Wednesday, May 24, 2006

Where Are You When I'm Calling Your Name?

Annabel, my dear, I know you're going to be devastated but... this is the last single. Single number 20, it was released in February, and is the latest single to make the top three! Hooray for Westlife! So there probably won't be another one released until September-ish. It's already confirmed to be The Dance, a cover of a Garth Brooks song. They performed it on tour and it's sounding fantastic! But in the meantime, here's the latest single... Amazing.

This video makes bugger-all sense. From what I can figure, Mark's gotten himself locked in the car park of an empty building, and the others have come back in the middle of the night to look for him. Kian checks in the stairwell. Nope, Mark's not there. Shane wanders around one deserted floor, and then looks out the window in case Mark's out on the road. Nope, he's not there either. Nicky finds a floor with nothing but a photocopier in it, but Mark's not there either. The photocopier starts to go haywire, spewing blank pages everywhere. Nicky makes himself scarce so he can't be blamed for breaking the photocopier. Meanwhile, Mark's been wandering around the carpark so long he's grown a beard and has started singing to himself. Finally, he gets out of the carpark and finds the others in the lobby. Discovering that they've all been singing to themselves, they figure 'why not?' and launch into the chorus in the middle of the empty lobby. Then they take a photo of them singing in the lobby, just because no-one would believe it otherwise, and stick it on the front of the single. Mark still has a beard.

I, personally, liked the beard. But it did divide fans everywhere. Some thought it made him look all rough and manly. Some people thought it stopped his sudden eyeliner fetish looking too girly. Some people thought he looked like a total derro. I'm going with the first option, mostly because derros generally aren't dressed that expensively, and because I loved the eyeliner anyway.

Finally... Finally a single with some new material on it. This one comes with two brand new songs, one co-written by Shane and Mark. It's a ballad called Miss You When I'm Dreaming, and is a welcome reminder of just how talented Westlife are. The vocals are understated, but powerful, and you can't help but go a bit teary at the lyrics. It's utterly beautiful. The other song is called Still Here, an energetic up-tempo kick up the arse, considering the amount of ballads they've had recently. Also, there's not a cover in sight, a nice surprise when you consider there hasn't been a cover-less single for almost two years.

The other addition is an 'Exclusive Chat', which is basically just them having a very prompted discussion with each other. It's not entirely fake, but it sounds a bit rushed and tries to shove in too many ads for themselves at once. But there are a few cute 'mate' moments, so you can sort of forgive it. It's just a little hasty and scripted. Not as though every word has been prompted, but you can tell they were told exactly what they should talk about.

Example:
Shane: Are we looking forward to the tour, are we?
Kian: The tour is going to be excellent
Shane: We're actually touring in about... uh... seven weeks from now.
Kian: The tour is going to be excellent, so anybody who's bought a ticket we promise you you're in for a real treat

Hint, hint.

1 comment:

snowdrop said...

oooooooooooooooooooooooooh so THATS the story behind the video!!!!


i was wondering....