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Issue # 4
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-Bigger Than Boyzone- |
| Plucked from obscurity just over a year ago
and co-managed by Boyzone's Ronan Keating, boy band Westlife already have
a record - breaking consecutive No. 1 singles, pop awards and millions
of adoring fans. Can there be anything left for the fresh-faced Irish lads
to achieve? SPENCER BRIGHT meets the newly famous five.
In the hothouse world of the boy band, time speeds up. The learning curves are steeper, emotions more intense, money pours in and young girls cry. One minute you are five Backstreet Boys - in Westlife's case 16 months ago back in Sligo, on Ireland's west coast, and Dublin - and then this year your first three singles (IILYG, SIA and FWW, which made No. 1 on October 24) go to No. 1 in the UK, an accolade neither Boyzone, Take That nor any other boy band has achieved. The next step is that you take a breath and say you can't believe this has happened to you. Young Irish people still possess a niceness and beguiling innocence far rarer this side of the water. When Westlife tell me how perfect their lives are, call me old fashioned, but I almost believe them. On the day I met them all, Mark Feehily, aged 19, had slept with excitement at being about to meet his idol Mariah Carey. Kian Egan, also 19, was anxious that a minor accident had left a mark on his face which would show in he photographs. Black-haired Shane Filan, aged 20, was nostalgic for his horses back in Sligo. The previous evening they had been to the Horse Of The Year Show at Wembley Arena. They were still chuffed that Jeremy Beadle, Chris Evans and Susan George had come up to them and said hello. But it is Nicky Byrne, the oldest member at 21, and Bryan McFadden, 19, who seem to exemplify the emotional dilemmas inherent in their new lifestyle. Nicky is in a long-term relationship with Georgina Ahern, daughter of Ireland's Prime Minister Bertie Ahern. Bryan is still ajusting to the fact that girls find him attractive. In his short time in the band, Bryan, a still-growing, strapping lad, has grown two inches, taking him to 6ft 2in. He'd never kissed a girl till he was 17. He's only 19 now, and has been linked to Miss World. Untrue, he assures me, though he hopes all those boys at school who said no girl could ever fancy him heard it. He has just had a two-week fling with Lene Nystrom, a temptress with tattoos and body piercings who sings with the Scandinavian group Aqua - the band who had a huge hit with the song Barbie Girl. Bryan was embarrassed and not sure how to handle talking about this. Further quizzing revealed he had decided to end their fling, only he hadn't told her yet. I suggest it must be a strang feeling from being a no-hoper with the girls to dating a feisty pop star. He corrects dating. 'And dumping.' Was it that he found her dissapointing and normal? 'She's not normal. I don't want to talk about it.' Bryan's upbringing was far from normal. He had always wanted to be a performer and from the age of six appeared professionally in plays and pantomimes. When he was 16 he played a bully in the TV series Finbar's Class, an Irish version of Grange Hill. 'It was a bit of an irony. I always got bullied at school at the time and I was the bully on camera.' He was bullied because he was fat, suffering taunts like Fat Boy and Chunk. He never fought back physically, learning instead to lash out with his tongue andpraying for God's help. 'I used to always say, "Please, look down on me and bless me and tomorrow let me wake up and feel normal."' God answered his prayers. 'From being an overweight child, when I could never even pull a girl, to being in a pop group and having thousands of girls screaming for me - He's definitely blessed me. I've obviously done something right for God.' In many ways Bryan typifies the new Ireland with its increasing affluence and the loosening grip of the Catholic Church. His parents come from families of 14 and 12 brothers and sisters. Bryan has only one sibling, a sister. He still considers himself very religious, praying every night and attending Mass when home. But that doesn't stop him from sleeping with girls. 'People get the wrong ideas of Irish Catholics. They think they are set in their ways. We're in the Nineties. I don't think any Catholics follow the church.' A couple of years ago, Bryan's weight started falling away. He was physically active every day, either at stage school learning to sing and dance, at hip-hop classes, and playing Gaelic football. It was only when he was in the band that he realised he might be attractive. 'Suddenly the girls were starting to scream for me, so that's when I thought, "Hold on a second, I can't be as bad as I used to be."' Keep to move out of acting and into the world of pop, he formed his own boy band, Cartel, who were starting to have local success. He sent a tape to Louis Walsh, manager of Boyzone, who is to Irish pop what Jackie Charlton was to Irish football. Walsh invited him to audition for a new boy band, he was forming and co - managing with Boyzone's singer, Ronan Keating. Bryan is still coming to terms with the adjustment in his fortunes and lifestyle. Take That were famously forced to lead a very restrictive lifestyle and not allowed girlfriends, one of the causes of their implosion after Robbie Williams left. Westlife's management has learnt that lesson. 'We're normal blokes. We like to have a few drinks and have a good laugh,' says Bryan. 'We're not going to lie to the fans and tell them we don't have girlfriends and that we don't drink. They have shown us a lot of respect in putting us where we are today in buying our music and supporting us, so we think it would be very disrespectful if we started lying to them.' 'Louis said at the start, "I hope none of you is going to get married and have babies." We said of course we're not. If someone meets someone they love and wants to get married and have kids, they're still free to do that. But we've all agreed among ourselves that it would be stupid at this stage. If you got married now it would affect your career, because you're going to be so focused on your family and your wife. I think it's just a bit silly.' It might not be the right time for marriage, but Bryan did find himself falling in love for the first time. She was English, neither a pop star nor a model, and they went out for two months. He shrugs, embarrased, noy wishing to say much. He was cut up when it ended, but it was a mutual parting. 'We had to. We didn't get to see each other enough. It was just too hard. It's impossible to hold down a relationship in band. People say if you're going to be in a relationship it should be with someone else in the business. I think that's even worse. Two people trying to fit in with each other's schedules is a waste of time. I don't know how Nicky and Georgina do it, because none of the rest of us can hold relationships down. Nicky's very brave. So is Georgina.' So if Bryan does not want to be lonely or abstinent, are casual relationships the only answer for someone inhis position? ' I suppose casual relationships are the only thing we can do at the moment,' he says. |