The Wild, Wild Westlife

Ash hate them. Maybe you do, too. But do Westlife give a shit? Hardly. Why should they? They’ve sold ten million albums, had eight number one singles in Britain, a number 2 in America and consistently break box-office records in venues like the Point. Not only that. Each member of Westlife is a millionaire at the age of roughly 20.

But what’s even better about Westlife is their absolute lack of pretension – an uncommon factor in the anally retentive world of rock and pop. Sure some members of the group may reject the “they’re-not-even-musicians” jibe levelled at them by bands like Ash, and argue, with more than a little legitimacy, that their voices are their instruments. But mostly Westlife accept that they are a “product”, a marketing phenomenon rather than a “real band”. Whatever the hell that is.

But, right now, all members are more than happy to be in Westlife. Five years from now? Which one will have become the Ronan Keating of Westlife? Which four, possibly, will have fallen by the wayside? Who knows? Yet these are the kind of questions that already concern Kian Egan, Shane Filan, Mark Feehily, Nicky Byrne and Bryan McFadden.

So, not surprisingly, they are among the questions they addressed in their first major hotpress interview, conducted as all five sat – separately, not together – in what we came to jokingly call “the confessional”, upstairs in the front of their tour bus en route to one of their recent sell-out gigs in Wembley.

KIAN

Joe Jackson: Earlier this year Ash burned 300 copies of your CD. As a former member of rock bands can you understand why Ash might actually hate Westlife?

Kian Egan: Ash burned 300 copies of our CD as a publicity stunt! But I understand why rock bands hate boybands, in general. Because rock bands write their own material, slog it out for years, trying to get a record deal, trying to get noticed. We seem not to have done that. So I see where they’re coming from. Yet I don’t accept how they can diss everything we do. What probably wrecks their heads is that we sell so many albums. Our market is a lot bigger, right now, than the rock market. Look at how many rock acts were trying to break through even at the time we started this band. My brother was in a rock group and I had been in at least ten rock bands because everyone thought they could follow U2, but that didn’t turn out to be the case. Nobody has. Whereas Ireland now is known as a country that produces great pop.

JJ: Westlife may sing lead vocals on all their number one hits but all of your major recordings have been penned by Britain’s “pop alchemists”, Steve Mac and Wayne Hector, and produced by the Cherion Group in Stockholm, who work similar wonders for the likes of Britney Spears. So can you see why many rock fans say there’s no real musical creativity within boybands like Westlife?

KE: We’re vocalists, not musicians. And I am one of the guys in the band who argues that our voices are our instruments. But then I don’t really feel I have to argue that point.

JJ: You got slapped by some guys recently in Sligo. Were they irate rock fans?

KE: It was more “there’s Kian Egan, let’s give him a slap.”

JJ: Do you know who did it?

KE: Two guys I went to school with. One was in my class really early; the other in my class in the teenage years.

JJ: Did you get a dig back?

KE: Not to the same extent they got me because they had two cans of beer in a plastic bag and hit me on the back of the head with it.

JJ: Was the attack totally unprovoked?

KE: 100%. That’s part of the reason I really felt angry. And hurt inside. Because Sligo is my hometown.

JJ: Are you guys well-protected by minders?

KE: It’s very unusual for people to get at us. Even when we go out at night. Because there is solid protection around us. Not in pubs and restaurants but when we go to clubs together, as Westlife. Yet I’ve never encountered that kind of thing that happened in Sligo, in, say, London. Though maybe if I went to Equinox in Leicester Square I’d be jumped on by a 100 guys because that’s where you’d find the type of people who’d be so against what we do they’d say things like “boyband faggot.”

JJ: Are you guys called “boyband faggots”, as Boyzone were, seven, eight years ago?

KE: Things have changed since. A lot of guys accept the music. If it’s a good song they’ll buy it and don’t care whether the singers are gay or not. Though you probably would find that prejudice, among guys, “against” five guys singing on stage, because girls like us. And the best “insult” they can give is to say we’re gay. It’s pathetic. But I don’t think “boyband faggots” hatred really exists, in the main, anymore.

JJ: Would you buy Westlife records if you were in a rock band?

KE: Yeah. I buy Backstreet Boys, N’Sync, as well as the likes of Metallica. I’m a huge Metallica fan.

JJ: But is it the ballads by Metallica you like?

KE: I don’t listen to the ballads! Not in the same way I love ‘Sad But True’, ‘Enter Sandman’, ‘One’, ‘Hit The Lights’, with those great, big guitar riffs. I play guitar and love that vibe. And we have a rock guitar player on stage and at the end of ballads I’m shouting “rock! rock! rock! Give me some rock solos!” Because I am such a heavy rock fan. So putting them in at the end of the ballads lifts songs. But that is my idea and I hand-picked that guitarist. He puts that bit of “ooomph” in our stage show. And I’m always looking for more of that.

JJ: Who picks things like ‘Mustang Sally’?

KE: I did it first in the show. I used to do ‘Wild Thing’ and Bryan’d do ‘Teenage Dirtbag’ but then Bryan ran out one night and instead of stopping me, joined me! Then, after that, it was his song. So, now, as soon as I finish ‘Wild Thing’ he goes into ‘Mustang Sally’. But that’s the kind of music we all love. We did the set list with our show producer Kim Gavin. And I, absolutely, have an input into what we do on stage. There’s sequenced stuff there, obviously, because sounds we create in the studio – strings and stuff – can’t be created as well on stage. But apart from that we have our back-up band playing live and the five guys are always miked. Every show.

