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The Girls5eva Soundtrack Includes An Extra Treat For Sara Bareilles Fans

The Grammy winner stars as Dawn in the Peacock musical comedy.

Paula Pell as Gloria, Sara Bareilles as Dawn, Renée Elise Goldsberry as Wickie, Busy Philipps as Sum...
Heidi Gutman/Peacock

Should you find yourself unable to get ‘90s-style jams like “Famous 5eva” out of your head, the songs in Girls5eva will all be on an accompanying soundtrack album, Billboard revealed on May 3. Fans of the Peacock musical comedy series won’t have to wait to stream or purchase the songs from cast members Sara Bareilles, Renée Elise Goldsberry, Busy Philipps and Paula Pell, either: Epic Records is dropping the album on May 6, the same day Girls5eva premieres on Peacock.

As an added gift, Bareilles penned a new song called “4 Stars,” which appears along with her character’s solo, “I’m Afraid (Dawn’s Songs of Fears),” for the project. “I wrote the song “4 Stars” as I got to know the characters of the other women,” the Grammy winner explained in a “Behind the Music” video from the NBC streaming service. “Writing that song towards them and giving their inner worlds a place to sing and something to say was really really exciting.”

Goldsberry, who previously won a Tony Award for originating the role of Angelica Schuyler in Hamilton, added that she cried the first time she heard Bareilles’ demo of “4 Stars.” The actor described the track as a “perfect pop song about the beauty of being yourself and not being perfect, for any women, but in particular, this very strange group of women.”

Girls5eva follows a one-hit wonder ‘90s girl group that reunites after a young rapper samples their song. Now in their 40s, the women want to “give their pop star dreams one more shot,” though they’re “balancing spouses, kids, jobs, debt, aging parents, and shoulder pain,” per Peacock’s official description. In addition to tracks from the show’s core cast members, the album also features vocals from Andrew Rannells, Erika Henningsen, Ashley Park, Jeremiah Craft, and The Milk Carton Kids.

Jeff Richmond — who serves as an executive producer for the Meredith Scardino-created series, along with Tina Fey, Robert Carlock, David Miner, Eric Gurian — also composed the soundtrack. “The musical style that we’re approaching in Girls5eva is all the stuff from the late 1990s when girl groups were all the fun of synths [and] dance beats,” Richmond explained in Peacock’s BTS video. Fey, for her part, called the group’s first hit, “Famous 5eva,” an “earworm,” while Scardino joked that though some of the lyrics are “stupid and bad,” the songs are still “really good.”

Check out the full Girls5eva tracklist, courtesy of Billboard, below.

  1. “Famous 5eva” by Sara Bareilles, Renée Elise Goldsberry, Erika Henningsen, Ashley Park and Busy Philipps
  2. “Dream Girlfriends” by Sara Bareilles, Renée Elise Goldsberry, Paula Pell and Busy Philipps
  3. “New York Lonely Boy” by The Milk Carton Kids
  4. “Space Boys” by Sara Bareilles, Renée Elise Goldsberry, Erika Henningsen, Ashley Park and Busy Philipps
  5. “I’m Afraid (Dawn’s Song of Fears)” by Sara Bareilles
  6. “The Splingee” by Sara Bareilles, Renée Elise Goldsberry, Paula Pell and Busy Philipps
  7. “Boyz Next Door (Puber-Dude)” by Andrew Rannells
  8. “Line Up” by Jeremiah Craft with Sara Bareilles, Renée Elise Goldsberry, Paula Pell and Busy Philipps
  9. “4 Stars” by Sara Bareilles, Renée Elise Goldsberry, Paula Pell and Busy Philipps