After Dinner Speakers: Mel B, Willie Nelson, Sid Watkins

b. Melanie Janine Brown, 29 May 1975, Leeds, Yorkshire, England. Brown, aka Scary Spice, has stamped herself indelibly on pop history as a member of the cultural UK phenomenon that is the Spice Girls. She was the first Spice Girl to enjoy solo success, collaborating with Missy "Misdemeanor" Elliott on the excellent "I Want You Back'. The harsh urban beats of the single, which topped the UK charts in September 1998, marked a significant departure from the Spice Girls" pop blueprint. Brown subsequently became a fixture in the tabloid press with her troubled marriage to Jimmy Gulzar, a dancer on the Spice Girls touring show, and the birth of the couple's daughter Phoenix Chi in February 1999. The low chart position of July's lame cover version of Cameo's "Word Up", recorded for the soundtrack of Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me, was a rare Spice Girls-associated failure. Brown continued to promote an urban-orientated direction on her solo debut Hot and the new Spice Girls album, Forever, which were released within one month of each other at the end of 2000. Producers Teddy Riley, Sisqo, Jimmy Jam And Terry Lewis stamped their style all over Hot, while R&B's man of the moment Rodney Jerkins was brought in to add a contemporary sheen to Forever. Brown's appearance as a working single mother in Bruce Goodison's low budget short, Fish, was in marked contrast to her concurrent musical activities.