B*Witched is still inspiring us with their hit song (Picture: Ray Palmer/Shutterstock)
The shock return of B*Witched has dedicated fans reminiscing about their 90s hit song and even the coordinating dance to varying success.
The beloved Irish girlband are back in business after they unexpectedly dropped a new four-track EP, 26 years after hitting number one in the charts.
Turns out fans are still enamoured with their head-bopping debut single C’est La Vie — and keep injuring themselves while attempting to do the Irish jig it’s famed for.
B*Witched — comprised of Edele and Keavy Lynch, Lindsay Armaou, and Sinéad O’Carroll — have been sent numerous messages over the years from people who have failed at the dance.
Some extreme cases have even resulted in hospital visits, although the girl group themselves have remained unscathed.
‘We’ve been fine actually,’ Edele told The Sun newspaper’s Bizarre column. ‘But I’d say weekly we get a message with somebody who’s hurt themselves trying to do the Irish dance.
C’est La Vie was a huge UK number one hit (Picture: Rachel Joseph/Comic Relief via Getty Images)
‘And it’s like, if you just do it without alcohol, you’ll be fine. One bride, she broke both her ankles on her wedding day trying to do the jig.’
They’ve just announced a new EP called Ripped Jeans and consists of three new songs: So Into You, Multiply and My Greatest Little Mistake.
It also includes the previously released track Birthday, which came out last year to mark their quarter-century anniversary.
Fans were instantly supportive of the comeback, which is hardly surprising considering how often they seem to be listening to C’est La Vie to the point of injury.
B*Witched first formed in Dublin in the late 90s and released their chart-topping debut in 1998, making them the youngest girl group to have a number one in the UK at the time.
‘We were very young,’ Keavy told Bang Showbiz. ‘We hadn’t really had much experience of the industry other than we were only starting. We were hoping for a Top 20.
‘So when it was mid week, we found out that we were number one. And we were like, “Is this a joke?”
‘We never even thought that it might happen. That’s not something we were reaching for or thought that we could attain that, though on the Wednesday, that’s when you did have midweeks on Wednesdays.
‘And it was like a phone number you called. Now, you have the chart position, every minute of every day and it changes leaps around when you look online.’
After storming the charts, they released their debut album which had more popular singles such as Blame It on the Weatherman.
Their second and last album, Awake and Breathe, was released the following year and reached number five in the UK charts. To date the girls have sold more than three million albums worldwide.
The band split not long after in 2002 but regrouped in 2013 on ITV2 reality series The Big Reunion and have been together since.
Part of their success came from having such an iconic 90s look — double denim.
B*Witched were known for their iconic double denim looks (Picture: Lorne Thomson/Redferns)
Sinéad said: ‘For years, we kind of stepped away from the double denim because we were a bit fed up with it. And then you realise over time that if we’re not wearing denim, we might as well not be singing C’est la Vie.
‘It’s like the same impact. There was a moment where we turned up for this gig when we were rebelling against the denim.
‘It seemed everybody in the audience was top to toe in denim. Then somebody told us it was a denim party.
‘We were like, oh, we didn’t get that memo. And they were like, but you are the memo.’
Ahead of the first release since 2014, the icons sat down with Metro.co.uk and reflected on their career.
The band has just announced a comeback EP (Picture: Shutterstock)
Asked what it was like to create music together again, Sinéad said: ‘Do you know what, it was so good. It was really organic how it all happened because we had done two series of a podcast over lockdown because we all missed each other.
‘Then our old producer literally was just listening to the podcast and I think he just missed being the fifth member of B*Witched. He got on the phone and said he’d love to do something.
‘It’s taken a while but I think it’s happened at the right time. The minute we heard Birthday we were just like – please! Please can we have it! It’s perfect, it’s a bit of us from years ago but also trying to bring it into 2023. And we’re here!’
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