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A Westlife star has admitted to forgetting the words to the group’s brand new single as they sang it live for the very first time on The Late Late Show.
Shane Filan, 46, a founding member of the chart-topping Irish vocal group, admitted to making up words on the spot during the high-profile TV performance.
A founding member of the group in 1998, Shane has been singing alongside Kian Egan, Nicky Byrne, and Mark Feehily for more than 25 years.
However, Mark has been absent from several recent public Westlife shows, with the 45-year-old singer currently on hiatus from the group due to chronic health issues.
During a performance of their new song Chariot, it was the words in Mark’s verse that Shane forgot, leaving him no choice but to improvise for the TV audience.
While those watching didn’t seem to notice the mishap, cheeky host Patrick Kielty just had to mention it during their interview in the aftermath.
Patrick joked that the version of Chariot’s lyrics sung by Shane came as a ‘surprise’, leaving the singer no choice but to admit to the blunder and reveal his attempts to work around it.
‘So it was the world premiere of Chariot – but the second verse, I actually sang the wrong line. I actually made up a line tonight. I’m going to blame Mark on it cuz it’s Mark’s verse, but yeah.’
Calling it a ‘new rendition’, Shane continued: ‘I’m reading through and I’m going, “What’s the line?”, and then it didn’t come to me at all. And I knew it was coming, but it was fun. Sometimes you’ve just got to improvise.’
The line in the single version of the song goes as follows: ‘I don’t want a tearful sombre last goodbye, the memories of my final moment should be golden.’
On Friday night’s show, however, Shane hilariously improvised the following: ‘I’d find the moments at the moments… should be golden.’
Mark was absent from Friday’s live rendition of Chariot as a result of health issues, which he’s been dealing with since 2020, following surgery complications at the time.
The singer required intensive care treatment after developing sepsis, which required even more surgery to save his life – he was unable to see his family due to Covid restrictions in hospitals.
While Mark did leave the hospital briefly in order to join Shane, Kian, and Nicky on their Wildest Dreams tour in 2022, he ended up being readmitted after coming down with pneumonia.
His pneumonia diagnosis then required more surgery to treat, which meant he had to miss out on the rest of Westlife’s live dates for the foreseeable future.
Mark posted a statement on social media, saying he wished things could be ‘different’ after taking the decision to go on a total performance hiatus.
‘It is with the utmost level of regret that I must now temporarily stand down from all Westlife touring until a time that I have had the chance to fully recover from the turbulent journey I have been through as an individual.’
Watch The Late Late Show on RTÉ. 9.35pm, October 31.
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