JJ: Sometimes, when you’re hung over, don’t you use tapes?

KE: No. Because, when we’re doing shows, we don’t get up till the afternoon so we’re well sorted by the evening.

JJ: You all seemed a little worse for the drink during your last show at The Point because – I heard – you were still hung over from the Sky broadcast party the night before.

KE: I wasn’t. And there’s a party every night! But I don’t get hangovers. I could stay in the bar till six in the morning and not have a hangover the next day. I might feel a bit tired but that’s it.

JJ: What about the other guys?

KE: Nicky gets hangovers. Shane doesn’t. Mark doesn’t. Bryan goes out but also goes home early because Kerry (Katona) is having the baby.

JJ: Keith Duffy recently told me that, in Boyzone, there was a tendency to drink too much on tour. Either because you’re lonely or bored or need to deal with the come-down after a show. He and Ronan hit the Jack Daniels fairly hard. Do you?

KE: When you get off the stage the problem is you are on such a high that, when you go back to your hotel, you’ve all of a sudden dropped from singing in front of 10,000 people to sitting there on your own, in front of a TV. Certain nights you lie on the bed and fall asleep. Most nights, though, you think “hey, I need to do something”. So you go down to the bar. And the crew, catering, dancers, musicians are there, so you end up going down to them all the time.

JJ: Are you afraid of drinking too much?

KE: We know when to stop.

JJ: But is there someone in the bar, keeping an eye on you, ready to step in, say “okay, Kian, time to go to bed”?

KE: We’ve got security and if they see us getting too drunk, they do say “chill out.” And I could drink 10 vodka and Red Bulls, which does leave me wired to the moon. Too often 10 vodka and Red Bulls make me go mad so I’ve stopped drinking them now. I drink vodka and cranberry juice.

JJ: So what other kind of craziness goes on in Westlife after hours? Drugs? Some bands – even boybands – do cocaine to help deal with the come-down after a show. Or before a performance.

KE: Whoever brings coke into this band will be gone the next day.

JJ: Is that a policy decision imposed by management on Westlife?

KE: It’s a decision made by us ourselves, the five boys. And it applies to crew, catering, whoever. I’m sure people on tour do it but if we don’t see it we don’t know about it. But we took that position at the very start.

JJ: Why? Have you any experience of drugs. Ecstasy in clubs?

KE: I can only talk for myself. I’ve never experienced it. I know Shane and Mark very well – Shane was my best friend when I was growing up – and I’ve never seen him do drugs. Or Mark. And Nicky and Bryan are so against drugs it’s unbelievable. So I would definitely say nobody in Westlife ever touched Ecstasy, acid, all the stuff ravers take.

JJ: What about coke in the come-down after the gig?

KE: You go to the bar and have a few beers rather than do coke. Coke can really fuck you up. I’ve seen people really messed up on cocaine.

JJ: Friends or within the music business?

KE: Never friends, they wouldn’t be my friend if they were doing coke.

JJ: You feel that strongly about cocaine?

KE: I would never say “you’re doing coke, you’ll never be my friend again.” But I would say “what are you at, man?” to try to wise them up. I’ve seen one guy, off his tits one night in a club, and he was pulling his trousers down and I thought ”that is not cool”! But then people doing coke get that buzz and feel they own the world.

JJ: That, too, is what Keith said. That when he was a kid in clubs coke made him feel like the most confident guy in the world. And he saw that this was the danger for a guy like himself who was actually lacking self-confidence.

KE: I understand that but it’s not the way to go. And Robbie Williams – who, I know was a mate of Keith’s – apparently said he used to feel so nervous doing certain things, he took coke. But that’s not a route anyone in this band is going down. Unless it happens after the band breaks. Because, as I say, anyone who does coke, wouldn’t be in the band.

JJ: Even if it was done socially, after hours, between tours?

KE: We’re friends so it’s not a case of us all leading separate lives. If somebody was doing it off-hours and we heard about it – if they hid it from us we wouldn’t know, obviously – we’d say “are you doing coke?” And if they said “yeah,” we’d ask “what is your problem, let’s talk about it.” Or I’d say “get pissed with me, instead. I’ll get pissed with you every night to get you off that stuff, if that’s what it takes.”

JJ: Apart from the temptation of drink and drugs after a show there also is the lure of sex to help you through a long, lonely or horny night. Especially if you’re locked.

KE: (Laughs self-consciously) That can be part of the whole syndrome. But the best way to address this question is to put Westlife in the setting of a club in London, where you’ve got all the page three models, and other types of models coming on to you and if you choose to take advantage of that, fair play to ya! It’s human nature. If a good-looking girl starts chatting me up I’m not going to send her away because I’m in Westlife!

JJ: When women approach you, say, in clubs, do you ever worry you may be getting set up for a tabloid scam?

KE: What security do when we go to a club is that one will stay with us and the other will go upstairs and sort out the paparazzi. We don’t mind them taking photos! So if I’m walking out of a club with a good-looking girl and I get a photograph taken, fine.

