly flat pop singer. It then flips again to the shouty stage… and the whole thing is just disorientating and messy. The whole song flips between different musical and vocal styles, and keys together (I guess following the ‘go for it’ advice throughout), but the end result is poor. ‘Nothing is impossible’ explains one of the group, and a robotic male voice… except perhaps making a decent song out of this idea.

That’s followed by What Kinda Girl, returning us to pop, and this time we’re in a semi-sultry zone, and for a moment there I thought I might be listening to Melanie B. The vocal harmonies are wonderful here, but the cheapness of the synth sounds in this track remind me of a cheap Casio keyboard my cousin had in the late 1980s. The track itself is catchy, along with the melody, but musically it sounds quite dated or budget.

It’s time now for some Promises, and this brings the tempo down as we wander back into ballad zone. Melanie has the microphone again, and the track flows easily under her command. She’s flanked by yet more lovely vocal harmonies. The change from chorus to verse jar a little at times, but Melanie puts in a great effort to distract you, and she’s able to deliver the song with relative ease. There’s a nice synth solo in the middle which thankfully fits with the genre of the song, allowing Melanie to reach for some higher and bigger notes – and thankfully she manages it perfectly. It’s a nice little song.

Next up is Skating On Thin Ice, and clearly someone has found a cow bell in the cupboard. Robyn has picked up the mic once more, and she just seems to be able to deliver any song that’s thrown at her. Whilst the song isn’t particularly catchy, she puts in a good turn delivering it. The rest of the group are somewhat kept for some sparing vocal harmonies during the chorus. This very much feels like a solo song that could have been handed over by Janet Jackson or Paula Abdul.

Then it’s Love’s On My Mind, opening with a wash of ballad piano and tender vocals. Imagine a low budget version of the Spice Girls 2 Become 1 track. This has all the ballad tropes you’d expect for a song with this title, including the step-off-the-stool-with-arms-wide moment in the final third. To be fair though, the vocal harmonies are once again great, even if the song is somewhat paint by numbers. This was the album’s final single, and it didn’t touch the UK chart.

The album closes with fourth single Bad Attitude, signalled by the growling guitar sound at the start, and the more chugging guitar led sound through the opening verse. Again, Robyn has the mic, and the result here with the energy injected by the harder sound, and Robyn’s vocals allows this to take on a rockier sound and it works quite well – the chorus is perfect – musically and lyrically. Sadly, the track didn’t bother the UK charts.

Girlfriend’s lead single ‘Take It From Me’ (1992).

Verdict

Over all, this album is a fairly well executed debut pop album. It has the usual formula of pop songs, fillers, and a few ballads thrown in to show off the more emotional and serious side.

Bad Attitude is brilliant, and makes me wonder what a harder sounding album would have been like, but Girl’s Life and Take It From Me are also two good strong pop songs. Most of the rest are nice, if perhaps a little unadventurous – playing the same routine with a slight variation in melody.

The low point is Go For It, which is just too clumsy and cluttered to be retained by my brain, or to be sung along to thanks to it’s juttering structure.

Whilst this does remind me of Dannii Minogue, Paula Abdul, and bits of Janet Jackson, it does feel like an early incarnation of the Spice Girls. If only they’d been a couple of years later, and with a couple of stronger tracks on the album, then we might have been looking to Girlfriend for our Girl Power, rather than the Spice Girls.