Released: 2nd October 2000
Writers: Danski / DJ Delmundo
Peak position: #19
Chart run: 19-32-43-51-60
Cheekah Bow Wow (That Computer Song) saw a new – animated – member join the Vengaboys to help promote a fourth single from The Platinum Album.
If it were possible to pinpoint where the Vengaboys run among the biggest acts in the UK – which saw them score seven consecutive top ten hits, including two #1 singles – came to an end, Cheekah Bow Wow (That Computer Song) is probably the moment. Yet, there’s also a very good reason why that should be the case. This is still notionally a Vengaboys track, but only because it was created by Danski and DJ Delmundo, like the vast majority of their material. The duo had performed under that name in the early ‘90s before later evolving the concept into a Eurodance pop group fronted by Kim Sasabone, Denise Post-Van Rijswijk, Roy den Burger, and – at this point in 2000 – Yorick Bakker. It never became a prerequisite expectation that they performed on every track since both The Party Album and The Platinum Album contain instrumentals. However, the Vengaboys were essentially marketed like any other mainstream pop act of the time, making Kim, Denise, Roy and Yorick integral to both the sound and identity of the singles. That’s where Cheekah Bow Wow (That Computer Song) becomes an anomaly because although the group promoted the track and lip-synced to the vocals, they’re not audible at all; it’s entirely sung by a computer.
The rationale for choosing Cheekah Bow Wow (That Computer Song) is that it allowed the Vengaboys to release a single without disrupting their touring commitments in America. That makes sense to some degree, though many of their peers faced similar demands without resorting to such extreme measures. Furthermore, the Vengaboys still appeared in the music video – which is more than they did for We’re Going To Ibiza – and even performed on shows like Top Of The Pops. So, while Cheekah Bow Wow (That Computer Song) might’ve been convenient, it wasn’t just a means to an end.
The track also feels intended to tap into the novelty of CGI animation in pop music. Though not a new technology, it was becoming more accessible and widespread, with attempts to see how far it could be utilised (LCD launched as the world’s first digital supergroup in 1998 with their single, Zorba’s Dance). Thus, creating the titular Cheekah, who ‘joined’ the Vengaboys and ostensibly voiced Cheekah Bow Wow (That Computer Song), veers perilously close to coming across as a novelty gimmick. Albeit one the group went all in on.
According to his official biography on the Vengaboys’ website, Cheekah is about five feet tall, into computers (obviously) and is admired for his singing voice and seamless pizza-ordering skills. However, Cheekah Bow Wow (That Computer Song) is a far less innocent endeavour. The track is filled with computer-themed innuendo: “I saw you in the disco, last night in San Francisco, the way you used your joystick, it really makes my mouse click”, while the production blips, bleeps, whirs and even includes a dial-up internet tone for good measure. The hard-edged beat is consistent with the digital theme of the song, but it doesn’t quite have the same sparkle as earlier Vengaboys tracks. And that’s where the group’s absence becomes apparent. A computerised voice had been used before (probably most recognisably on the: “Everybody get on down” and: “Vengaboys are back in town” parts of Boom, Boom, Boom, Boom!!) and worked well. Yet, without any natural human inflexion – distorted or otherwise – to break it up, Cheekah Bow Wow (That Computer Song) can, at points, verge on being flat and monotonous by the Vengaboys’ usual effervescent standards.
If substituting the group for a computer was already an unorthodox move, things become even more bizarre as the track continues. It escalates beyond innuendo; there’s little subtext for what: “Come sit down on my laptop, let’s do a little hip hop, let’s go into a chat room, and do a little boom boom” is describing. Alas, by the second verse, things have gone awry. The story is told again, this time in hindsight and with an unwelcome twist for Cheekah: “I saw you in the disco, last week in San Francisco, the way you used your joystick, has really made me feel sick”. It transpires that Cheekah Bow Wow (That Computer Song) is, in fact, a metaphor warning of the dangers of unprotected sex: “The doctor checked my hard drive, a virus in my archive, my disc was not protected, and now I am infected” as told through the misadventures of a computer. Creating a Eurodance track about contracting a sexually transmitted disease is undoubtedly a unique spin on socially conscious pop music. Yet if any act were brave enough to pull it off, it was the Vengaboys.
