Westlife

Westlife are an Irish boy band who formed in 1998. Its members are Shane Filan, Kian Egan, Nicky Bryne, and Mark Feehily. Bryan McFadden left the band on March 9, 2004 to give more of his time to his family life with the British TV personality and former Atomic Kitten member Kerry Katona, although he has subsequently separated from her and changed the spelling of his first name to 'Brian'.

The band has been very successful since it was started and is popular in both Ireland and United Kingdom, with hits like:

• "Swear It Again" (1999)
• "If I Let You Go" (1999)
• "Flying Without Wings" featuring BoA (appeared on the Pokémon 2000 soundtrack) (1999)
• "I Have A Dream"/"Seasons In The Sun" (covers of ABBA and Terry Jacks respectively) (1999)
• "Fool Again" (2000)
• "Against All Odds (Take A Look At Me Now)" (with Mariah Carey) (cover of Phil Collins) (2000)
• "My Love" (2000)
• "Uptown Girl" (cover of Billy Joel) (2001)
• "Queen Of My Heart" (2001)
• "World of Our Own" (2002)
• "Unbreakable" (2002)
• "Mandy" (cover of Barry Manilow) (2003)
• "You Raise Me Up" (2005)
• "The Rose" (2006)

Not every single of theirs have gone to No. 1 in the UK:

• "What Makes a Man" (2000) #2
• "Bop Bop Baby" (2002) #5
• "Hey Whatever" (2003) #4
• "Obvious" (2004) #3
• "Home" (2007) #3
• "Us Against The World" (2008) #8
• "What About Now" (2004) #2
• "Safe" (2010) #10

The band have also won ITV's Record of the Year competition on a record four occasions, with "Flying Without Wings", "My Love", "Mandy" and "You Raise Me Up".

Westlife did not manage success in America, although their debut single, "Swear It Again" was a minor hit on mainstream radio and MTV. Its video made MTV's Total Request Live briefly, and it managed to chart on the Billboard Hot 100 in the summer of 2000, going up to No. 20 on the chart.

Their debut American album was also released in 2000, and although they have not released another one there since, that has not stopped thousands of Americans from becoming Westlife fans. And beyond Europe and the USA, Westlife's fan base is truly global, including Canada, Latin America, Southeast Asia, and Australia.

Like most other boy bands, Westlife was primarily marketed to teenage girls, but they had a large following among gay men (approximately 20% of Westlife fans are male), and they have performed numerous times at gay venues in the UK.

It was announced in October 2011 that Westlife will split in 2012.

Discography

• 1999 "Westlife" #2 UK, #129 US
• 2000 "Coast to Coast" #1 UK
• 2001 "World of Our Own" #1 UK
• 2002 "Unbreakable - The Greatest Hits - Vol. 1" #1 UK
• 2003 "Turnaround" #1 UK
• 2004 "Allow Us To Be Frank" #3 UK
• 2005 "Face to Face" #1 UK
• 2006 "The Love Album" #1 UK
• 2007 "Back Home" #1 UK
• 2009 "Where We Are" #2 UK
• 2010 "Gravity" #3 UK