Mark Feehily now sells coffee from a van

It's only a "side project", says Mark Feehily, as he flogs coffees:

The former boyband member – who raked in a string of hits before the band split up in 2012 – revealed he is now running a catering van, selling crepes and coffees.
The 34-year-old insisted the career move was a “side project”

I'm not sure 'being in a top-selling pop act' and then 'selling coffee at the side of the road' quite counts as a "career move".

...adding: “People were flabbergasted that I was in the van making crepes."

God, yes. Who the hell buys crepes from a van these days?

Gordon in the morning: Gone West-life

There's a sizeable story on Bizarre this morning, as Aaron Tinney and Blanaid Murphy turn up with grim news from the Westlife camp:

WESTLIFE star Shane Filan has started a court battle over massive debts.

A property company set up by the Irish boyband singer, 32, ran into trouble owing £4million.

He applied for a legal agreement in London this week to pay back creditors over a period of time.

This may be a prime example of sticking to what you do best. Although having heard Westlife's music, it's quite possible that being a property tycoon still is what Shane Filan does best.

Westlife linger, don't they? Like pneumonia.

Nicky Byrne has given an interview marking the end of Westlife:

It's a miracle and a blessing that we lasted 14 years.

Which goes to prove the old saying: five people's miracles is everybody else's nightmare.

Gordon in the morning: Print this out, keep it in your wallet

I'm not sure that an interview with Gordon Smart can form a legally binding contract, but let's cling to the possibility:

THOSE wooden stools can now officially be turned into sawdust – DA LOIFE say they will never return as a band following their farewell tour.

Oh, by the way, the dodgy "Loife" isn't actually the worst of Smart's lapse into clumsy Irish stereotyping - Alan Smartridge, if you will:

The lads have ruled out doing a Take That-style comeback in years to come.

Even if they were offered all the potatoes in Ireland. That's it.

Let's just be thankful he managed to get through the piece without mentioning horses on council estates.

Being Smart, he doesn't actually have a quote which backs up his claim, instead offering this:

Kian Egan said: "We walked away from a multi-million-pound record deal that would have changed our lives for ever, secured our future beyond anything.

"It's not about the money. We'd have made far more on a new record than we ever would with a comeback tour."

That's not quite the same thing as saying there will never be a return, though, is it?

The real worry is that there's now going to be lots of them making records:

Shane said: "The first person to decide to do a solo record, the other three will all be there."

You do know that's not quite how "solo" works, don't you, Shane?

Westlife go west; end life

This is how it ends: not with a bland, but with a rolling farewell tour. Westlife have announced they're slaughtered their last song; the bar stools will be turned over and placed on a table for the last time next year.

Mark Out Of Westlife said: "we've been told we can only do a lucrative reunion tour if we break up in the first place, which makes this inevitable."

Relatives of Westlife's victim, Music, told journalists that although they were pleased to hear the torment was to end, it wouldn't repair the damage it has done.

Ireland now relying on advice from Westlife

If it wasn't bad enough having the IMF turn up like your mother, suggesting you spend a little less on takeaway pizzas and suggesting you ask your Uncle Mickey for a job at the car wash, Ireland are now suffering the indignity of having Westlife trying to perk them up:

In his assessment of the Irish economy, Nicky Byrne is blunt.

"Things are very bad," he says.

"But when things are bad you need to dig deep and pull together. We're a good enough nation to do that."

No wonder the Irish government kept denying they were going to seek a bailout - they were just waiting to deploy Westlife distributing tin-eared platitudes. That'll sort things out:

Byrne's bandmate Kian Egan thinks that most people still hold the country in high esteem.

"I don't think the image of Ireland is down," he says.

"The people are down, but Ireland is the most beautiful country in the world and the people are some of the friendliest in the world."

