“Help me get my feet back on the ground”
The Beatles, 1965

“The Sun Always Shines On TV”
A-ha, 1986

“Heaven knows I was just a young boy
Didn't know what I wanted to be
I was every little hungry schoolgirl's pride and joy
And I guess it was enough for me
To win the race? A prettier face!
Brand new clothes and a big fat place
On your rock and roll TV
But today the way I play the game is not the same
No way
Think I'm gonna get myself happy”
George Michael, 1990


ONE

Right.

I’ll start by introducing myself. Then the band. We’re the most important people in this, I suppose.

I’m Lucy and I’m fourteen. I’m white with brown hair and I’m ‘curvy’, according to my mum. That probably means I’m a bit fat even though everyone tells me I’m not. I live in north-west London with my mum and my little brother, but my nan might as well live here too. Actually, Sinead might as well live here too. Sinead’s my best mate and she’s a nutter, but you’ll meet her soon.

Our house is falling apart. Well, it’s not really. It just looks like it is because stuff is coming off the walls on the outside – the ‘pebbledashing’, it’s called. All these white clumps are crumbling off the walls, leaving patches of old red brick underneath. I didn’t mind the red brick, though. It reminds me of the start of Coronation Street. Mum said she’s going to track the builders down and sue them. Nan said she’s going track them down, line them up and knee them all in the bollocks.

My nan’s got metal in her knee, so a knee in the bollocks from her would really hurt. It happened in the 1960s after she climbed up the gates of Buckingham Palace. She was trying to get a glimpse of the Beatles when they went to get their MBEs from the queen, but she fell off the gates and shattered her knee cap. She says it was worth it to get a glimpse of Paul McCartney. She still fancies him now. ‘Ooh. I bet Paul’s a right goer,’ she says. Yuck.

I’d fall off a royal gate for Owen Mistry. Any day of the week.

Anyway, I got a bit sidetracked there and introduced a few other people. But mentioning Owen (yum) brings me nicely on to the band. They’re called Gonna B. And they’re at number one in the single and album charts right now.

There are five of them:

Ian Sanders
Ian Sanders is the gay one in the band. And that’s meant to be really exciting as he’s the first boy band member to be openly gay from the start (there was a gay bloke from a band called Boyzone when I was young, but he only came out because the papers were about to put it all over their front pages). Ian is from a place called Hyde, on the outskirts of Manchester. He’s a brilliant dancer and can do all mad backflips and the splits and stuff. He’s quite small, but he has a very muscley, tanned body and sometimes girls wish he was straight, or at least bisexual. He says he snogs his female friends sometimes, though, for a laugh.

Paul Adu
Paul is the hoodie of the band. He’s half black and half white and comes from Streatham. He used to be a gang called STA and he got in trouble with the police loads. Then he left it all to join Gonna B. Sometimes TV presenters have trouble understanding what Paul is saying and so do my mum and nan. That’s why I’ve decided to put translations in brackets. He says he has to live in North London now otherwise people in South London might try to murk him (kill him) or kick his motorbike over. He raps a lot on Gonna B’s songs. He didn’t get on with Ian at first because he didn’t like batty men (gay people), but he said Ian helped him overcome his prejudice and that every hoodie should have a batty mate because it means you know they’re never gonna tief your gash (steal your girlfriend). Loads of girls fancy Paul, but like my mum says, he’s a bit of rough – someone you should have a fling with, but not the type you want to marry.

Lawrence Macmillan
Lawrence is the emo kid of the band. He’s from Northampton, which is meant to be a bit countrified and posh. He plays quite a few instruments, including guitar, bass and drums. He always wears black. He got in trouble for drinking Jack Daniels when Gonna B started as he was only seventeen, but he’s eighteen now. He dyes his hair a lot and once said that his life feels empty. He sometimes wears black nailpolish too. Once on TV, Paul called him a batty man for that, but Ian told Paul to shut up because he was the only gay in the band. Then Lawrence stood up and said, ‘I’m the only gay in the village,’ in a squeaky Welsh accent like the guy in Little Britain and everyone nearly pissed themselves laughing. Lawrence is quite witty when he’s not going on about self-harm and whisky and stuff.

Daniel Maher
Daniel is the other one who’s a bit exciting, like Ian. That’s because he’s the first disabled boyband member ever. He’s in a wheelchair, which is really sad, but he’s also the main songwriter, which means he makes more money than everyone else, so people don’t feel too sorry for him. He’s the only bandmember with a chauffeur and will probably have enough money to retire to a mansion in Surrey soon. He’s from Dublin. He plays piano too. He’s the only band member who has a girlfriend (or boyfriend). Her name is Keeley and she’s a natural blonde and quite nice. Sometimes Paul says he’s disabled too because he’s dyslexic and has something called ADHD, but people don’t really take any notice. My mum thinks Daniel is the best looking one. He has a cute face with big Irish blue eyes, but he’s too pretty for me.

Owen Mistry
Owen’s the most important member of Gonna B, because he’s my favourite. He’s from Harrow, near here, so we’ve probably been to loads of the same places. I do all my shopping in Harrow now because I know I could be stepping on the same floors he has stepped on. He’s half-Asian. I think that’s yet another exciting thing for Gonna B as there’s probably never been an Asian guy in a boyband before either. So Ian is as close as it gets. He has gorgeous dark shiny hair and brown skin and he’s just so yum. He’s the best singer too. Some people think Daniel is the best, but Owen’s voice is a bit more manly, so I prefer it. My main ambition is to have a proper chat with Owen when no one else is there and him to know my name. Well, my main ambition would be to marry him, but at school they tell us you should make your goals SMART. SMART= specific, measurable, agreed, realistic and time-bound. So I want us to have a chat and for Owen to know my name within the next year. There’s still the ‘agreed’ part and Ok, Owen hasn’t agreed, but he’s nice to his fans, so I reckon it’ll be OK.

So yeah, that’s the guys in the band.

Gonna B are linked with a reality TV show, which is also called Gonna B. But it’s not like Pop Idol or X Factor. The band had already been put together and had a manager (he’s called called Stephen Braston, but we call him Sleazy Bastard). It’s like a documentary of the band doing all their normal band stuff: Writing and recording songs, rehearsing for gigs, going to hairdressers and clothes shops, going to the gym, seeing stylists, chilling out together and having meetings with Sleazy Bastard. Sometimes you get to see other parts of their lives too, like Owen going to see his mum, which is so cute because he loves her so much. But with the TV show, we get to vote on things at the end of each programme. We voted on what their first single should be, what dance routine they should use at their Astoria gig, whether Paul should eat less McDonalds and whether Owen should grow his hair (I didn’t bother voting as he’d look gorgeous even if he had a comb-over, like my Science teacher). Once, Lawrence got texted by an ex-girlfriend asking if he wanted to meet up, but everyone voted ‘no’, so he couldn’t meet her. He started threatening to self-harm that night and had to be sent to his counsellor, Sarah.

Gonna B have been around for about a year now. And I’ve met them. Loads of times.