4 December 2014
I often encounter folks who were Westlife and One Direction ultras in their youth, but are any of you HomeTown fans of yore? I must admit, I don’t remember them. Yes, boybands were still a going concern this deep into the ’10s, with later 1D pushing the format towards post-Britrock stylings such as non-matching outfits and at least one of them being seen to strum an acoustic guitar. And of course, by 2014 Ed Sheeran’s earnest folk-pop was in the ascendancy too. But this crowd seem to have passed me by.
HomeTown were Louis Walsh’s latest boyband hustle, moulded on the 1D and Ed templates because there’s nothing Louis likes more than a proven successful formula to latch onto. News articles and press releases of the time—and since Louis is involved I’m having trouble telling which are which—have Louis and the lads posit Olly Murs and McBusted as their peers and (in classic Louis bluster) Ed Sheeran their putative writer: big talk slightly undercut by HomeTown’s next high-profile gig in December 2014 being their role in Aladdin, a Dublin panto that Christmas.
‘Where I Belong’, written by Kodaline, certainly fills the 1D-Ed product brief. Since Louis is the person signing off on this, you can be damn sure it’s bland and risk-free. The video (below) captures the vibe: slo-mo close-ups for the heartfelt opening; waste-ground larks for a bit of journey and “authenticity”; free-house singalong party at the end. Throw in a bit of hurling—where only one of the lads has a hurley—and ‘Where I Belong’ song and video could be a draft Tourism Ireland promo, albeit one with placeholder music until the marketing agency find something a bit more memorable.
For all my snark, though, that all-male ‘authentic’ and ‘heartfelt’ acoustic folk-pop sound is dominating the charts again in 2025. Throw in the hurling here too and you even have Ireland’s number one single as I write this in May 2025, ‘Killeagh’ by Kingfishr. Has HomeTown’s time come again? Will there be a reunion and revival for all you HomeTown fans out there?