It turns out that rather than quantitative easing, Westlife's plan to refloat the Irish economy is to release an extra flow of stereotypes into the system:

"Anyone who has ever been knows it's a fantastic country for a pint of Guinness, a night in the pub, a bit of a laugh. The surf here is amazing, there's so many great things here. Tourism will come back up big again.

That's all it's going to take, then - just get the Dáil to agree to increase the craic levels and everything will be fine.

I suppose at least they didn't ask Bono. Although there'd be something quite pleasing about the Dutch using U2's tax funds to bail out the Irish.

Gordon in the morning: Shifting fields of battle

Because Gordon loves the idea of a chart battle, a shift in record company distribution plans, moving the Take That album to November 15th isn't simply a reaction to earlier supply and a way of maximising units shifted pre-Christmas, it's a major shift in the theatre of war:

WESTLIFE will be crying into their Guinness tonight.

TAKE THAT have lobbed a massive spanner into the Irish lads' plans for chart domination with their new album Gravity.

GARY BARLOW, MARK OWEN, JASON ORANGE, HOWARD DONALD and their old pal ROBBIE WILLIAMS have moved the release date of their new album Progress forward to the same day, November 15.

All the four-leaf clovers in the world won't help in Westlife HQ when word filters through to the lads.

Some of you might think Gordon's lobbing in of Irish stereotypes is a bit obscene; others will be surprised he didn't work in a reference to potato famines.

But if Westlife are the new losers, who are the winners?

Da Loif's loss is a huge gain for JLS. Their second album, Out Of This World, was originally due to go head-to-head with Take That.

They will now have the chance to knock the elder statesmen of pop, or Westlife, off the top spot after only a week.

If Gary Barlow is the elder statesman in his thirties, what does that make Cliff Richard?

Still, even Gordon is a realist:

I can't see it happening, but it is going to make for a great chart battle.

No, no it isn't.

Last night a Take That spokesman said the release date change was because of the huge response to their press conference at London's Savoy hotel on Tuesday announcing their tour dates.

I reckon the real reason is to give them an extra week to fill their boots with monster sales in the Christmas market.

Do you think, Gordon? Almost as if the chart position doesn't mean a thing to anyone, outside someone with a few column inches to fill.

There's also some story about Joe Cole renaming his box after Liam Gallagher's trouser company. It turns out it's about Cole's football-watching box.

Gordon in the morning: Ride the tiger

We're expected to believe that a dangerous, man-eating tiger "gatecrashed" the Brand-Perry nuptials.

How serious could that have been, Gordon?

Officials at the Ranthambore National Park said the tiger was drawn by lights and music from the party and could have killed any of the 85 revellers, who included rapper P DIDDY and comedian DAVID BADDIEL.

Good God, can you imagine the horror? Of being stuck at a wedding party with that lot. You'd just be hoping a hungry tiger would turn up. You'd probably be splashing gravy about just in case.

The suspicion that, given this is a wildlife park, you'd expect there to be wildlife wandering about doesn't seem to have occurred to Gordon.

Guards beat the tiger off with a stick, which sounds about as much fun as Perry would have been having that evening.

Elsewhere, Westlife are thinking about getting into the contraceptive business. Thinking about Westlife is a contraceptive, surely?

Westlife fire lasers into people's eyes

Westlife's appearance on the X Factor has been the focus of an upheld complaint to Ofcom, as it turns out their flashing light show could have triggered epileptic fits amongst the audience:

Ofcom tested this segment of the programme against its published Guidance
concerning PSE. It found that for two sequences during the Westlife performance,
lasting just over three seconds in total, it contained flashing where the brightness,
frequency and screen areas exceeded the “intensity” limits as set out in the
Guidance. The sequences contained flashing at an average rate of approximately 15
flashes per second (the limit in Ofcom’s Guidance being no more than three flashes
per second).

It's a difficult balance - obviously, you have to consider viewers who are sensitive to flashing images, but on the other hand: how do you make something like Westlife interesting, assuming setting fire to them is illegal?

