Portal Melanie C || www.melaniec.com.br ||

Melanie began 2000 promoting Northern Star through Europe and the United States, appearing on several TV shows and presenting an award to the group TLC at the American Music Awards on January 17th.

Mel also guest starred on the American TV show Norm that aired on January 26th.

On March 3rd the Spice Girls reunited to sing and receive the Outstanding Contribution to Music award at the Brit Awards. At the after party Melanie met the singer J Brown from the band Five and started the most troubled relationship of her life until then.

Never Be The Same Again, the third single from the album Northern Star was released on March 20th. A duet with member of TLC, Lisa Left-Eye Lopes, it immediately reached the number one in the British charts (replacing Geri Halliwell’s single Bag It Up in the first position) and in another 6 countries. Mel’s solo career was starting to take off.

Lisa traveled to England to do the promotion for the single with Mel. As they hadn’t had much contact yet they didn’t seem very friendly at first but Mel soon broke the ice with Lisa and told her about the relationship with J Brown from Five. Lisa confessed to Mel that she had no idea of who J or Five were but promised to go back to the States better informed!

In April 2000 Mel and Lisa went to Top Of The Pops to sing Never Be The Same Again. At the time Westlife were working with the song Fool Again and competing with the two girls for the best position in the charts. A member of the group, Kian, had already said bad things about Melanie’s relationship with J from Five but on the day of Top Of The Pops he sent a bottle of champagne to Mel and Lisa congratulating them for their number one. Straight after that Westlife got up on stage and begged the fans to buy the single Fool Again instead of Never Be The Same Again! The conflicts between Melanie and Westlife had just begun.

Melanie traveled with her personal assistant (ever since the Spice Girls) and friend Ying to spend a holyday in Barbados. Their pictures sunbathing together appeared in the press as shocking news for two reasons: they showed Mel a little overweight and at the same time supported the idea that she was a lesbian, making the tabloids assure that Ying was her girlfriend. The picture of the bed on which they both had supposedly slept on together was printed in the papers and Ying’s personal life began to be investigated through interviews with her relatives and close friends.

Melanie denied the lesbian rumours and justified the weight gain claiming that it happened because she was taking energetic shakes. The information was “translated” by the press as steroids, creating more and more rumors.

In the middle of the situation J showed himself completely undecided about the relationship, admitting it in some interviews and denying it in others! The press begins to follow the couple’s footsteps and to report that Melanie had been seen leaving J’s hotel room in the early morning while Five was on tour in Scotland.

In may Melanie appeared on Top Of The Pops to perform Never Be The Same Again wearing a shirt that brought an answer to the tabloids and their tireless rumours: "Tabloids Kiss My Fit (Fat) ***" with the word “fat” crossed out.

Westlife began swapping insults with Mel and J, causing tension especially when J swore to hit Westlife’s members.

On June 13th Mel won a Platinum Europe Music Award for Northern Star sales: 1 million copies in entire Europe.

On August 7th the single I Turn To You was released as a remix by Hex Hector. It also hit number 1 in the charts including American Billboard Dance Chart!

I Turn To You wins the awards of remix of the year at the Grammy Awards and Melanie becomes the first British singer to have 11 number 1s (solo and as a group) in the UK charts. That got her in the Guinness Book.

J traveled to Ibiza to perform with Five and was seen there with several women drinking and dancing at the clubs. On the next day he told Melanie, through the media, that their relationship was over.

In September Melanie starts her Northern Star Tour in the United Kingdom.

In October she admits starting treatment against depression with the drug Prozac. She also gives her outburst to the press about her eating disorders.

On October 9th Melanie B thanks Melanie in her first solo album, Hot.

And on October 16th another album is released including “thank yous” to Mel: Saint and Sinners, All Saints’ new album. Mel appears in Natalie’s thanks but unfortunately her last name “Chisholm” was written the wrong way, without an “h”.

A few days before the start of the European tour, Melanie fells off a restaurant's stairs and breaks her foot.

Melanie starts the Northern Star European tour with the band Tomcat as her support act. The band's leader was Dan Williams who soon began a relationship with Melanie.

The Spice Girls got together one more time for the release of their new single Holler/Let Love Lead The Way, on October 23rd.

Melanie who already was behaving oddly with Dan, and the other Tomcat members, crashed a hotel room. She says: “It's the first time we've actually socialised together so it was fun. We had a bit of an accident in the hotel room. ”. And then she blamed them: “They trashed my room. Yesterday they sent me some flowers to apologise but I'm not going to let them off, they're not going to get away with it that easily.”

The Spice Girls set up the release of their third album for the same day as the release of Coast to Coast, by Westlife. The conflicts that already existed between Mel and Westlife got worse. J gave interviews supporting Melanie and betting that the Spice Girls would win the sales battle in the first week.

On November 6th the third Spice Girl’s album was released: Forever. Both bands (Westlife and Spice) did a big party each to the launch. Early indications showed that J would attend the Spice Girls’ party… but he went to Westlife’s! Pictures of a drunk Melanie, doing obscene gestures at the party were printed in the tabloids forcing her to apologise for the aggressive behaviour.

Westlife won the battle and Forever reached the 2nd position. But until the half of November 2000, the song Holler was still the most played in the world.

On November 16th the MTV Europe Music Awards happens in Stockholm, Sweden. Melanie is nominated for 3 awards and ready to perform on stage with the Spice Girls. Rumours has it that Mel said that this would be the last Spice Girls’ performance.

