The music merry go round continues to spin – as Steps announce that they are to reform, Westlife have informed the world that they are to split for good. Westlife will retire with a farewell tour in 2012, but before that band members Mark Feehily, Kian Egan, Shane Filan and Nicky Byrne are due to release a greatest hits album on 21st November 2011.

Westlife, for many years managed by X Factor judge Louis Walsh, had 14 UK No1 hits including “Swear It Again” and “Flying Without Wings”, and have sold more than 44 million records around the world. By any group’s standards they were phenomenally successful, but for all of this, the news that they are to split leaves me singularly underwhelmed!! Although I freely admit that I was never part of their designated target market, to my mind Westlife and Boyzone were always the “poor country cousins” of Take That. In the 1990s Take That were able to engage a broad church of followers, who were not necessarily pre-pubescent schoolgirls – they had a universal appeal because they possessed charisma, personality and perhaps most significantly an excellent homegrown songwriter in Gary Barlow. In comparison Westlife and Boyzone, who were invented and designed to fill the void left by Take That’s retirement in 1995, were pale, plastic pretenders to the Take That Throne!! There was however one group in the 1990s that defied the normal Boy Band definition, by being the very antithesis of the “nice boys next door” and that was East 17 – but this urban, inner city crew had the required style, charisma and credibility and I would welcome their comeback.

Take That are not alone though, for in the previous decade of the 1980s there were two credible Boy Bands, who again wrote their own songs – Duran Duran and Spandau Ballet. They both had great style and panache and it’s no coincidence that along with Take That, all three groups have reformed to great excitement and acclaim in recent years!!

The UK in the 1970s gave us Boy Bands like the Bay City Rollers, Rubettes, Pilot, Kenny and Racey, and although sentimentality and nostalgia prevents me from slating them, they completely lacked the pre-requisite quality and credibility to find a place in the UK Boy Band Hall of Fame. But I would stretch the definition of “Boy Band” to include a group that fall somewhere between pop and rock, and that’s Slade. They were fun and funny, but nevertheless talented and by 1974 and 1975 lead singer Noddy Holder was writing poignant, sophisticated songs that belied the slightly vacuous nature of their earlier hits.

So here’s my Top 5 UK Boy Bands from the 70s, 80s and 90s, who all share one thing in common, namely that they penned their own songs.

Top 5 UK Boy Bands

1) Slade

2) Take That

3) Duran Duran

4) East 17

5) Spandau Ballet

Which 5 Boy Bands would you choose? Let us know in the Reply Box below.

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