9 August 1998
Tepid on the heels of ‘All That I Need’, ‘No Matter What’ is another step in Louis Walsh’s succession planning, where late-era Boyzone morph into a proto-Westlife: white suits, cruciform posing, milquetoast R&B-lite ballads superannuated with vaguely Christian spirituality and a climactic key change. And if that isn’t appealing enough, ‘No Matter What’ was written by the dream team of Andrew Lloyd Webber and Jim Steinman. Yes, they’ve joined forces! I can report that this comes from a West End musical called Whistle Down The Wind, not that any of us would ever want to sit through a whole evening of such maudlin mush.
Never fear: our Boyz stamp their own mark on this. Stephen and Ronan plough on with Boyzone’s patented vocal style – not quite cursive singing yet, but filling their mouths with as much breath as possible before quacking out the words through a duck-faced pout. The backing vocals, notionally the other three lads, are just as vaporous and windy as usual. Anyway, next time we have this sort of thing at number one it’ll be with Westlife. Betcha can’t wait!