JJ: Not if you’re off your tits and falling out the door.

KE: That’s true! If paparazzi get a picture of you drunk, that’s not very good. But normally it’s arranged that a car pulls up outside the door and we step right into it. But as for a woman setting me up, to sell a story, that hasn’t happened. But I’ve seen it happen to one of the guys out of Five. I knew she was a journalist and he didn’t. She was quite cute. And she started chatting him up so I went over and said “she’s a journalist”. And he said “shit” and brushed her off. And you do have to be wary of that. Because those women could get you to trust them, then start asking questions about what really goes on in the band, and, next minute, it’s spread all over the newspapers.

JJ: Would you have respect for the type of groupies who hang around outside a hotel?

KE: The girls that hang around the hotel, all that type of stuff, I feel sorry for. They stay out there all night long, often in the freezing cold. And we go out and say “listen, go home, we’re leaving at this particular time in the morning, get a good night’s sleep, come back then.” Because there’s no point in hiding from them, they’ll just wait longer.

JJ: Surely there also is the temptation, some nights, when you’re lonely or horny, to bring one, or more, into your room?

KE: No. Because that’s what those girls want to happen. So you could never do that.

JJ: Really? Why?

KE: First of all she’d go out and rat – tell all the other fans, right? And the thing is they don’t really care about you. They’d probably come back to your room and ask you about Bryan! You don’t need the hassle. Lonely, horny, yeah, right. I’d prefer to be in my bed alone than have all that hassle. Like some girl saying “so what’s it like when Bryan comes into the dressing room and you start arguing with Mark?”

JJ: Sounds like you had that experience!

KE: No. But you can tell so easily. And another thing is I can tell that half those girls out there, when we’re gone, move to outside A1’s hotel, for example. None of the guys would end up sleeping with any of those fans. But what does happen, quite a bit, is that some of the older fans – our age – check into the hotels. Good-looking girls. And whether you go with one of them, or not, is a personal choice of everyone in the band.

JJ: Who made the decision for Westlife to drop Ronan Keating as a kind of manager?

KE: It happened. Ronan got really involved at the start of the band, even in terms of videos. He’d say “that’s not a great shot of you there, Kian, why not replace it” or whatever. For the first three singles he was always there, came on the tour bus when we toured Europe and so on. But after a while that faded away.

JJ: Is it true you all felt his involvement, in the beginning, was worth the 10% he got but, later, to give him that cut when his involvement lessened, seemed ludicrous.

KE: It wasn’t fair. And he agrees. He said “I understand, guys.” We had a friendly chat about it. We said, “What’s happening, we haven’t seen you in over two and a half months and we’re still paying you 10% management commission. What’s going on?”

JJ: And he just happily let the 10% go?

KE: Yeah. But we pay a management company. We don’t pay Ronan, we don’t pay Louis. They do. So Louis split the money with Ronan and we happen to know it was 10%. But Ronan no longer gets that. Yet we still get on great with him.

JJ: Would you have learned from what happened to Boyzone. Keith was suicidal when Boyzone broke up. Shane seems to have lost the plot and Stephen’s solo career didn’t take flight. The same may happen to Mikey, leaving only Ronan a success.

KE: So you have seen four out of five fade away, to whatever degree, that is true. And I can see the boys trying so hard to stay in the limelight and you kind of look at them and go ‘oh no’.

JJ: As in? Shane cursing the media at the Childline concert?

KE: Yeah. I’d never do what Shane Lynch does! Cursing the media is stupid. Yet Keith’s doing quite well for himself as a TV presenter. And like him, I would try to set up, in advance, something to move directly into after Westlife finishes.

JJ: Mark recently said the band may have ten years, but isn’t five more often the shelf life of a boyband?

KE: It depends on the music. If you can get your fans to grow with you, what’s the point in letting it go? You could go on ten years. Boyzone could have gone on. They might have been at their peak but they could have gone on and faded after another two, three years. But you don’t really learn lessons from Boyzone – or any other bands – in that sense. You have to find out for yourself. And Ronan realised that when he started working with us. He said “I can only teach these guys so much. They’ve got to go out and learn the rest for themselves, the hard way.”

JJ: Westlife became millionaires faster than Boyzone.

KE: Everything happened for us faster than it happened for Boyzone. As I said, we did pick up things like lawyers and accountants from Boyzone and, obviously, their manager in Louis, who had been through all this. It took us a year and a half, actually, to become millionaires. Yet we don’t take any of this for granted.

JJ: No? I read that some of you guys were buying £900 remote control cars and £2,000 Gucci jackets the first Christmas you got your cash!

KE: I’m really bad for that. I never bought a £900 remote control car but I bought loads of jackets. About ten. Not Gucci. I’m more of a Dolce & Gabbana man! Though I’ve a few Gucci jackets. But that’s all part of being in a pop band! Having your Gucci jacket, Rolex watch and diamond ring.

JJ: For the one-time Take That fan who grew up to find that his single with Westlife, ‘Swear It Again’, was the fastest selling single in Irish history and that you can sell out 10 nights in Wembley – what’s left to prove?

