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couple of weeks ago, I was humming the tune of Republica’s “Ready To Go” (mp3, +30 seconds): earlier I had found an excellent live performance of the song at VH1 Loudly Fashionable (or something like that), which led to a search for the original European version of the song.
Apparently, the band (or rather their record company) released two versions of the song: A US version (which sounds a bit more rock-like and is probably the one everybody is familiar with) and a European one (which sounds a bit more ‘techno-like’). Adding to the confusion, the band also produced two different videos for each continent. Whichever version you fancy, the song became a hit on both continents: in Europe the band got mainly positive reviews and was branded as one of the most promising UK bands. That was until the members decided to disband the band and go their own ways. Saffron, the band’s vocalist, ended up contributing to various other artists’ recordings (The Cure, Junkie XL) and even sang in a London musical called ‘Starlight Express’. In between, there was an incident about a record company releasing an unauthorized ‘Best Of Republica’ CD, which prompted a swift statement from Saffron and her fellow members to their fans not to buy this CD.
What surprises me is that the song is popular with the YouTube crowd: from people who make machinima movies to aspiring musicians who prefer to create ‘unplugged’ versions of any hit-song mankind has ever produced. I’d be the last person in the world to say that this song doesn’t have a catchy chorus.