WESTLIFE - WESTLIFE DEFEND COVER VERSIONS

WESTLIFE DEFEND COVER VERSIONS

Westlife singer Mark Feehily says he's fed up of people criticising his band for doing cover songs.

Mark Feehily says he's fed up of people criticising Westlife for doing cover songs.

The 29-year-old vocalist said he was annoyed his group - who have had 14 number one hits and sold more than 43 million records sold worldwide - were "misunderstood."

The 'Flying Without Wings' vocalist said: "Our record company, they don't want to take risks, so they are happier to do more covers.

"To anyone who criticises what we do, we actually do a lot of original pop songs and a lot of our best songs, a lot of our number one singles are actually original pop songs. "

Although he added: "We definitely did go too far, we did too many covers. That's something we allowed to happen and shouldn't have."

Despite this, Westlife's new single 'What About Now' is actually a cover of a track by Daughtry, an American rock band.

Defending their choice, Mark said: "It's a cover in the way that it's been recorded by another artist but it's not a cover in the way 'Mandy' was, in that it's been a massive hit already."

Westlife's new single 'What About Now' is released today (02.11.09), and their album 'Where We Are' follows later in the month.