Also in the latest Ofcom complaints: A Cornwall-based radio station ran a competition offering valuables as prizes. The station said they were worth £100; they turned out to be worth less than half that. People complained, the station apologised and fixed the error.

However, given the station was Pirate FM, would people not be expecting some sort of buccaneering trickery? If you tuned in to Radio Highwayman or Talk Cutpurse, you'd be on your guard; surely the same should be true of a company which trades under the name of a group of brigands?

Woot-ton: Westlife introduce the splitless comeback

Dan Wootton is bloody thrilled to have an exclusive chat with Westlife this morning:

WESTLIFE launch their mega comeback on X Factor tonight and a certain Mr COWELL will be watching very closely.

Determined to knock TAKE THAT from their best band perch, he's personally overseen every aspect of the Irish lads' relaunch, even what threads they wear.

Megacomeback? Have they actually been away? Don't you have to at least pretend to go away before you can have a comeback? They even did the last bloody series of The X Factor, didn't they?

There's something of an air of self-delusion hanging over the entire project:

Nicky said: "Simon's competitive about it. We're his Take That. We don't want to be second best."

Woah, Nicky. Before you start aiming for second best, why not have a crack at trying to be the 39,647,323rd best?

Because you're not Simon Cowell's Take That. You're Louis Walsh's other Boyzone.

"For years when they were off the scene we had it all to ourselves. So we had to come back with a strong song.

"We were the grand-dads of pop. Now they're back we're the babies again."

It doesn't really work like that, does it? The return of Take That doesn't suddenly rejuvenate you, it just throws into ever stronger relief the painful, pedestrian, lack of life that characterises your music, boys.

Westlife chaos

That expensive booking fee creamed off when you buy tickets through Ticketmaster - that's for the quality service they give.

Sometimes.

Last night's Liverpool Westlife gig was a bit of a screw-up: Ticketmaster customers hadn't received their tickets through the post, so eager Westlife fans had to turn up in hope and lay siege to the ticket office in a bid to get in.

We're sure Ticketmaster will be refunding all those booking fees as they'd not really done anything to earn them.

Of course, poor though this show was, the angry Westlife fans still managed to overstate their frustration:

Kath Johnson, 55, from Liverpool city centre, said: “It has been horrendous. I have never known anything like it. I had to wait over an hour to get my ticket.”

Upsetting. Ruined the fun of the evening. Maybe a bit annoying. But if you can live half a century on this planet and you've never known anything as "horrendous" as having to queue for a little while outside a box office, you might consider your life to have been somewhat charmed.

And if Kath really wanted to know horrendous, wait until she got inside and saw Westlife singing. Now, that's bad.

And people think Shane Filan knows nothing about music

Shane from Westlife has decided that their single wasn't as good as Leona Lewis':

"At the end of the day, I think Leona had the better song - it's more exciting and she deserves to be number one. Maybe Take That had a better song, too."

Yes. And you know what else was better and more exciting than the Westlife single? Every other thing that's ever been put on a record. Even the theme from the Apple Dumpling Gang. Especially the theme from the Apple Dumpling Gang.

Westlife, Newton gather for a fawn-in

There's a splendid, mighty-cringe of a photo in this morning's Sun where Victoria Newton and Westlife pose with pints of Guinness. It's like the worst blind date ever.

The image isn't helped by the awful caption:

Loife and soul ... Victoria has a pint with, left to right, Mark, Shane, Nicky and Kian

Loife and soul? I suppose Westlife should be grateful they got off with just the Guinness cliche and weren't asked to be photographed with a pig under their arms.

Faced with the prospect of Newton pawing at them, Westlife instead make it clear they've got a boyfrie... sorry, express their love for the boss:

Nicky, 29, told me: “Simon is bigger than BRAD PITT in America. Ever since he started American Idol he’s become a megastar.

