ORIGINAL BRATS
Noughties pop icons haven’t aged a day 24 years since being bottled with WEE at Reading festival
These trouble-making pop stars had their own brand of bubblegum pop - which didn't go down well at a pop-punk festival
THESE early noughties pop icons had addictive tunes you couldn’t get out of your head – and trouble followed them everywhere they went.
In fact, during one notorious moment in 2000, the decision to put these bubblegum pop twosome on the main stage of Reading Festival resulted in them being pummelled with bottles of wee.
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But fast forward 24 years, Daphne and Celeste are now far more settled, even though it looks like they haven’t aged a day.
The pop duo, real names Karen DiConcetto and Celeste Cruz, shot to fame thanks to their songs Oooh Stick You! and U.G.L.Y.
Armed with chipmunk-style voices and punchy lyrics, the girls threw around insults with a sickly sweet beat that left them loved and hated in equal measure.
Oooh Stick You peaked at number eight in the UK charts, while U.G.L.Y. became a synonymous chant around school playgrounds across the globe.
It peaked with their Reading Festival performance – where they were put on the line-up alongside the likes of Placebo, Stereophonics and Slipknot, and were sent out to a crowd of baffled and angry drunk rock fans.
“Backstage, Slipknot and Rage Against the Machine were coming up to us and telling us how hardcore we were – how they wouldn’t have stayed out there,” Karen later told The Guardian.
“It was definitely the best thing we did, our crowning achievement.”
But their fame was short and sweet, and they were dropped by their record label just a year later after poor performance of their album.
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The duo have remained in touch, and even tried getting their career off the ground more than once, but with little success.
Their last effort was 2018 single, You And I Alone, which didn't chart.
Since then, the New Jersey natives have embarked on their own career, though still have fond memories of their time in the band.
Karen DiConcetto pivoted away from music and became a screenwriter and producer for TV shows – most notably 2016’s Recovery Road.
Based on the book by Blake Nelson, the teen drama focused on a young party girl who decides to check into a rehab facility.
Celeste returned to her studies after her time in the group, and later landed a series of one-off roles in shows including 30 Rock and Cupid.
She’s been married to husband Abram Seaman for the past 10 years, and together they live in New York with their four-year-old son, Leif.
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