KE: I was talking to our agent the other day and said “ten Wembley’s, how normal is that?” And he said “I don’t think you realise, it’s not normal to do two Wembleys!” And here’s another example. We played Manchester, six nights, 18,000 people a night. The Corrs played one night. Things like that make you go “this is big.” But the States is a goal, for sure. Yet it’s such a fickle market. We can’t just go there with what we are now because it would be a waste of time.

JJ: Why?

KE: They don’t want boybands. They don’t want pop music. It’s gone all R ‘n’ B and the rock thing has come back in America. And that will translate to over here as well. There will be very few who will survive that change. It might be the next Westlife. Or this Westlife, if we get it right. Backstreet Boys and N’Sync are the only two pop bands surviving in America. But we don’t want to go over there and fail.

JJ: You had a major American hit with ‘Against All Odds’, the duet with Mariah Carey.

KE: That opened small doors. Got us well known within the industry. Well known by record companies because people said “Mariah Carey is doing something with a band from England”.

JJ: England!

KE: We’re British as far as the Americans are concerned. Though I always say “Are you a Canadian? No, you’re not. You’re American. And we’re Irish.” But America is an ultimate goal for all of us.

Shane

JJ: Having studied accountancy, are you in a position to advise the lad on investments?

SF: I was in marketing and accounting and it did give me business savvy in terms of making sure that whatever money I make in Westlife, I make more out of it as a result of investments and whatever. I’m very cautious with money, that’s just the way I was brought up. And, in terms of the lads making investments, we advise each other! But I have advised them, and made investments. Property, shares, stuff like that.

JJ: This kind of discussion will feed into the prejudices of those who say bands like Westlife only see pop as a business.

SF: That’s not true of me. Growing up, I always wanted to be a singer! Sure, it’s a great business, but even if we weren’t at the level we’re at, I’d love to be singing. All my life I wanted to be like Billy Joel. When ‘Uptown Girl’ came out I was only four but my mom bought it for me. That was the first song I ever sang.

JJ: How does to feel to have recorded it?

SF: I said to Louis back at the beginning of Westlife, “if we ever cover a record, I want to sing Uptown Girl “. Then he said, ‘Richard Curtis wants to do ‘Uptown Girl’ ’ and I said ‘nice one, Louis!’.” And singing it is deadly. Especially live.

JJ: You have to tell all the newspapers that you’re single, so you can seem available to fans, right?

SF: I am single, honestly. I’m available at the moment.

JJ: So all the female dancers on stage are options?

SF: No. It’s not like that, at all. They’re all good looking girls.

JJ: Come on, I saw Bryan jokingly undo the top one girl was wearing on stage so that made me wonder how much further you guys go with those dancers back in the hotel!

SF: It’s not like that! They’re not the options. In this business you have too many options, which is the problem. And it’s not even because of who you are it’s just because you’re in a band. You’re in a club and girls just come up and say they want to be with you but you know it’s just because of the band. 90% of the time.

JJ: “With” you means “shag” you?

SF: Often, yeah.

JJ: And if you’re drunk aren’t you inclined to go?

SF: I don’t get drunk that often.

JJ: I heard of a “friend” of Westlife having a young girl in a loo during a Westlife tour.

SF: That wasn’t me.

JJ: But you must see all that carry-on, so would you say “that’s for me” or “it’s not”?

SF: I’m not that kind of fella. Growing up I was always going out with a girl for a year and a half, or whatever. And stuck to one girl. I was never the kind of fella who was with a load of girls in one night. Or who would go out and be with a different girl every night

JJ: Are Westlife really all friends with one another?

SF: Definitely. And all the boys, individually, are great lads and they’ve got their own good characteristics, as people. But myself and Kian are very close mates and have been since we were nine or ten. So I know all his bad points.

JJ: What are Kian’s bad points?

SF: He’s moody. He can be very grumpy. And if he’s in a bad mood he can shout his head off at you, very quickly.

JJ: And your bad points?

SF: I don’t listen to people sometimes. I’d be looking at the TV going “yeah” and somebody would be telling me something really serious. The boys don’t like that. And I’m moody. Like in the morning, if I’m in bad form. But we’ve lived with each other for two and a half years so we know each other well at this stage.

JJ: Has anybody changed, for the worse?

SF: At one stage everyone in the band has been a bit of a prick. Each and every one of us for periods like a week, or a month. Then the four of us would sit him down and say “quit it. This is how things are going to be if you want to stay in the band.” We can be honest with each other and straight-to-the-point. Fingers crossed that’s the way things will remain.

JJ: You said earlier you don’t drink much?

SF: No. I will tonight because it’s Bryan’s 21st birthday. And some nights on the tour I go down to the bar in the hotel. But I’m not the kind of person who gets drunk after every show. You can’t do that, when you are singing live every night.

JJ: Any desire to compose? Even on an economic level it makes sense to write songs so you can haul in the money from publishing.

SF: You do look at the money side of that. But it’s even nicer to see your name on an album sleeve and know you wrote a song. That’s one thing money can’t buy. Myself and Bryan write a lot. And Kian, Bryan and myself wrote ‘Fragile Heart’ on the new album. It’s just one song but it’s a start.

JJ: When you wrote ‘Fragile Heart’ didn’t Steve Mac and Wayne Hector help?