In some respects, Cheekah Bow Wow (That Computer Song) is structurally similar to Up and Down. Indeed, it even reintroduces the: “Wooo!” sample used prominently in that track. There isn’t a chorus, as such. Instead, an instrumental refrain – that is musically much more distinctly Vengaboys-sounding – features grunts of: “Cheekah bow wow”. It’s later combined with a: “Doo doop da doop da doop doo” refrain, and the two together work well because the shorter robotic vocals can be distorted and absorbed into the melody, giving them a little more personality. The Hitradio Mix also adds an additional: “One, two, three, shake your ass and dance with me” breakdown. In its purest sense, Cheekah Bow Wow (That Computer Song) is fairly faithful to the early Vengaboys formula. However, the group had evolved, and their material – particularly the singles – became more rounded as mainstream pop songs rather than minimalistic dance tracks. Cheekah Bow Wow (That Computer Song) falls somewhere in the middle and doesn’t quite fit with how the group were now being marketed.
Although the Vengaboys do appear in the accompanying music video, it’s evident that their availability was somewhat limited. It starts with the group entering a room and sitting at a console where they log onto their official website. Cheekah – a long-limbed green creature with a screen for a torso – appears and summons them inside a CGI rendering of the interior behind the homepage, with doors to different sections (gallery, news, download, chat room). Digital avatars of Kim Sasabone, Denise Post-Van Rijswijk, Roy den Burger, and Yorick Bakker are sucked inside Cheekah and materialise on the screen. He runs into a room labelled ‘disco’, which is mainly filled with gyrating women whose oversized breasts appear to move independently of the rest of their bodies. The group bursts out of Cheekah’s stomach and start dancing. However, a virus alert appears and causes people and objects in the room to turn transparent. Cheekah grabs a hose and sprays it (phallically) over everyone to make them reappear. A disco ball springs out at the end as the real-life Vengaboys exit the console.
It goes without saying that the animation of Cheekah Bow Wow (That Computer Song), by today’s standards, is basic. The characters move in a limited, robotic fashion with rictus facial features. However, with the sort of budget that the Vengaboys were likely to command – particularly on a fourth single from The Platinum Album – the video looks about the quality that would reasonably be expected. Some effort has, at least, gone into creating Cheekah, who has a much broader range of motion and expressions. As a cute, friendly-looking mascot for the group that represents the transition into the era of websites and digital content, he’s well-designed. But it doesn’t match the deeper voice of the protagonist in Cheekah Bow Wow (That Computer Song). Indeed, during some of the sequences, Cheekah appears positively alarmed at the breasts being pushed rhythmically into his face. Ultimately, the visuals have aged terribly, which is inevitable and as true for this single as it is for a lot of 3D-modelled CGI across different mediums that, at the time, was relatively groundbreaking. The newer retro-inspired lyric video is much cooler (and uses more appropriately adult-looking characters), but, in fairness, it’s animated with far better technology.
From a commercial perspective, Cheekah Bow Wow (That Computer Song) became the Vengaboys’ first major misstep in the UK when it peaked at #19. Though, given it could, in principle, have existed without their involvement whatsoever, perhaps that’s not entirely surprising. Yet, the track did earn the accolade of becoming the first top 20 hit to be performed solely by a computer, which is certainly an achievement for Danski and DJ Delmundo, if not necessarily for the Vengaboys themselves. Tellingly, Cheekah Bow Wow (That Computer Song) did little to improve the fortunes of The Platinum Album, which, until this point, had been hovering around the top 75 but dipped out when the track was released. In some respects, the single might even be considered counterintuitive as an album seller because it essentially conveyed that Kim Sasabone, Denise Post-Van Rijswijk, Roy den Burger, and Yorick Bakker were incidental to their own material.
The Vengaboys never truly recovered from Cheekah Bow Wow (That Computer Song) in the ‘00s. Their next single – Forever As One – fared even worse, peaking at #28. However, it’s not necessarily that this track alone caused the bubble to burst; it just came when the group’s commercial prowess started to wane, and they needed to re-assert their chart presence. Sending a CGI character to ostensibly stand in for them was a risk that might have generated some interest from a novelty perspective, but it ultimately didn’t pay off to the extent required.
Even so, the Vengaboys haven’t turned their back on Cheekah; he’s still recognised as an honorary fifth member of the group while the track – for better or worse – remains a fascinatingly peculiar oddity of its time.
