Bananarama have opened up about their 1988 split in a new interview.

Ahead of the release of their new memoir, Really Saying Something, on October 29th, ‘nanas Sara Dallin and Keren Woodward chatted with You magazine about their 40-year career – with the pair touching on Siobhan Fahey’s exit from the band.

“I think [in the book] we talk about Siobhan quite honestly,” reflects Keren. “It wasn’t great when we split but we’ve talked about it since and you think, ‘Why was that such a big deal?’”

Bananarama were promoting their fourth album, Wow!, and had just released third single I Can’t Help It when Siobhan left the line-up to form Shakespears Sister. Sara and Keren, of course, recruited Jacquie O’Sullivan as a replacement and continued to promote the album with fourth single I Want You Back.

When asked whether Siobhan may have felt ousted from the group due to the childhood friends’ closeness, Keren adds: “Because Sara and I were such good friends beforehand, Siobhan may have seen it like that, but we were very much a trio.

“We laughed about the same things,” she muses. “Even when we did the reunion, we laughed and laughed.”

“But also when you work with people in an office, you’re not best friends with everyone,” explains Sara. “Obviously, we had different sets of friends and she was a little bit older, living with a boyfriend. We’d just left school and it seemed like a big gap.”

Any past tension between the trio was overcome when they reunited in 2017 for their Original Line-Up Tour and, as Keren says, “all the things that seemed a big deal were not, really.

“She needed a change just like I needed a change when I moved to Cornwall,” she adds. “So I don’t remember feeling particularly p**sed off when she left.”

Really Saying Something is available to order here and Sara and Keren will open up further about their lives and career during a special live stream event next month.