Westlife
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| Westlife | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Background information | |
| Origin | Sligo/Dublin, Ireland |
| Genre(s) | Pop, adult contemporary |
| Years active | 1998–present |
| Label(s) | Sony BMG, RCA |
| Website | www.westlife.com |
| Members | |
| Nicky Byrne Kian Egan Mark Feehily Shane Filan | |
| Former members | |
| Brian (Bryan) McFadden | |
Westlife is an Irish pop music group that formed in July 1998. They were signed by Simon Cowell and managed by Louis Walsh. In recent years, Westlife's sound has evolved from boy band "teen pop" sound into a more adult contemporary music (ACM) sound, with an emphasis on ballads.
Westlife has had 14 number one singles in the United Kingdom between the years 1999 and 2006 from their 9 albums done, the third-highest such total in UK history, behind Elvis Presley and The Beatles, and tied with Cliff Richard.
They are the first UK act with 4 number 1's in a year. They are also the first number 1 song in the UK download chart: Flying Without Wings, live from Stockholm Globe Arena.
They have 25+ UK multi-platinum albums and have sold more than 40 million records worldwide.[1][2]
Westlife was awarded as the Best Irish Pop Act, a public voting category, at the annual Ireland Meteor Awards for the seventh consecutive year on 2 February 2007 which they are the only act that has done it. They are also the only artist/group to win 'Record of the Year' in the UK four times.
Contents |
Formation
Pre-formation
Westlife was formed in July 1998, with the members Kian Egan, Mark Feehily, Shane Filan, Nicky Byrne, and Brian McFadden.
The group's roots are in Sligo in the north west of Ireland, where Egan, Feehily, and Filan were in a six-member vocal group named IOYOU (sometimes IOU), with fellow Sligonians Derrick Lacey, Graham Keighron and Michael "Miggles" Garrett. IOYOU were groomed and managed by choreographer Mary McDonagh and two other informal managers.[3]. IOYOU released a single called "Together Girl Forever" with the song "Everlasting Love".
The band was then 'discovered' by Louis Walsh, the manager of 1990s boy band Boyzone - he was actually contacted by Filan's mother. However IOYOU did not meet Simon Cowell's approval for a record deal with BMG, so changes were needed. Two members of IOYOU were given the sack, and auditions were held in Dublin. The band recruited Byrne and McFadden. A third original member, Michael Garrett, was dropped. The group was re-named Westside soon afterwards but as the name was already taken by another band, it was changed to Westlife. Boyzone singer Ronan Keating was brought in to co-manage the band with Walsh.
Shane Filan, Mark Feehily and Bryan McFadden shared most of the lead vocals. Some of the boys can play instruments (Kian and Bryan play the guitar and the piano) and all five of them are songwriters, although most of their hits have been composed by outside songwriters. The group's musical influences include boy bands such as Boyzone, Take That, Backstreet Boys and Boyz II Men.[4][5]
Original group
Big break
Westlife's first big break came in 1998 when they opened for the Boyzone in Dublin. Later that year, they won Best New Tour Act at the Smash Hits Poll Winners Party.[6]
In March 1999, their first single, "Swear It Again", was released, and went straight to the top of the charts in Ireland and the UK.[7] The band's success was to be confirmed when their second single, "If I Let You Go", entered the charts at number 1 in August 1999, followed by "Flying Without Wings" in October, which repeated the feat.[7] This version was included in the soundtrack for the Warner Brothers film, Pokemon 2000. They had the honour of having the Christmas number-one single of 1999.[8] when their double-A-side single, "I Have A Dream"/"Seasons In The Sun" knocked Cliff Richard's "The Millennium Prayer" off the top spot.[9] The single held this position for the subsequent week, making Westlife the first number one act of the new millennium.
Swear It Again
Their first album, simply titled Westlife, was released in November 1999 and was also a big hit, peaking at #2. The album included the four #1 singles, and the follow-up "Fool Again" which also reached the top spot in April 2000.[10] After the intital success, they then went on a UK tour performing at Newcastle Metro Radio Arena before releasing the second album.
Coast to Coast
Westlife's next album was quickly recorded, and released in November 2000. Coast to Coast was a #1 hit in the UK, becoming the country's 4th biggest selling album of the year and Westlife's biggest selling album to date.
