Westlife
Face The Truth – Mark Interview -
August 2006
by
Myles Wearring
WESTLIFE’S
OPENLY GAY MARK FEEHILY DISCUSSES COMING OUT, BEING IN
A BOYBAND
One
year ago this month, Mark Feehily, member of Irish
boyband Westlife, publicly
came out of the closet. In the
Speaking
on what was supposed to be the eve of the band’s first Australian tour – the
tour has just been postponed until 2007 – Feehily said
he didn’t out himself because the tabloids were threatening to do it for him (as
was apparently the case for Stephen Gately from Boyzone, who came out in 1999). He simply felt it was
finally time to do it.
“I
always say I should’ve done it years ago,” Feehily
told Sydney Star
Observer from his home in
“The
band seemed to be going strong and in order for me to be happy and move forward
I just wanted to get it out of the way. And it was the best decision I’ve ever
made in my life by a mile, because it’s just made my life so much
better.”
Most
boybands don’t last long – “technically” they are only
meant to last three or four years, according to Feehily. Yet Westlife are still
hot property seven years after their first hit single, Swear It
Again. They’ve sold more than 35 million albums worldwide and their
seventh record, Face To
Face, shot to number one on the Australian charts earlier this
year.
“Nobody
expected the band to last this long, and I kind of never knew whether or not I
was going to have to face up to it and come out publicly, if I was ever going to
be asked to do that,” he said.
Because
the band’s four members regularly grace the pages of Britain’s
celebrity-obsessed tabloids, when Feehily became
involved in his “first proper relationship” with singer Kevin McDaid, who was in former British boyband V, he realised the time was right to do
it.
“Obviously
when I started going out with Kevin I thought, I don’t want to sneak around, to
go for dinner and be scared someone’s going to see us and put two and two
together.”
The
26-year-old’s friends, family and bandmates had known
he was gay for years and were all supportive. And, to his surprise, after he
went public so were his fans.
“I
didn’t know what to expect from the fans because of the way boybands are designed to appeal. I was bracing myself for
any amount of reactions. But to this day, a year later, I haven’t experienced
even one word of negative response, which is fantastic.”
This
is due partly, he said, because he never tried to use sex appeal to attract
female fans like some boyband members. Instead he
hoped they would just appreciate him for his voice (Feehily is widely regarded as having the strongest voice in
the band).
“I
think Westlife has always been more about the songs
than about having six-packs, because none of us do have six-packs anyway,” he
laughed.
Plus
he made a point of not lying about his sexuality. “Obviously being in a pop band
like this you’re always doing interviews with
newspapers and magazines and it was definitely kind of weird or awkward speaking
about my love life. But I just tried my best to remain as honest as possible
without actually giving away that side of me until I was ready to do
it.”
Since
Feehily came out last year, Lance Bass from NSYNC has followed suit, as has
He
and McDaid are still together and going strong, he
said, but rumours they were planning a civil partnership aren’t true. Not yet
anyway.
“If
I was, the whole world would know because it’s something I’d be celebrating,” he
said. “I wouldn’t be keeping it quiet.”
info
Westlife's
Australian tour has been postponed. For more info see Ticketek.
Credit/Source:
www.ssonet.com.au