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Try to imagine it: the Spice Girls Reunion Tour.
It's the year 2013 and Ginger Spice decides to revive the quintet, proving that Girl Power is still a viable proposition at age 45.
The overwhelming response to the concert leads to a triumphant world tour and a hit live album. The Spice Girls' original teeny-bopper fans are now adults with lots of buying power and the right to exercise nostalgia.
That scenario is comical, perhaps, but not totally implausible--in fact, the equivalent of a Spice Girls reunion tour is happening right now in the Latin pop world. That's right: Menudo, the '80s Latin teen-pop phenomenon, is back.
The group may now be calling itself El Reencuentro (the Reencounter), but it is actually a virtual re-creation of the original Menudo's most popular lineup. When the reunion was announced earlier this year, observers wondered whether the group's fans would still care after all these years. The answer came swiftly and dramatically.
"We contacted the guys as soon as we heard about the Puerto Rico gigs," says Steve Sybesma of SFX Entertainment, the tour's producer. "When I went to see them live, I couldn't believe the crowd's reaction. There were hysterical fans of all ages, grandmothers and granddaughters who knew the lyrics and were singing them together."
Initially, the reunion was going to be limited to Puerto Rico. But what was to be one single concert soon became six sold-out shows there. And the enthusiastic response to a double live album, which broke into the Top 10 on the Billboard Latin chart, made it clear that the project could be turned into a big tour throughout the Americas.
"The response has been incredible. Anywhere we've been, they ask us to come back," says Sybesma, adding there is already talk of recording an album of new songs, which could in turn lead to more touring. The first leg of the current tour, which is...