Louis Walsh with Simon Cowell in 2004. Photo: WireImage
When the going gets tough, the tough insult Ronan Keating. Such was the Celebrity Big Brother strategy adopted by the acid-tongued pop manager Louis Walsh, who spent his time in an Orwellian candy shack insulting virtually everyone he had ever worked with.
Constantly egged on by his old X Factor best friend Sharon Osbourne (who has now left CBB after a five-night stint as a «boarder»), Walsh was a one-man dirt-throwing machine. In Wednesday night's episode, he described Take That's Mark Owen as «looking old» and questioned why Jason Orange left the venerable boy band. After all, “he didn’t have to do much.”
“What happened to Jason? He was a good guy. He just left,” Louis said while chatting to Osbourne and Love Island’s Akin-Soo. “Poof! I don't know why he left, he just wanted to dance a little.”
He was also thinking about Meghan, Duchess of Sussex. “Does anyone like this girl? Except Harry. Does anyone else like her? She's a bad actress.»
Whatever it is about Megan's performance, you can't question Walsh's ability to stir things up on Celebrity Big Brother. In an otherwise tiresome return to a failed reality show, he was the gossip gift that keeps on coming. His feet were barely under the multi-colored CBB table before he laid down on top of his former Boyzone protégé Ronan Keating.
“He was such a jerk,” he said after Osbourne expressed her love for “Life Is A American Coaster.” «Everyone thinks he's a nice guy, you know what I mean?» He added: “He hasn’t had a hit since I left. He fired me.”
Louis has just started. Although he had some nice things to say about his former pop stars: The Rivals blames Girls Aloud (“Nadine is a good singer,” he said, referring to Nadine Coyle, before admitting he “didn’t always get on” with Cheryl), he had plenty of vitriol towards the tall-haired novelty twins Jedward, whom he championed on X Factor and managed for a time. “They were vile,” he said, adding: “I got £5 million from them. I swear on my mother’s life.”
Jedward responded on Twitter, calling Walsh a «cold-blooded bastard» and saying he didn't send flowers when their mother died. He may well be heartless, but he is by far the juiciest contestant on Celebrity Big Brother 2024. No one familiar with his career should be surprised, then. On The X Factor, Walsh cleverly allowed Simon Cowell to take on the role of the long-haired villain and, by contrast, seemed generally pleasant and supportive.
But he has long had his pitiful sides. Back in 2002 and in Popstars: The Rivals, he was all too happy to take shots at pop stars. In an interview that year, he described Robbie Williams as a «bouncing karaoke singer» and said that Kylie Minogue's success was due to the fact that she had «a huge powerful machine behind her.» He also had strong opinions about his rival, Popstars judge Pete Waterman of Stock Aitken Waterman.
«He's not used to working with good singers,» he said. “This is the man who gave us Jason, Kylie and a bunch of other crap.”
Walsh won a Popstar Award, but his relationship with Girls Aloud quickly soured. Last year he said he was «too busy» to manage them and later said they couldn't stand each other. To be fair, the hostility was mutual. In 2017, Girls Aloud singer Kimberley Walsh claimed that Louis had made unkind remarks about their performances (the group will reunite in May in honor of late member Sarah Harding).
Louis Walsh with Girls Aloud in Happier Times (2002) Photo: Getty
«We were filming a video for Love Machine in 2004,» she said, «and Louis Walsh waltzed in and said to us, 'Oh, none of you are fat anymore.' Great, this is great.”
Walsh has been making music since he was 20. He grew up in Kiltimah in County Mayo, where listening to Radio Luxembourg honed his love of pop music. In 1975 he met a young Dublin singer called Johnny Logan, who was then appearing in a show of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat at Goffs in Kildare. Walsh fought his way into the position of Logan's manager (having been sued by the previous holder of the position).
Logan won the Eurovision Song Contest twice. But despite his success, he considered himself a singer-songwriter and had little interest in the bright future that Walsh had outlined for him. “[What’s Another Year] was number one in 10 countries,” Walsh said. «But even though he won it again in 1987, he didn't want to be the pop star I wanted.»
Louis Walsh in 1988. Photo: Getty
In the early 1990s, he became interested in boy bands, creating Boyzone. The band were initially treated as a joke — their shambolic first appearance on RTÉ's Late Late Show caused instant notoriety. However, no one laughed when, after Take That broke up in 1996 and soon after, East-17 Boyzone became the hottest boy band on the charts.
Then came Westlife and the start of his relationship with Simon Cowell, with whom he subsequently worked as a judge on The X Factor. “Westlife never got the recognition it deserved. They sold 45 million albums,” he told the Sunday Independent. “Simon made a lot of money. It worked because I met Simon Cowell and it changed my whole life.»
Walsh has never had much success at the box office on The X Factor. He didn't immediately thrust himself into the spotlight like Cowell, but instead simply politely encouraged acts under his control. But he may have spotted the potential, nodding via Niall Horan on X Factor when Cheryl rejected the future One Direction member as «too young».
His great talent in those years seemed to disagree with the people behind the scenes. There were the aforementioned rows with Girls Aloud and Jedward. He and Ronan Keating never spoke after Keating decided that he would rather write his own songs (the record-buying public preferred that he not do so). Despite Niall Horan's early support, he also joined One Direction.
“Too much money, too much success, too fast,” he said after the band went on hiatus (he reportedly turned down the opportunity to manage Harry Styles). “Simon created monsters and that’s it. They all think they will become solo stars. They are not. Only Harry. That's all. Then they will regret breaking up and it will be too late because there is another boy group. This is what always happens in boy bands.»
He was right about Harry Styles becoming a star, although the rest of One Direction could argue with his prediction that they would quickly fall back into obscurity. But it's unlikely that Walsh thought too deeply about his comments — he'd be busy looking for the next pop star to insult.
Now, at 71, he's making his mark again. Whatever happens on Celebrity Big Brother (Walsh has expressed concern that he will be voted out next week), the impresario is a major part of the series (relaunched by ITV after being axed by Channel 5 in 2018).
The conclusion for now is that Walsh's true ability probably lies in being a world-class axe. He clearly didn't care what others thought of him. He spent the week on CBB having fun burning bridges — and while he can expect a big reaction when he leaves, what fantastic entertainment it provided. Forget about Love Island, The Masked Singer or Traitors. The reality TV treat we never knew we'd need in 2024 finds Louis Walsh coming at Jedward with all guns blazing.
Свежие комментарии