“We met up with him in the States a couple of years ago but we couldn’t get near him because he was so busy signing autographs.

“We take the mickey out of him. In his office he has a mirror that says, ‘Yes, Simon, you look terrific’.

“He wasn’t famous when we first met him but he hasn’t changed. How you see him behave on The X Factor is how he has always been.”

Simon Cowell - just for the record - isn't bigger in the US than Brad Pitt, although he is marginally more famous than Craig Revel Horwood. At the moment.

Still, it's nice to hear that fame hasn't changed him - although since before he was famous he was a honking, classless bully maybe it would have been better if it had.

Shane, meanwhile, welcomes back Take That:

“Slowly but surely pop music is coming back into the charts again thanks to Take That.

“Since their massive comeback I think it’s had a knock-on effect, helping to make pop music popular again. I hope it’s going to inspire record company bosses to sign more pop acts.

“Seven or eight years ago you couldn’t move for pop acts, then guitar bands came in and pop became a dirty word.

“Now you’ve got the SPICE GIRLS back, BOYZONE are reforming and with LEONA LEWIS’ incredible single sales it feels like things could be changing.”

You mean Leona Lewis, who is managed by... oh, Simon Cowell. What a surprise.

It's not clear, though, why record labels would need to go out signing new pop acts when there's so many old ones clambering out their crypts; indeed, if we were Shane we'd be worried that all these decade-old acts cluttering things up pop is starting to look somewhat elderly?

Westlife fogged off

Heartbreaking news from the launch of the new Westlife album yesterday in London:

WESTLIFE star MARK FEEHILY disappointed fans at his band's album launch on Monday - after he missed a performance at lavish London department store Harrods. The singer was due to perform with his bandmates to mark the release of new LP Back Home, but had to pull out of the event when his plane from his native Ireland to the British mainland was delayed by fog.

How terrible: not only to be a Westlife fan in the first place, but then to be a disappointed Westlife fan on top of that.

Spice against Life

We can hardly contain our excitement at the mounting prospect of a chart battle between the Spice Girls and Westlife.

Actually, that's not true, we've just found a small yoghurt pot which has more than enabled us to contain it.

We're assuming that Mel C has started tearing strips off Westlife that the party line at Camp Spice was supposed to be saying nothing in public:

"We've just sold out 17 nights at the O2 Centre... We've got nothing to prove!"

And referring to her longrunning spat with Louis, she added: "I think Louis secretly fancies me. In the playground if you fancy someone you just smack 'em. Whenever Louis gets the chance he slags me off!"

That's quite a brave thing to say, really, as it's impossible to formulate a sentence of that sort without imagining the other person's sex face looming down on yours in the smaller rooms at a Ramada Encore.

Let's not count the number of perfectly good Internet Rumours that a Mel C-Louios Walsh marriage would destroy.

It's all in the research

Victoria Newton has got exclusive pictures from Westlife's advert for the Post Office:

WESTLIFE have given a first-class performance in their debut telly commercial.

Debut commercial, is it, Newton? Presumably the 2006 Woolworths advert doesn't count, then?

Why are the Post Office using Westlife in their advert, though? They used to advertise with a series of crudely-animated ants with annoying voices, so I suppose the use of Westlife at least continues that theme. And if you're looking to get the public behind an ongoing series of closures for Post Offices, what better way to do it than to plant the suggestion that having a Post office in your village might lead to the appearance of Westlife in your neighbourhood?

Westlife seek a little Xtra help

James P alerts us to the surprising news of Westlife's new album, and the way they seem desperate to build their release schedule around the X Factor:

Westlife want to showcase their new album on a TV programme scheduled just before X Factor to help boost record sales.

The 'Flying Without Wings' boyband reportedly believe that by previewing new tracks around the popular ITV reality show they will be helped in achieving a hit with new single 'Home'.

A source told The Sun: "It will be a Saturday night type of show so it’d be great to run it before the semi-final or final of X Factor as the ratings have been so good."