SF: They didn’t help us write it. We had the song fully written ourselves, they produced it. But for our next album, myself, Bryan and Kian will write more than one song.

JJ: So, like Kian, do you reject the accusation that the Cherion group, Mac and Hector, are “the real Westlife” – and you guys are puppets.

SF: They’re definitely one of the biggest powers behind Westlife’s success. But the five of us work hard, look the way we do, sing those songs and sell out Wembley. If Steve Mac or Wayne put on a gig, how many seats would they sell? So there are many pieces of the jigsaw that make up Westlife.

JJ: When you go into the studio have Mac and Hector laid down all the tracks and you guys just add vocals?

SF: No. Sometimes they play us a song and say “this is the way we want it, what do you think?” And we agree or suggest how it might work better for us. Or they play a demo and we take it from there. We do have an input. Especially in terms of how we sing a song.

JJ: But do producers ever treat you guys like puppets?

SF: At the beginning, definitely. In the broadest sense. We had to do every note the way we were told, interviews, television, anything they put before us. But now we have more power than we ever had. It’s the same with the recordings. Now we’re big and bold enough to do our own thing! I certainly do. As I said, I always wanted to sing. I was born to be on stage. The best thing of all, for me, is coming out on stage that first moment. Like tonight, at Wembley. At the start of the show the buzz of the audience is like three seconds of a huge charge that kicks you into a different zone. It’s amazing. And for that hour and a half, you are in a totally different space. Then you come off stage positively glowing, with your towel round your neck, a can of Red Bull, or whatever. That’s what I love most.

JJ: Are you guys sponsored by Red Bull?!?

SF: I don’t know but there’s an awful lot of Red Bull around! Thanks Red Bull if we are!

NICKY

JJ: Nicky, where’s your can of Red Bull?

Nicky Byrne: I’m the only one who doesn’t drink the fucking stuff. I hate it. And, to be honest with you, I’m not drinking as much as I was at the start of the tour when we were getting hammered every single night. We went out one night in Sheffield and they opened up a pub especially for us. And I used to play for Leeds so I had all the Leeds footballers up, Gary Kelly, Steve McPhail, Robbie Keane. And I had some friends over from Ireland. So we got hammered. We were dancing on the bar and then came back to the hotel where they opened the bar there for us too. Paul Higgins and Fran – our security – and us were running round with cushions beatin’ the shite out of everybody. But eventually, security just put me to bed. And I was like talkin’ to me da, saying “I’ll be good!” But you can’t have nights like that too often.

JJ: But security do know they’re there to see you guys don’t, ultimately, damage the “product” that is Westlife.

NB: That is their role. And they stay sober so they can step in when they have to. They even see things happening before they happen, whether it is a fight, one of us getting too drunk, whatever.

JJ: Do you get into many fights?

NB: No. I always get jealous guys having a go at me verbally but never physically. I remember Ronan said he got that in Dublin a lot. And I’ve noticed that. But to be honest with you, they can say what they want about me, I couldn’t give a toss.

JJ: As in guys shouting “all boybands are faggots”?

NB: Yeah. And people say that to us but I just leave it. Yet if they brought Georgina into it, or me mam and dad, or anyone in the family, that’s gonna piss me off.

JJ: Do you have to be extra careful about not getting into fights because your girlfriend is Georgina Ahern, the Taoiseach’s daughter?

NB: Yeah.

JJ: Like the way the tabloids picked up on your Hello interview and said you and Georgina were planning to live in sin.

NB: One just linked us on the same page, among the famous couples to do that, yeah. So it’s all part of what I’ve got to watch.

JJ: Presumably, you can you take care of yourself; you were going to be a Garda!

NB: Yeah. And I reckon I could. And it always happens when I have drink on me, if someone says something about Georgina or me family. I’d never hit anybody, unless he hit me first, but I’d have friends with me and they’d usually pull me back. Last week in Manchester, meself and Paul and Fran went out. We were sitting in a club and one guy said “is he your bouncer?” He was but I said “no, not at all.” And he said “so if I try to whack you what would he do?” And I said “he wouldn’t do anything but I’d fucking kill ya!” He wasn’t expecting it from me. So he says “no, you wouldn’t.” And I put my pint down and said “right, go for it. Give me your best shot.” And he goes “Jesus Christ man! I’m only messing.” Then I said “I’m glad you didn’t because I’m a black belt in karaoke!” And that broke the ice! He started laughing and walked away.

JJ: Do you regret not becoming a Guard?

NB: No. I think I got a better gig! Though I do love the buzz of the police, the guards. I always wanted to drive around in a police car. Ever since I saw T.J Hooker on telly! Even when we go out with Georgina’s dad (Bertie Ahern) he has the Special Branch with him. I love travelling with that and always look at them to see what they’re doing.

JJ: So you feel like jumping out and doing a Clint Eastwood, running beside the car!

NB: Yeah! Or Kevin Costner in The Bodyguard! And I do sometimes wish I had gone down that path. But I don’t think anyone is going to take me seriously as a Garda, after this gig in Westlife!

JJ: When wonderful looking models approach you in clubs, can you always say ‘no’?