Westlife took on a signing tour around the UK called "Coast To Coast". The album was preceded by a duet with Mariah Carey on the Phil Collins classic "Against All Odds (Take a Look at Me Now)" and the ballad "My Love". Both singles reached #1 in the UK charts.[13][14] With this, Westlife broke an unexpected record, having their first seven singles debut at the top of the UK charts. In December 2000, however, that run was broken when they failed to secure their eighth chart-topper in a row when kid's favourite Bob The Builder's "Can We Fix It" was crowned Christmas number-one single.
In 2001, the boys launched their first world tour, Where Dreams Come True Tour 2001, unofficially nicknamed "The No Stools Tour", because of the band's reputation of performing perched on stools.
My Love
World of Our Own
Westlife released their third album in November 2001 called World of Our Own, which featured several singles that eventually became Number 1 hits including "Uptown Girl", "Queen of My Heart" and "World of Our Own".
This album also featured the original version of "Evergreen", which was then covered by Gareth Gates and Will Young for Pop Idol.[20][21] When Will Young was declared the winner of the television contest, the song subsequently went on to become his first number one single, sending another "Westlife" song to the top spot.
Westlife took this album and went on their second tour, World Of Our Own: In The Round Tour 2002.[6] The tour was taken all over the UK and Europe.
Queen of My Heart
Greatest Hits
November 2002 saw Westlife release their Greatest Hits album, Unbreakable - The Greatest Hits Vol. 1, amidst rumours of a split because of homophobic behaviour towards each other. They released their first single from this album in October 2002, Unbreakable.[22] This was followed by the double a-side single "Tonight/Miss You Nights" which debuted at no.3. in the U.K.[23]
In 2003, Westlife went on to their third tour, The Greatest Hits Tour 2003 and still shrugged off rumours of a split.[24]
Westlife's number one off theUnbreakable
Turnaround
In September 2003, Westlife released "Hey Whatever", which made it to Number 4 in the UK Charts.[25] In November 2003 came Westlife's fourth studio album Turnaround, which made number 1 on the UK charts and won them Record of the Year for the third time in five years. Along with the number 1 album was their twelfth number 1 single. "Mandy" (a cover of Barry Manilow's ballad) was released in November 2003.[26] "Obvious" was also released on the album and charted at number 3 in February 2004.[27]
Hey whatever
Departure of Brian McFadden
On 9 March 2004, just three weeks before Westlife were due to embark on their fourth European tour, Turnaround Tour 2004, Bryan McFadden left the band. He subsequently started a solo career, changing the spelling of his first name back to its original 'Brian'. Brian McFadden entered the chart at number one with his first solo single, "Real To Me".[30] He went on to release more singles, but to only moderate success.
New group
Allow Us to Be Frank
Less than a month after McFadden's departure, the boys kicked off their fourth arena Turnaround tour. They released a live version of Flying Without Wings as an official UK download. They released their come-back album Allow Us to Be Frank later in the year, a Rat Pack-inspired album and debuted at its peak position at Number Three. Westlife did not release a single from this album even though they shot many music videos. They did, however, release more official UK downloads, including Ain't That A Kick In The Head and Smile.
Before the album release, Westlife travelled up and down the UK to find "the perfect fan" to help promote their album. After X Factor style auditions, they found Joanne Hindley (who later appeared on X Factor).[6] They recorded "The Way You Look Tonight". To celebrate their first ever fan to appear on a Westlife song they televised it, showing auditions and live performances. Their performances included Joanne, their fathers and glamour model Katie Price. They also performed alone.