Isn't it a bit rich for a supposedly successful band to be seeking a leg-up from the unknowns? Surely the last thing Cowell wants is for his shaky new act to be sharing the limelight with Walsh's creaky old barbershop outfit? Or was pushing Westlife part of the deal cut when Walsh agreed to take the faux-fall?

Hope, and the absence of hope

Alone in a universe of people, Brian Harvey still holds out hope for another East 17 reunion:

"I hoped we could put all the old stuff behind us. Me, Terry and John are fine, but I just don't think Tony likes me! I honestly don't know what I've done, whether I've stolen the limelight or something. I'd still be up for doing the reunion, though."

Brian, chickadee, there's precious little limelight to be stolen from East 17 these days - you'd be hard put to read a large print novel in the glow of fame left for you lot.

Meanwhile, Westlife have firmly ruled out any chance of Brian McFadden returning, tail between legs or no:

NICKY BYRNE, 28, adds, "Let's put the record straight - there's no room for Brian in Westlife now. I haven't had this conversation with Brian, but there's no reason for him to want to be in Westlife now anyway."

Good lord, Nicky. There's no reason for anyone to want to be in Westlife - unless, perhaps, they've got explosives strapped under their jackets.

I'm off: Preston turns his back on his career

For all the glitz and glamour and excitement and - yes, the very real sense that anything could happen - that hung around the neck of the Brits last night, it's interesting that the most entertaining pop music moment of the night on the TV was recorded two weeks ago and had already been blogged and written about.

Preston on - or rather off - Never Mind The Buzzcocks.

It had been puzzling us as to why he walked away when Simon Amstell read his own wife's autobiography out to him. Could it be that he was defending his wife's honour? But since he effectively said "not only is my wife's book embarrassing, but it is so embarrassing I can't think of anything to say about it when it's read to me in a public place", it wasn't so much a defence of her honour as a retreat beaten in shame.

He could have had a comeback. He could have even just sat there and taken it. Instead, he got up and walked. Could it be that he finally realised he'd become little more than "rock star boyfriend" in someone else's bad Jackie Collins novel life?

Still, let's enjoy the moment again, thanks to the magic of YouTube.

It's a wonderful moment - it's like Vinnie Jones dressed as Morrissey recreating John Nott on Nationwide.

For the record, the Brits wasn't even the second most enjoyable TV-pop moment last night: that would go to Westlife, and the looks in their eyes as, having been invited on to sing a special Valentine's song on the lottery draw, the football overran and shoved them back to the wrong side of eleven o'clock. After all, if they wanted to sing to sixteen disappointed people, they could get a support slot on an Ordinary Boys tour.

And the winner is... Westlife again?

The Ireland music awards could, if they were savvy, try to position themselves as some sort of Golden Globe-y event, a bellwether leading off the music awards season.

Instead, year after year, they announce that Westlife are the "best pop act" - it's seven bloody years running now.

As if that wasn't enough, they gave most of the prizes to Snow Patrol.

Winners in full, then:

Best Irish DJ: (as in the radio, not djing)
Ray D'Arcy

Best Irish band:
Snow Patrol

Best Irish male:
Damien Dempsey (Beat Van Morrison for the title)

Best Irish female:
Luan Parle

Best Irish pop:
Westlife

Best live performance:
Snow Patrol - Marlay Park

Best international group:
Scissor Sisters

Best international male:
Justin Timberlake

Best international female:
Lily Allen

Best international album:
Arctic Monkeys - Whatever People Say I Am, I'm Not, Right?

Best folk/traditional artist:
Sharon Shannon

Best Irish album:
Snow Patrol – Eyes Open

Best New Irish Act:
Director

Hope for 2007:
Royseven

Lifetime achievement:
Clannad

Humanitarian award:
Paul Brady, Director of The Belvedere Youth Club

Industry award:
Larry Gogan