NB: Yeah! And the lads look at me and honestly don’t know how I do it! But I love Georgina to death. And I couldn’t give up all we have for some little fling. I’m not into just shagging someone for the sake of it. I always look at life from the long term perspective of “what’ll happen after the band”? You can live this life and enjoy it but it doesn’t last forever. But when I look to my future beyond all this, I always want Georgina in my life. And if Westlife is going to put that at risk, I’m not interested. I can enjoy these years without shagging models. That’s not what I’m into.

JJ: With your long term plans to marry and settle down you seem not too worried about the day it all ends for Westlife?

NB: It’s in the back of my mind, what I will do. I could release a solo record but I’d rather finish out at the top. I don’t want to go on and flop. I do think there are people in this band who will be successful in the music industry. I’m not saying that when Westlife ends the five of us won’t go anywhere. But I don’t know which one it will be. And I’m not sure if I want to waste my time doing that. Then again, I’ve always said I want to record a song with me dad. Because he’s been in a cabaret band for the past 20 years. That’s how I got into the music industry. I’d like to get into TV. As I grew up and watched The Late Late Show, me mam told me “he’s your uncle Gaybo” and I thought Gay was my uncle!

JJ: How long do you think Westlife will last?

NB: There is, as you say, supposed to be a shelf life of five years for a boyband but I want to beat that because we can. Overall the buzz is still here, we’re enjoying the tour and the goal we have, as Kian says, is America. And Germany. We’re breaking Germany at the moment. It’s huge market so if we break that then move on to America that will be our greatest achievement.

MARK

JJ: Mark, Nicky just talked to me about Westlife breaking America, meaning even more gigs and so on. But at times you look uncomfortable on stage, as if you aren’t really at home amid thousands of teenage kids screaming at you.

MF: There can be moments when I feel uncomfortable. Like when we do the Motown medley, I just let go and think “do the people really like this or think I’m just some eejit?” I feel that way during the upbeat stuff, more than the ballads, which are more in the style of what we do. It might be a lack of confidence. And part of it is that most of the kids can’t really hear us with all that screaming! That’s why, a lot of the time, I sing for myself. Because I love to sing. So when the crowd doesn’t listen, you still know you’re giving the song the best you can. Then again, sometimes when you’re really breaking your ass on stage and you realise someone isn’t really listening, it makes you think “Oh God nobody’s listening. “ You take an impression of one face as being the whole audience but that’s wrong.

Last night the whole crowd was buzzed up but there was one girl sitting in the front row, resting her hand on her chin and she looked like she was watching the news on TV! Totally disinterested. Wembley could hold 8,000 but that one little girl can spoil the whole thing for me.

JJ: Are you enjoying Westlife? Say, for example, the fans rushing you this morning as you came out of the hotel.

MF: I try my best to say hello to everybody, have one little second of eye contact, acknowledge them. Especially if they’ve travelled a distance and waited outside a hotel. But sometimes you are not in the mood. It’s not like I have something against the person standing there. Yet, let’s face facts, it’s not a friendship that developed naturally with these people. So I don’t see it as real life, I see it as something that has more to do with the band than me as an individual.

JJ: Isn’t it true that Liam Gallagher snubbed you once, and you’d liked his music before that?

MF: That was a long time ago. It was one of my first impressions of meeting someone famous. But because it was years ago I understand better now why he walked away. Maybe he just wasn’t in the mood to talk to someone who came over and said he liked his music. In our line of work when you go out to a pub I suppose you want time off from talking about music – so maybe that’s why he did it. But I’ve learned not to judge people on moments like that.

JJ: Who did you idolise, vocally, musically?

MF: Bands, male and female vocalists. If The Commitments were playing a gig in my home town when I was growing up, I wouldn’t have misssed it. That movie brought soul music into Ireland.

JJ: Have you ever looked, again, at the end of the movie The Commitments – or looked at the fall of Boyzone – and thought ‘I’m not going to be pushed out, and end up the loser?’

MF: That may be the way the lads in Boyzone feel but I’d disagree. You have to think of where you started at the beginning of the story. And where you are at the end of it all. The fact that they enjoyed themselves all the way through should count for something, whether they come out of it all with that they wanted, or not. They’re very lucky. They made a lot of money and were a very big and successful band. And I do think “where will I be in five years?” But one thing I’ve learned from being in this group is that the future is hard to plan. It’s such a fickle business. One day you’re hot the next day you're not.

JJ: Do you sometimes think of the memories Boyzone hold for a young kid, cleaning out a toilet in a Burger King shop, listening to ‘Words’ on the radio and wishing he was in a boyband – yourself!

MF: Yeah! But, having started off in jobs like that we’ve really learned to appreciate what we’ve achieved. We know we’re in a position that many other bands would love to be in. Just like they have things we don’t have anymore. Like a normal lifestyle. Going to Burger King! This is a great lifestyle but sometimes you cry out to do something normal for a change. Like when we were in Birmingham recently a friend of Nicky’s, from a garage, lent us cars – and for me to just drive up the road and be in traffic on my own was a thrill! I know that sounds stupid but it’s how I felt. And I think “Oh My God, driving a car is a thrill for me and I’m going on stage tonight to sing for thousands of people. What’s happening here?”