Westlife continued to tour Europe with their No.1's Tour launched in 2005 before taking a 4 months break from work.[31]
Face to Face
In 2005, after a four-months break, they came back with "You Raise Me Up", a cover of a Secret Garden song, which was the first single off their sixth studio album Face to Face. On 6 November 2005, both the album and the single ("You Raise Me Up") were at Number 1 in the UK charts at the same time. It was the first time the band had held both top album and single position in the same week.[32][33]
In December 2005, Westlife released the second single off their album, "When You Tell Me That You Love Me", which was a duet with Diana Ross who had previously sung the song alone.[34] Westlife then released their third single "Amazing" which debuted at no.4.[35]
As a tradition of Westlife, they launched their 2006 tour, titled Face to Face Tour. They travelled extensively including UK, Ireland, Australia and in Asia: Manila, Singapore, Shanghai, Hong Kong and Taiwan. This tour marked the first time Westlife have travelled to mainland China for a concert.[36][37]
When You Tell Me That You Love Me
The Love Album
In late 2006, Westlife signed a brand new five album deal with Sony/BMG. Their 8th studio album, The Love Album, consists all of covers of love songs.
The first single from The Love Album was a cover version of Bette Midler's classic "The Rose" Produced by:Quiz & Larossi, which became their 14th UK number one single.[38] This made Westlife the third act (along with Cliff Richard) in the UK chart history to have most number one singles, only behind Elvis Presley (21, 18 of them different songs) and The Beatles (17). Plans for the release of Total Eclipse of the Heart and that a video were being made were scrapped. In February, the band announced that they would no longer be releasing Bonnie Tyler's song "Total Eclipse of the Heart", produced by Jim Steinman, nor any other singles from the album.
Westlife kicked off their eight tour called The Love Tour on 21 February 2007 in Perth, Australia.[39] The tour took in other cities in Australia, before moving on to South Africa, the UK and Ireland, ending in Dublin on 3 May. The band played its last major concert of 2007 at Carlisle on Sunday 12 August at Bitts Park in Carlisle, England.
Total eclipse of the heart ??
Back Home
Westlife's 9th studio album Back Home was released on Monday, 5 November 2007 and contains nine new and original songs and three cover songs. The album sold more than a million only in UK alone for just 3 months to date and held as 2007's #5 Biggest selling album in UK. In the album, the band worked with producers including Steve Mac, Quiz & Larossi, Jorgen Elofsson and Maratone. The album debuted at number 1 on the UK Music Charts.[41]
On 29 October 2007, Westlife released the first single from the album, a cover of "Home" by Michael Bublé and it debuted at number 3 in the UK Chart.[42][43] Westlife plans to release "Us Against The World" as the second single off Back Home in February 25, 2008, the day their Back Home Tour will embark.
I'm Already There, not officially a single, charted in the UK Top 75 on downloads alone, following a performance on the X Factor.
There's also a rumor that "Something Right" will also be a forthcoming single by an announcement held in Sweden[44] and Greece.[45]
Approaching 10 years
Despite celebrating 10 years in 2008, they are planning to take a year out of the spotlight following their Back Home Tour.[46] Fans began to panic over news the guys are taking a year long break after their upcoming tour. "The fans are all not sure because that's what Boyzone said and whatever but we're just going to take a lot longer to make this 10th album. This is a big tour coming up and then we're actually taking a year off after that. It's a big one for us and a big one for the fans. So it's not like we're taking a year off- we're taking a year away from releasing an album in November because we've done the nine albums in nine years,” Mark confirmed while talking to Female First.co.uk.[47]
On 2 November 2007, during an interview on Irish TV show The Late Late Show (as well as being wished Happy Decade by fellow artists Backstreet Boys), Westlife made a number of announcements, including details of a 10 Years Of Westlife concert at Croke Park in Dublin on 1 June 2008.[48] Croke Park is the fourth biggest stadium in Europe which holds 82,300 people[49] making the concert Westlife's biggest performance to date. Kian described the upcoming performance to be a pop extravaganza. Shane confirmed that the band will not be releasing a new album in 2008 but they will release a corresponding live concert DVD. It was confirmed on 22 November that Shayne Ward will be the support act at the Croke Park concert.[50]
Duets
Westlife has performed duets with some of the biggest names of the music industry, including Mariah Carey, Donny Osmond, Lulu, Donna Summer, The Vards, Sherina, Secret Garden, Diana Ross, Amr Diab, Lionel Richie, Christian Castro, Ronan Keating and Delta Goodrem.[51][52][53][54][55][56] Claudia Schiffer and Vinnie Jones have also starred in their music videos.[6][57] Westlife also collaborated with Asian-music sensation BoA with the song "Flying Without Wings", which appeared on her mini-album, Shine We Are!.
