Westlife On New Zealand TV

Westlife were on a New Zealand TV channel giving an interview and Jess made a transcript of what was said. Thank you Jess!

Voice over: Hunky, spunky, not all that funky; clean, keen and certainly not mean. That’s the public image of Westlife but the reality can be a bit different.

Cut to Shane: Jeez, I’ve such a bad hangover; *beep* it’s not even funny. My liver is just saying, don’t do that ever again to me.

Clip of winning Meteor award for best pop act the previous night.

How are you all feeling today:

Shane: Great actually, I didn’t drink last night; I went to bed early.

Kian: Not really, no.

Nicky: That’s a lie.Shane: *nods* I’m lying right now, straight through my teeth. A bit of a hangover today, but we’re not too bad. We were celebrating our win.

They celebrated as only Irishmen can

Shane: Mixing champagne and Guinness (look of pleasure comes across his face).

Introduction time… noted that each of the boys said his full name EXCEPT Kian!

How big? Well, they’ve topped the British charts 14 times. That puts them in third place for the most number ones behind the Beatles and Elvis Presley, and tied with Cliff Richard.

When are you going to take out Cliff?

Shane: We need to take out Cliff soon.

Nicky: And we need to beat him as well! It’d be good. There’s a new single out in a week’s time in the UK and Ireland.

Are you competitive in that way?

Kian: Yeah, we’re quite competitive. It’s not … I wouldn’t say competitive, as such. We’re ambitious.

Westlife holds the record for the most consecutive number ones … until this (clip of Bob the Builder).

You had seven singles debuted at number one, and then … Bob the Builder.

What do you think when you see ‘can we fix it?’

Mark: Can we break it?!

The lads were signed by Simon Cowell who’s gone on to make millions by being rude to people on American Idol.

Is Simon Cowell a bastard in real life?

Nicky: He’s not a bastard. He’s a *beep* bastard *laughs*

Shane: He’s a rich bastard! *laughs* A very rich bastard!

While they’re pop and proud, it doesn’t stop Westlife acting like rock stars and throwing the furniture out of a hotel room.

Mark: Well, it wasn’t very rock and roll cause I looked out the window first to make sure there was nobody there.

Kian: He was drunk and …

Mark: You know, it was just a silly, kind of hyper, giddy night out.

The incident came just before Mark admitted publicly that he was gay.

Did it affect the band in any way when you came out?

Shane: We got more fans!

Nicky: To be honest with ya, I wasn’t very happy with that at all *laughs with Mark*

Mark: Obviously, every boy band, there’s that thing with the fans where they fancy them, or dream about marrying them some day. I think that people like us for our songs and our voices. It's not like I shattered loads of girls’ dreams because they thought they were actually going to marry me and now I’m gay, you know?

Ten years later, Westlife are still pumping out the chart toppers. Surprising when you realise that most boy bands fizzle and die after a couple of numbers ones, rehab and a supermodel girlfriend.

Ten years on, are you still a boy band?

Shane: I think we’ll always be called a boy band, you know. Even if we’re together when we’re fifty. We’re a pop group, in our eyes. We just make pop music.

You’re not going to be a man band?

Shane: We’re a man band. We’re a young man band! But we feel young. I suppose with Take That - we were kind of the granddads of pop, and now Take That and Boyzone are back; now we feel like obviously kids again cause they’re older than us spring chickens!

But all those records and the sell-out tours don’t mean diddly to the critics. Westlife have grown to accept that they’ll never be quite cool and they don’t care.

Kian: Look, at the end of the day, the people who are buying them albums, are the people who we care about. The people who come to our concerts are the people who we care about. And it’s our aim to continue to make the best music that we can for them, and they’re our real critics!

Mark Sainsbury (anchor) summing up: And you might just see Kian at a beach near you. Kian’s a keen surfer and hoping to hit the waves when Westlife tour New Zealand in May.