A lot of people, maybe still working in places like Burger King, dream of being rich and famous and released from whatever situation they’re in. But those same people probably have really cool things about their lives, that they don’t appreciate until you don’t have them. Normal everyday things. For me, it’s balancing out. I’m really happy with the way things are going. So I’m not complaining. But there is a price to pay for all this. There are losses along the way. Sacrifices.

JJ: So what’s your response to Keith claiming life in a boyband left him unable to deal with reality when the bubble burst?

MF: That, too, is the nature of this boyband thing. We are so disposable. People will tell you you’re a great singer, look good – blah, blah, blah. You’ll be showered with praise. And they say: “What do you drink? We’ll get you a drink?” Or “what kind of food do you like, any food?” You get treated like a king and, like Keith says, at the end of it all, you wake up one day and you can’t just ring someone to find out the exact flight number you need to know. You have to ring up and book it yourself. Or you can’t ring a doctor and he’s there in an hour because you’re in a boyband. You may be the same person you were before joining a boyband but you never experienced the fall. You were picked up, placed in a band, then it all ends. That could be a killer.

Yet I still think if you have the right attitude you can cushion the final fall. If you prepare yourself. I am very happy with myself in this sense. Because I’ve realised a lot of things maybe sooner than some people do. I know the difference between Mark Feely and Mark from Westlife. I can be one, or be the other. The real problem arises when both become one person. And you believe in the hype. Believe all the great things people say to you every day. Believe people are getting you dinner because they want to and not because it’s their job. Believe all the praise in magazines and think you are unstoppable, invincible. The day Mark Feely and Mark from Westlife get lost in one another is the day I enter the danger zone. But, hopefully, I can keep them separated.

BRYAN

JJ: Bryan, how could you let down everyone from Artane by undoing that dancer’s top on stage!

BRYAN MCFADDEN: Every night I do something to that girl on stage, to keep from being bored!

JJ: And Kerry doesn’t object to you undoing another woman’s top!

BMcF: She knows it’s a laugh. Besides, the top didn’t come off, it just fell a bit. And she had another top on underneath.

JJ: But you do seem to have a boob fixation; you were caught admiring Mariah Carey’s tits in that video.

BMcF: I wasn’t even looking at her boobs! It was her leg I was looking at. Me girlfriend has bigger boobs than any of them girls, so it doesn’t bother either of us that I was “caught.” I’d trust Kerry with my life. And she’d trust me as well. There are a lot of girlfriends who would get jealous of things like the Mariah Carey video – but Kerry didn’t.

JJ: Was there any problem within Westlife, or the group’s management, when it came to you announcing Kerry was pregnant?

BMcF: At the start I was afraid to tell anybody because I thought they were all going to freak. I told Nicky first, then Mark. But I didn’t want to tell the other two because they’re more old-fashioned, go according to the book. Don’t curse, don’t smoke in interviews, all that. Whereas I had a relationship with Nicky before. And Mark is me best mate in the band.

JJ: Kian and Shane are like mother hens?

BMcF: Yeah. And how they found out was that Louis found out through the Sun newspaper.

JJ: I’m sure Louis didn’t give a fuck, since he’s been through all this with Boyzone.

BMcF: He didn’t. And he’s really fond of Kerry. That helped. But I had problems in the past with Louis. We didn’t get on. But we do now.

JJ: Why didn’t you, at the start?

BMcF: He thought I was going to be a “Robbie Williams”, a loose canon. He felt I wasn’t like the rest. And I don’t put on an image as much as some people do.

JJ: Would Louis also have been afraid you might go down the path of excessive drink and drugs?

BMcF: He knows, out of all of us, I’d be the least inclined to do that. I’m the most anti-drugs person in the world. At the start, though, he probably would have thought I’d go for drinking. But I hate drugs. One of my friends ended up on heroin. He wasn’t my friend when he was on heroin but I knew him as a kid. And I seen how his life changed, turned terrible. He started off on weed then went on to ecstasy, “Charlie” and ended up on heroin. So I was always anti-drugs.

Y’know when you’re in school and everyone tries ecstasy once? I didn’t. I never took an acid tablet. Never did anything. I just don’t like putting things in my body. I’ll go tonight and get fucked on drink because it’s me birthday but it doesn’t appeal to me. And I’m sure Louis at the start, was worried about me and drink. Yet now he probably looks at me as the sensible one. Because all the boys, on this tour, have been drunk every night, coming in at seven, eight in the morning. I was out once or twice. Though I do smoke a lot. But you better not put that in the interview.

JJ: Why? Because the boyband rule book says so?

BMcF: No. I don’t not smoke in front of the kids because I’m told not to. It’s something I do that I actually think is stupid. I’m addicted to cigarettes. I’m so anti-drugs, not pushed on drinking yet cigarettes got me and I can’t stop. And I wouldn’t want kids to know I smoke. They might think “if he smokes, and he’s a singer, it must be okay”. It’s not! It ruins peoples’ voices.

JJ: Why don’t we leave in the interview what you just said about smoking? It’s the opposite of what you fear might be suggested to fans.

BMcF: Fair enough. Leave it in. But I’ve been smoking since I was 16. I gave up cigarettes just before joining the band but as soon as I was in Westlife I started again. And now I smoke 25 a day. So I do regret that I started smoking. Yet it’s something I can’t give up. I wake up every morning and feel disgusting. I have to go onto the bathroom and cough up phlegm. It’s not a pretty sight.

