Blame me. I mentioned them in passing in my last post and, like a vengeful demon, that is all it takes to summon Westlife…
Mandy, by Westlife (their 12th of fourteen #1s)
1 week, 23rd – 30th November 2003
You might be wondering why I made a fuss about the end of ‘the golden age of boybands’, when Busted are the biggest pop group in the land, and Westlife are still cranking out the number ones. Well, I’ve explained why Busted weren’t actually a boyband, and in this post I’ll explain why Westlife were no longer one either.
Actually, the this cover of Barry Manilow’s 1974 UK #11 (and US #1) hit does the explaining for me. Westlife have renounced the boyband mantle, and any attempts to woo the traditional teenage girl market, and become full-on granny baiters. (Westlife, for all their many musical crimes, were not initially very cover-version heavy. This was only their fourth non-original #1 from twelve.)
And the fact that they are now mining a rich seam of proudly cheesy, easy-listening hits means that this is actually one of their more enjoyable chart-toppers. After the dirges that were ‘Unbreakable’, and ‘Queen of My Heart’, a cover of a Manilow classic is a pleasant surprise. Plus, they’ve added a strangely interesting sitar riff. And a key change, naturally.
Giving up any pretence at being relevant was probably a sensible career move for Westlife, and the run of MOR covers that started with ‘Mandy’ probably extended their chart careers for a good few years (and set them up nicely for a post-chart career touring Asia, where people’s love of a soppy ballad knows no bounds). This was the second single from their fourth studio album, ‘Turnaround’. The lead single – the slightly more contemporary and actually quite upbeat ‘Hey Whatever’ – had done the unthinkable and stalled at #4 in September. Which proves my point about this being the right move for a boyband almost five years into their careers, as back to #1 they went.
A couple of interesting things about ‘Mandy’ before we finish. It was originally written as ‘Brandy’, and had reached #12 in the UK in 1971 for Scott English. Manilow changed the name to avoid confusion with Looking Glass’s big hit ‘Brandy (You’re a Fine Girl)’. And Westlife’s version technically has the biggest climb to #1 in chart history, after a handful of copies were made available a day early by mistake. It had charted at #200 the week before, then rocketed to #1 when properly released. The OCC only acknowledge the Top 100, however, and so it is officially a new entry at number one.
The UK Number Ones Blog 
I’m old enough to know and love the Scott English original, still the greatest version of the song before Manilow watered it down, edited it, and turned it into MOR slush. I’m happy the song got to the top spot in the UK eventually, but this is still essentially Manilow part 2 rather than going back to the way more interesting and emotive original and taking that as the guide. As I said recently, Westlife’s current single is much better than peak ballad era Westlife, it’s one of my top 100 pop singles of 2025 – Chariot is proper Irish upbeat family-referring tour-promoting singalong charm!
I mean, at least it’s upbeat and catchy! Is it just me, or are they upping the Oirish accents on it too?
oh to be sure to be sure, I expect they were going for rootsy home-based charm 🙂 At least no “potatoes!”
Granny baiters is a great description…
Barry Manilow is one of my favourite 70s soft rockers. Him and The Carpenters are my favourite. I always like how Manilow brought some sense of theatricality and Broadway to his songs, even the gloopy ones. He wasn’t glam rock in the slightest, but he felt in part of me a glam rocker who decided to indulge in soft rock. Kinda like how Chic were the rock band of the disco genre. Like, I could see him doing an extremely well-done version of “Two Out of Three Ain’t Bad” by Meat Loaf and nailing the emotion and sentiment behind the song. And come on, “Can’t Smile Without You” is a fantastic song.
As for Westlife, this is an extremely faithful version of the Manilow version, to the point of wondering…why bother? It’s good, but rather pointless, but it’s not bad at all. It’s very listenable and much more tolerable than a lot of their hits. I think if you’ven ever heard Manilow’s version, it’s a perfectly fine substitute.