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Development[]
It's basically a love song, but it's got a message—make sure you put a condom on if you're going to have sex. We all think that's very important!
Writing Process[]
2 Become 1 was co-written by the Spice Girls along with partners Richard Stannard and Matthew Rowe. Stannard and Rowe also co-produced the track. The slow ballad focuses upon how the bonding of two lovers can become so strong that they practically become one entity, through the act of sexual intercourse.
According to their official book, Girl Power!, after writing more animated and dance-based songs the group decided to write a slow ballad, but the lyrics started to sound a bit corny, so the group decided to address the importance of contraception to the song with the lyrics:
"be a little bit wiser baby, put it on, put it on."
The group wrote the song after they finished Wannabe, inspired by the "special" relationship which was delevoping between Halliwell and Rowe. Melanie Brown hinted this development in her autobiography commenting: "When Matt and Geri started making eye contact at each other, I knew what was going on, even though they denied it. I knew them both too well for it to be a secret for me".
Stannard also remembered the fondness that existed between the two:
"I don't want to get into the side of things. They were very close. They clicked. And I think the lyrics in "2 Become 1" came from that, especially the first verse, which they wrote together."
The song was more a melodically adept, mainstream number that added another string to their songwriting bow. As well as the obvious sexual connotations there was an aspirational undercurrent to the lyric and desire was explicitly linked to ambition: "free your mind of doubt and danger/be for real don't be a stranger/we can achieve it/we can achieve it".
Spanish version[]
The group also recorded a Spanish version of the song, written by them, Rowe, Stannard, and N. Maño.. The title was Seremos uno los dos, although the title is loosely translated in one line of the song: Seremos uno los dos. The song was released as the eleventh track of their debut album Spice in Colombia, Mexico, South Africa, Latin Americaalso in a special re-edition of the album in Spain and as one of the tracks of the maxi-single of the 2 Become 1 in the US. Even in the Spanish version, the line "Wanna make love to ya baby", remained in English. The girls sing with an accent from Spain, using the traditional lisp on the letters "c" and "z". An Spanglish edit that traded verses between the English and Spanish versions was created by DJ Mike Rizzo and production director Bill Schultz for New York-based radio WKTU.
This is the only song the Spice Girls recorded in Spanish, aside from Halliwell's Spanish verse in the song, If U Can't Dance.
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Wannabe ·
Say You'll Be There ·
2 Become 1 ·
Love Thing ·
Last Time Lover ·
Mama | |||||||||