JJ: Does Kerry smoke?

BMcF: She did. But when she got pregnant she gave them up.

JJ: So why don’t you, even to protect her pregnancy?

BMcF: I tried. I gave up smoking when she got pregnant but I put on a stone in weight. Smoking stops me eating. Because when I’m not smoking I eat.

JJ: You got slagged in school for being “Fat McFadden”

BMcF: Yeah. I was huge in school. Two things I got slagged for. Being “fat, ugly McFadden” and “gay McFadden.” I was “gay” because I was in Billie Barry’s. The exact words they call me were “fat faggot.”

JJ: Did you get into fights over that?

BMcF: No. That’s where I got my wit from. That’s how I defend myself. I’d have a quick answer rather than lash back, physically.

JJ: Did that experience also make you want to prove them wrong?

BMcF: Yeah! I remember the first time I was on the cover of a poster magazine about myself. I remember looking at it and thinking “this is the bloke everyone used to call ‘fat’ and who could never get a girlfriend”! It was great to see. Very much “fuck you’se for slagging me, look at this!”

JJ: Do you ever get grief nowadays because Westlife are so big, you’re with a “babe”, and generally seem to have it all.

BMcF: No. I come from Artane so it’s grand. I go to The Goblet and people don’t say a fucking thing to me, in terms of slagging. The opposite in fact. So I’m lucky in that respect. But I’ve moved to Wicklow and I went to a night-club in Greystones the day Kian was in the papers, with his black eyes. And some fella said “do you want to look like your friend?” and threw a pint over me. He thought I was just going to run away, or something. I lost the plot and so did my two friends who were with me. They had to take us out of the night-club. I was going to kill the guy. I was so angry over Kian. I absolutely wanted to smack him. But even the guard said to me “if someone does what he did you can’t, legally, throw punches.” I said “if it happens again, I will.” But he said because the guy threw a liquid and didn’t hit me, I couldn’t hit him.

JJ: What was the worst moment in Westlife?

BMcF: The worst time, ever, in the band was when I was in New York. That was the worst three months of my life. It was too much. All of us in Westlife were wrecked from the travelling. We went from Taiwan to Canada, to some shithole in America to do a gig. Then got on a plane to fly to New York, then to Rome. Then we drove up to the mountains, and recorded that song with Mariah Carey, in Capri. We got there at six in the morning, worked straight through the night then left, back on a boat, to Rome, to New York. Arrived into the city at 11pm and went straight to do a midnight radio interview. By the time I got to my bed at two, it had been three days without sleep.

JJ: Why didn’t the “Dub” in you say “fuck this shit, you guys are killing the fatted calf.”

BMcF: We did when we came back. That’s why we failed America. We were too tired, pushed too far. I was. That night in the hotel, at 2 o’clock, I also got a phone call from my best mate. He was arrested for drink driving. All these things were going through my head. And I went to the mini bar, opened it and drank ten of those little bottles straight through. Then all the beer. And just sat there. Then I tried to lift up the telly, I wanted to throw it out the window, and it fell on my head and I fell on the bed. I was trying to be a rock star! But it fell arseways, and I did, and that’s how I fell asleep! Lying in the bed with a fat telly beside me. I went to work the next day and the guys thought ‘he’s gone mad’.

JJ: Beneath that madness was despair – so did you finally tell management how close they came to blowing everything apart?

BMcF: Yeah. But everybody wanted to break America. Instead, we broke. I ended up going home for a week. Mark’s granddad died, he went home for a week. Shane went home. We all, one at a time, fell and had to go home. We sold half a million records and had a number two single in the charts but that’s why it didn’t go any further. And we never went back. The thought of going back to America, I dread. Because of what I went through the first time. And now I really think no one is up for it. Because the first time it originally was all excitement, “let’s break America” – but it all went so wrong. Don’t even let me see New York.

JJ: You obviously are aware the pop business could drive you into the ground.

BMcF: They did drive us into the ground. But we got everything back together for the new album.

JJ: So how does Bryan McFadden prepare for the final fall, as happened to Louis’ first band Boyzone?

BMcF: You just have to keep working and in that way, prepare. But I don’t think it’s going to happen now. We’re too well paced out. We’ve said to the record company, “we’re not over-working anymore.” The first two years were ridiculous. But we’ve got our time now. This tour isn’t the record company’s time. It’s ours. And I, myself, am certainly not going to have a fall. I’m going to go on after this and have a solo career. I don’t care what anyone says. I’m not going to be a Mikey Graham or Stephen Gately. And I feel sorry for Mike and Stephen. I think it’s a sad ending to their story.

In the interview you did with Keith, he said he was suicidal after it ended. I understand that. But it’s not going to happen to me after Westlife folds. I’ve already started planning. I have my own life set up, I don’t rely on this band anymore. This band is everything to some people. It isn’t to me. I’ve got a baby and a wife and – Kerry’s going to be my wife next July. So the world doesn’t revolve around Westlife. Westlife is the best thing that ever happened to me, but it isn’t my future. It’s none of our futures. This band won’t last more than five years. That’s why I’m starting now to plan my future. I’m not only going to live another five years. I’m going to live another seventy.