Ireland is gearing up for its next pop sensation with Westlife's Kian Egan as co-manager, writes Alison Healy.
THE SEARCH for the female Westlife is on, and people with too much time on their hands were trying to come up with a name for Louis Walsh's new girl band.
"Breastlife?" one showbiz hack suggested helpfully, but Walsh wasn't bowled over by the idea. The music mogul opened two days of auditions for the five-member girl band at The Pod on Harcourt Street yesterday, the venue which previously hosted auditions for his bands Westlife and Boyzone.
"We're looking for talent," Walsh declared. "Undiscovered talent, young, with a good attitude. We're looking for everything. We don't want good, we want great."
The band will be co-managed by Westlife's Kian Egan, who believes that Ireland is ready for a girl band. "Obviously it's had two very successful boy bands and now I think it's time for the girls to step up," he said.
But, hello, didn't Walsh already fail to hit the high notes when he ventured down the Irish girl band route before? Remember B*witched? Briefly successful, then imploded. Bellefire? Big in Japan, before quietly expiring. But Walsh does not dwell on the past. "We are going for great songs, great voices. This is for the world, this is not just for Ireland," he said.
He is looking for a band to match the Pussycat Dolls, the Spice Girls or the Sugababes. "It's not the Nolan Sisters we're looking for," he said. "Who?" chorused the hundreds of bemused teenagers who were not even born when ladies boogied around their handbags to I'm In the Mood for Dancing.
Harcourt Street was a sea of false tan, short skirts and stilettos from 6.30am yesterday as more than 700 girls began taking their places in the queue. AR executive Sheila Burgel completed the trio of judges with Walsh and Egan. "Louis tells me Irish girls are amazing," she said. "I'm very excited about that."
Kian Egan has found himself in a sticky situation, with fiancée Jodi Albert up for audition. But the former Hollyoaks actress is not getting special treatment.
"There's absolutely nobody picked for this band," Walsh said. "Everybody has to audition because that's the way it is."
If Albert gets through the first round, she will be competing with Rosanna Egan from Killaloe, Co Clare. The 19-year-old was the first hopeful to audition. She left nothing to chance by checking into a hotel on Harcourt Street on Thursday night. "We came down at 4 [am] just to make sure there were no overnighters," she said.
Rosanna impressed the judges enough with her version of Rihanna's Umbrella to merit a call-back tomorrow. "I'm absolutely delighted. Can't stop shaking. First one up, absolutely nerve-racking altogether."
And Walsh's early-morning optimism does not seem to have been misplaced. Taking a break from auditions, he said there had been "three or four great, great people. The good ones have been really good. We could get 10 bands out of this," he predicted before returning to hear his 49th Mariah Carey song of the day.