More controversy is created concerning the end of the group when Mel, in an interview to Frank Skinner on TV on November 20th, said: “ever since I left the Spice Girls…”. Soon after that she cleared up by saying that the phrase had come out wrong and she was referring to “ever since she began her solo career…”

The last single from Northern Star is released on November 27th: If That Were Me. The royalties of the song were donated to the project No Place Home, from the charity Kandu Arts.

Melanie is a guest on the TV show Much Music Intimate and Interactive, singing acoustic songs and answering questions about her solo career and her problems with the press.

At Christmas, Dan Williams breaks up with Mel. She feared he was scared off by her tattoos!

Melanie began the year with a problem in her vocal chords that started as a simple flu. She’d gotten sick over Christmas and the flu became a serious viral infection in her throat when she traveled to Barbados to spend her birthday. The infection affected her vocal chords and Melanie was forced to cancel a few dates of her tour: “The specialist told me that if I went ahead with the tour, as planned, I probably wouldn't get through it, and also I might never sing again.”

The newspapers started to publish that this was an excuse, that Melanie actually had a relapse from the depression. So Melanie put a notice on her official website explaining the problem with her vocal chords. Virgin Records also cleared that the cancellation of the dates had strictly to do with the vocal chords.

Once more Melanie caused a fuss in the tabloids by being photographed leaving a club at night with a female friend still unknown by the journalists. It was just Rachel, Melanie’s childhood friend.

In February Mel started dating yet another Dan, this time the movie director Dan Cadan. Dan worked as an assistant director for Guy Ritchie at the movie Snatch. He is Madonna’s close friend and he wrote the text in the booklet of her Greatest Hits Volume 2 CD.

The world tour finally began in February.

Melanie went to Israel to do a concert in a time when many artists were canceling their performances in the country due to the increase of the violence between Israelis and Palestinians. Mel made a statement: "I am not at all afraid to be here. I have seen reports of what is going on in this country. I have fans here, and if they are living here and are OK, then I'm OK, too."

In March Melanie arrived in Bangkok’s airport in the middle of an attempt to murder the Thailand’s prime minister. Melanie's plane disembarked few minutes after a bomb exploded inside the Airways Boing 737 that already was on the tarmac, killing a man and hurting 7 people. The plane that would accommodate 149 passengers including the politician and his son was empty when it exploded.

Rumours that Mel was planning on officially leaving the Spice Girls appeared once again when she admitted not having any more intention on working with the group again. The tabloids began to spend the entire day in front of Melanie’s house and to chase her when she’d left by car, thinking that at any time she would give a departure declaration.

In April the American Northern Star Tour begins.

Melanie launches the anti-smoking campaign for children by the Roy Castle charity.

Dan Cadan breaks up with Melanie in May for thinking she was way straight ahead for him to control her. He said: "Put it this way, she is keen but I am not. I am treading a fine line between keeping the friendship and knocking her back. On my birthday we all went out to dinner. Mel C was really keen but I kept having to knock her back."

The tour in the United Kingdom and Ireland begins in May and Melanie is warned for using the Word “fuck” in several moments of her gigs and also for giving the middle finger during the performance of the song “Northern Star”. She shows off the middle finger to the fans when she sings the line "Don't give in to their lies and goodbyes". Some parents found her vocabulary inappropriate to her young fans. But Melanie resisted to the critics and said that just like anybody else, she sometimes may be careless and use harsh words in emotional moments. She also said she had no intention of upseting anyone.

Melanie and Russell Watson sing together the song Barcelona at the BBC Music Live. Melanie also sings Aren't You Kinda Glad We Did at the same event.

In May Mel opens up for two Bon Jovi concerts, in Belgium and in Switzerland. She also performs at several summer festivals in July.

Melanie attends the premiere of the movie Tomb Raider as a guest of the 8 year old Rachel Appleton, little Natalie Appleton’s daughter, who plays Lara Croft as a child in the movie.

On June 19th Mel sings at the 25th wedding anniversary celebration of king Carl Gustaf XVI and queen Silvia from Sweden.

Five announced the release of the last album of their career, Kingsize, and J talked about Melanie again. In interview to Loaded magazine he apologises for treating her so badly.

Melanie was one of the artists interviewed for the 20 years special documentary on MTV USA. It was the Everybody Talk About Pop Music, in August.

Five’s album, Kingsize, comes out with a surprise: J Brown had written with the other members of the band the song Closer To Me, to Melanie. The song is like an apology for the bad things he did to her. Years later, Closer To Me was recorded in Portuguese by the Brazilian singer Felipe Dylon.

Melanie recorded a version of the song Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen with Russell Watson and intended to release the duet on Russell’s new album, Encore. But the song was never released and nobody ever heard it.

In October, Mel dyed her hair back again and appeared visiting the Alder Hey children’s hospital with a completely different look and much thinner.

Mel started to receive death threats and packages with abusive material and vacuum cleaner parts sent by a fan. The police was on the case and the news was published in several newspapers. Soon the man was arrested.

Also in October Mel started dating the race driver Jason Plato. Jason and Mel met when Melanie went to see her brother Paul, also a pilot – run in BTCC (British Touring Car Championship). They dated for 2 months and Melanie broke it up because she thought he wanted to promote himself by being with her. Jason had plans to take Melanie as his date to the Autosport Awards party and with that, get the attention from all photographers and journalists and boost his career. But before the party happened Melanie ended the relationship. According to the tabloids Jason soon found a new date to the party: a brunette called Joe Cowin.

At the end of the year the documentary The Fat Loss Plan by Matt Roberts, Mel’s personal trainer, is released with tips from her diet on how to lose weight.