US market
Westlife have, however, failed to capture the imagination of the United States market. Initially, their debut single and music video "Swear It Again", released in the US in 2000, was a hit on mainstream radio and MTV with a succeeded guesting on MTV's Total Request Live. After that, the said song reached #20 and became #75 year-ender hit of 2000 of Billboard Hot 100.[58] Their debut American album was also released in 2000, however they have not yet released another album in the USA.[59] In 2002, an attempt to promote and release an American version of Westlife's "World Of Our Own" album was cut short with the band deciding to concentrate promotion in foreign markets where they have a larger fan base, a curious decision as the two most prominent boy bands in the US, Backstreet Boys and N' Sync were taking breaks at that time.
The Westlife hit song "Flying Without Wings" peaked at #2 in the US when American Idol winner Ruben Studdard released it after winning season 2 of the show.[60] The band have stated in interviews that they were disappointed when they heard Ruben had released the song in the US because that song was such a huge hit in the UK and they were planning on eventually bringing that song to American audiences. In 2003 they went to Nashville to film a TV documentary and recorded a song originally performed by country music legend Kenny Rogers, "Daytime Friends", which won them much critical praise.[6]
Discography
For a further discography of Westlife, see Westlife discography.
Albums
| Year | Album | U.K. | UK certificate |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1999 | Westlife | 2 | 4xPlatinum |
| 2000 | Coast to Coast | 1 | 5xPlatinum |
| 2001 | World Of Our Own | 1 | 4xPlatinum |
| 2002 | Unbreakable - The Greatest Hits Vol. 1 | 1 | 4xPlatinum |
| 2003 | Turnaround | 1 | 2xPlatinum |
| 2004 | Allow Us to Be Frank | 3 | 2xPlatinum |
| 2005 | Face to Face | 1 | 4xPlatinum |
| 2006 | The Love Album | 1 | 3xPlatinum |
| 2007 | Back Home | 1 | 3xPlatinum |
UK Number 1 Singles
| Number of #1 | Release date | Title | From the album | Weeks at #1 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | April 12, 1999 | "Swear It Again" | Westlife | 2 |
| 2 | August 9, 1999 | "If I Let You Go" | Westlife | 1 |
| 3 | October 18, 1999 | "Flying Without Wings" | Westlife | 1 |
| 4 | December 6, 1999 | "I Have a Dream / Seasons in the Sun" | Westlife | 4 |
| 5 | March 17, 2000 | "Fool Again" | Westlife | 1 |
| 6 | September 18, 2000 | "Against All Odds" (with Mariah Carey) | Coast to Coast | 2 |
| 7 | October 31, 2000 | "My Love" | Coast to Coast | 1 |
| 8 | February 26, 2001 | "Uptown Girl" | Coast to Coast | 1 |
| 9 | November 5, 2001 | "Queen of My Heart" | World of Our Own | 1 |
| 10 | February 18, 2002 | "World of Our Own" | World of Our Own | 1 |
| 11 | October 28, 2002 | "Unbreakable" | Unbreakable: The Greatest Hits Vol I | 1 |
| 12 | November 10, 2003 | "Mandy" | Turnaround | 1 |
| 13 | October 24, 2005 | "You Raise Me Up" | Face to Face | 2 |
| 14 | November 6, 2006 | "The Rose" | The Love Album | 1 |
Record-breakers
- Most Consecutive Number 1's
- Westlife with 7. Their 8th official single, "What Makes A Man", only reached #2 December 2000.
- Most entries at number 1
- Westlife, From May 1999 to November 2006, Westlife entered the chart at No. 1 on 14 occasions.
- Most Entries at Number 1 by a Debuting Act
- On 11 Nov 2000, Westlife became the first act to have their first seven singles enter the chart at number 1s when "My Love" reached no.1.
- Group with Most Consecutive Top 3 and Top 5 Hits in UK
- Westlife have 22 consecutive Top 10 hits from "Swear It Again" in 1999 to "Home" in 2007. Actually all of their released UK singles in 9 years in a row, surpassing the 8 years in a row from Elvis Presley.[citation needed]
- Fastest selling UK act to have top 5 single hits
- Biggest selling UK arena tour act
