Paradiso Girls

Paradiso Girls were a girl group created by Robin Antin, and were a European spin-off of Antin's other girl group The Pussycat Dolls. The members come from a number of countries: Chelsea Korka from the United States, Aria Crescendo from France, Lauren Bennett and Kelly Beckett from the United Kingdom and Shar Mae Amor from the Philippines. They were signed to Interscope Records.^[1] Their debut single "Patron Tequila" featuring Lil Jon and Eve was released on May 12, 2009 and reached position 3 on the Billboard Hot Dance Club Play.^[2] The band broke up in 2010, after they cancelled their debut album.

History

2007–08: Formation

Jimmy Iovine, owner of Interscope Records, decided to create a new girl group after meeting French singer and former Star Academy yoga teacher Aria Crescendo. Together with Robin Antin, Martin Kierszenbaum and will.i.am,^[3] he auditioned over 500 girls in London, some of which had been noticed during The X Factor UK auditions, casting six of them^[4] including singer Lauren Bennett,^[5] singer/dancer Kelly Beckett,^[6] as well as rapper/singer, Shar Mae Amor.^[7][8] Each girl represented a different country and the group had no lead singer, unlike The Pussycat Dolls.^[9] The group, cut down to a quartet was then featured in a remix of "I Got It from My Mama" by will.i.am.

However, following their appearances on Antin's Pussycat Dolls Present: The Search for the Next Doll, Chelsea Korka, Mariela Arteaga, Brittany Diiorio, Sisely Treasure and Rashon Graves a dancer from New Jersey were also added to the line-up, as seen on rehearsals videos.^[7][10] The group was then first revealed by Chelsea and Antin at CW Upfronts 2007.

2009–2011: Debut, departure from label and disabandment

After two years of production, the group finally released its first official single, "Patron Tequila" featuring Eve and Lil' Jon on iTunes on April 14, 2009. The song was intended as the lead single from their to-be debut album entitled Crazy Horse. As promotion, the group was featured on various songs by Space Cowboy^[11] and made appearances in numerous events^[7] including the Party Rock Tour, which featured many new artist from their label,^[12] TV shows,^{[13][14][15][16]} blogs^[17][18][19] and magazines^{[20][21][22][23] [24][25][26]} They have also modeled for Beats By Dre.^[27][28] In 2010, their second single called "Who's My Bitch" was released digitally on June 22, 2010 with a music video, shot from April 7–8, 2010 which had appeared on YouTube and MySpace on June 5, 2010. Unlike the previous single, it performed poorly on the charts and the group did no promotions for the song.

Following the poor performance of the second single, numerous rumors of them disbanding began to circulate in the internet after some members began to remove the word “Paradiso” from their Twitter names but however band member Shar Mae Amor stated in an interview on UStream that the group was preparing for a third single while Lauren Bennett stated that the album is already finished and that the groups are just waiting for their record label to set a release date.^[29] However, Interscope Records did not release an official statement explaining the status of the group.

The fate of the group was then put to question when a brief disagreement broke out between band members Aria Crescendo and Chelsea Korka through Twitter, after Korka tweeted that the group was still together but each band member will be pursuing their own projects for now. A frustrated Crescendo then replied to her tweet by saying "why are you confusing the fans ????????? u know the troth Chealsea so stop pretending .......be truthful to ur hart for once".^[30]

Then on October 27, 2010, band member Aria Crescendo made an unofficial confirmation that the group was dropped by Interscope Records through an online interview hosted by popChamber via Vimeo. In the interview, she expressed her disappointment for the lack of promotions given to the group in return for the efforts put in by each of the band members for the last two years. She has also confirmed that their highly anticipated debut album will no longer be released. It was revealed that they had apparently recorded over 50 songs for this album including a song called "Bad Man" featuring Will.i.am. She is now a solo artist under a different record label.^[31]

On September 15, 2015, former member Shar Mae Amor appeared on the seventh season of The X Factor Australia to audition. During an interview she mentioned her time with the group and confirmed that they were dropped by the label after the release of their second single.^[32]

Discography

Studio albums

• Crazy Horse (shelved)

Singles

Collaborations

Music videos

References

External links

• Official Website