S Club 7 have revealed they will be touring as a seven-piece pop group for the first time since their noughties heyday.
Their nationwide reunion tour will mark 25 years since the band had their first number one single, Bring It All Back, and 20 years since they made the sad announcement they’d be going their separate ways.
But the news has got some people harking back to a now cult-status interview which saw the then about-to-disband pop group storm out of a television interview with a then little known Claudia Winkleman, after being asked questions about their salaries.
Pontificating on the rumour on everyone’s lips at the time, a pre-Strictly Claudiaasked guests Jo O’Meara, Hannah Spearitt, Jon Lee and Bradley McIntosh if the real reason for the shock split was they were ‘grumpy’ about manager Simon Fuller (who also managed the Spice Girls, FYI) making a killing from their albums, while the 20-something stars were still waiting to see their success reflected in their own bank balances.
It was then that the band's reported press relations officer stormed into the TV studio and declared that the line of questioning was ‘not on’ before herding the band away.
Cut to Claudia’s iconic ‘oh dear’ expression and a discussion with a celebrity expert about how she was only commenting on what the press had been publishing anyway.
One Twitter user was quick to ensure that the interview, filmed for celebrity gossip show of the era Liquid News, was at the forefront of everyone’s minds ahead of the group’s return to the stage, sharing the clip in question and writing, ‘Nobody mention the money to S Club 7!’
The band announced their split in 2003, after Paul Cattermole made his departure a year earlier in early 2002. In 2014, the full line-up reunited for a one-off Children in Need performance of a medley of their biggest hits. More recently, Tina Barrett, Bradley and occasionally Jo had been touring smaller-scale venues as a three piece known as simply S Club.
A message on the group’s social media reads, ‘After eight years it feels amazing to announce that we're reuniting and performing together again. We're so excited to bring the S Club Party back to our fans across the country to celebrate 25 years of S Club 7. We can't even believe it's been so long!
‘Music and friendship have always been at the core of everything that we've ever done. We hope everyone can join us for one big party!’