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"Goodbye" is a song recorded by British girl group Spice Girls. It was written by the group, Richard Stannard, and Matt Rowe, while it was produced by the latter two. The song became the group's first song without the vocals of Geri Halliwell. It was released by Virgin Records on 8 December 1998 and was later included on their third studio album Forever (2000). "Goodbye" is a pop ballad that lyrically consists of the group's farewell to a friend, specifically Halliwell. The lyrics were also seen, by the media and fans alike, as the group's end, although the idea was dismissed by the members.
"Goodbye" received positive reviews from music commentators, who said it was one of the group's best singles. The song was a commercial success, peaking atop the UK Singles Chart and making the Spice Girls the first act to have had three consecutive Christmas number-one singles since The Beatles in 1965. Internationally, it was also commercially successful, reaching the top spots in Canada, New Zealand, and Ireland and peaking inside the top five on the charts in Australia, Denmark, Finland, Sweden and Taiwan. Additionally, "Goodbye" peaked at number 11 on the US Billboard Hot 100.
The accompanying music video for "Goodbye" was filmed at Mentmore Towers and featured the group singing the song at a castle; Melanie Brown and Victoria Beckham were both pregnant at the time. To promote "Goodbye", the Spice Girls performed the song on several television shows, such as the Royal Variety Performance and Top of the Pops, and later on their concert tours Christmas in Spiceworld (1999), The Return of the Spice Girls (2007–2008) and Spice World – 2019 Tour (2019).
The accompanying music video for "Goodbye" was filmed at Mentmore Towers in Mentmore, Buckinghamshire on 1 and 2 November 1998, being directed by Howard Greenhalgh, who previously directed their music video for "Too Much" (1997). It was premiered through MTV on 20 November 1998. Brown and Beckham were pregnant during the filming of this video. It opens with each of the girls in four different black cars – 1957 Cadillac Fleetwood 75, 1941 Cadillac Fleetwood 75, 1955 Imperial Newport, Tatra 603 – and white wolves running. They arrive at a castle and walk up the stairs arm-in-arm. When they enter within dry ice clouds, there are frozen couples that the girls observe. The video also shows shots of each girl inside the castle in a different setting with falling objects, namely sheets of paper (Beckham), toilet paper rolls (Bunton), plates (Brown), and an exploding chandelier (Chisholm). They are also seen singing the song together as a group. The video ends with the ice melting off the people as they come back to life, then shows the shot of the girls entering in reverse to look like they are leaving.
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