I have never liked Brian McFadden's musical output. I was very surprised when he broke loose of Westlife to go solo. I thought Shane or Mark would have done well in terms of voice.

 

I'm shocked that none of the other four have ever tried to go solo, or done anything whatsoever outside of Westlife! I guess they've got into a routine after 11 years of promoting like hell for 3 months at the end of the year, having 6 months off relaxing and then getting back on the touring circuit for 3 months before starting the same old routine yet again...I guess Brian got sick of the monotony. If Shane had tried a solo career circa 2002, even without leaving Westlife, just doing a side project sort of thing, he could have easily scored a couple of solo #1 hits. I guess it's not in their personal interest. I've never heard of a boyband last so long and with such consistently high sales though - even Backstreet Boys are going way downhill in popularity now.

Westlife are BIZARRELY popular. I mean, I like a good ballad or two but the amount of albums they shift and arenas they fill based on one hit a year is mad...

Westlife are BIZARRELY popular. I mean, I like a good ballad or two but the amount of albums they shift and arenas they fill based on one hit a year is mad...

 

Teenage girls who are now 20 somethings feeding off nostalgia? Sweeping generalisation I know :lol: But as far as I can gather, everytime they put on a show, even if they've had a new album out recently, they do only a handful of tracks from that but it's mostly a greatest hits show each time. I do wonder if without X Factor they would have been over by now. Home and What About Now, and their respective eras, certainly got a huge boost from it. Their last genuinely huge single, deserving of its hit status, in my opinion, was You Raise Me Up, and that was five years ago now. Just a genuinely popular song that was everywhere at the time and liked outside of their core fanbase. Plus it had quite a lengthy chart run iirc which was against the tide of both the chart at the time, and their own usual patterns.

What on earth does she see in him? Like... honestly?

I also am still trying to work this out.