Westlife’s brand new album Spectrum is finally released today, and it is an 11-track belter “more modern” and “fresh”, while still providing the boys’ signature vocals and style for their longtime fans. The band, which consists of Kian, Mark, Shane and Nicky, shocked the music world when they announced their new tour and return to the music scene as a group earlier this year. The comeback was long-awaited, and saw the boys make an even bigger announcement that they will finally be playing Wembley Stadium during their 2020 UK dates.
But while many have speculated the band are simply trying to keep up with the competition and face off against Take That and other bands who have had major comebacks, Shane Filan explained the real reason the band have teamed up to produce fresh new music.
A big part of that was feeling envious of other bands and singers, and also because the band mates simply “missed” each other.
Asked if there was an element of competition in the decision, Shane replied: “No I think it was more about us, not even necessarily [watching] bands getting back together I think it was really just seeing [other] people releasing new music, just any act.
“Whether it be Ed Sheeran or Adele – I remember watching her when she came out with Hello, the excitement. I was excited for her, and I was thinking that’s the kind of excitement we used to feel when we were about to miss a tour or miss an album, and I was like I really miss that and I really miss the boys.
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“We genuinely all had our little moments. Nicky was talking recently about going to watch a Coldplay concert and going ‘This is what we used to do, we used to have 50,000 people watching us going crazy for our songs and we don’t do that anymore’.
“I think you have to sometimes, really step outside and look back at it and go – ‘We did something, we had an amazing fanbase and we did something really special for them, and that’s all we can do, we can never… not everybody’s going to love Westlife but our fans really love it and we do as well.
“So to bring it back and to be doing it at this level again now is fantastic,” the musician went on. “And hopefully we can grow that. I suppose the thing for us, was playing Wembley Stadium.
“We’d never played it in our career so that was a massive thing for us and we didn’t think we’d get to it this quickly, but we’re doing it next summer and it’s definitely gonna be probably one of the pinnacle of our lives, that night, and it’s something you can always set yourself goals to try and get to, and try and get as many as you can.”
The singer added: “We genuinely started to miss Westlife and we started to realise how much people missed it and it just felt right, it was time. We missed each other too, we genuinely missed each other, we’ve a very special bond the four of us, we have all got children now and families and people to share this amazing thing with.
“I think that’s why it’s more special this time around, having our kids, seeing daddy on stage and the understanding how big it is and some of the concerts they go to and have gone, ‘God daddy the size of this place’.
“It’s cool it’s a nice thing to be able to share with your children.”
Mark Feehily agreed with his bandmate, though his personal life has been swamped by the arrival of his newborn baby, and it’s taken a while for the reality of this new adventure to sink in.
“I’ve been living in newborn baby land recently so it crept up on me and I’m like ‘Uh we’re back to work in a couple of days time,’” the star laughed. “So for once I haven’t had a big build up in my head to the album release.
“We finished it a few months ago and then we were on tour and then I went off and our baby arrived,” Mark continued. “So that’s kind of the land I’ve been living in.
“Now it’s all of a sudden all this excitement about the album, not out of the blue, but all of a sudden. And it’s really exciting you know, for me the magic moment when the fans hear new music.
“So far it’s just been one song at a time, so they’re all about to hear it, and in some countries in the world they’re already hearing all the songs at once you know. I remember being a fan of plenty of people as a kid, when they bring out a new album as a fan it’s very exciting to hear all this new music, so it’s very exciting for me to think there’s people out there that feel that about our new album and I can’t wait to hear what they think about all this work we’ve been doing in the studio recently.
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“We’re really proud of it, we feel like our vocals are the best they’ve been ever probably, the production and the songs are all something we’re really proud of but at the same time we have no idea what the fan favourite’s going to be and what the fans might not like so much, so it’s all part of the fun of finding all that out now at the moment,” the singer added.
The band’s new album was recorded in Dublin, LA and London, and sees Shane, Mark, Kian and Nicky crowned the biggest selling Irish band in the UK in the 21st century.
Their comeback included the stunning stunning success of this summer’s ‘Twenty Tour’ which sold a record 600,000 tickets across 27 cities and 13 countries.
The band have also announced a stadium tour for 2020 which culminates at their first ever Wembley Stadium show on 22 August.
Westlife have sold over 55 million records worldwide, and are the only band to have their first seven singles enter the UK chart at No.1.
They also have the most singles of any artist to debut at No.1 in the UK. The band have managed a whopping 14 No.1 singles, behind only rock ’n’ roll singer Elvis Presley and iconic band The Beatles.
They have had 33 No.1 albums worldwide and as a live act have sold 5 million concert tickets worldwide.
