Their Story

InFOCUS came together in March 2000 when Alan Hendrick and James Feeney were chosen from extensive auditions in Dublin by Harmony Music Management to be the final two members to join a pre-existing group made up of Keith Conroy, Peter O' Shaughnessy and Jamie Mc Daid. The young band started rehearsing and performing together straight away but it would be another few months before they really got off the ground as they awaited Alan and Keith to complete school and college exams. The first gig of InFOCUS was not a very typical one for a pop band venturing out for their first performance as it was at University College Dublin's Rag Week where they performed to an audience of drunken students. The bands second performance was their Manager John Pickering's club 'Flirt' and needless to say it went a lot better and was the first of many great performances for the fledgling band.

InFOCUS's next performance was at a pop showcase called 'Pop Saturday' at the Vicar Street Theatre in Dublin. It was here they began to amass a loyal fan base that would follow them far and wide to their gigs. News spread about the new band and they received an invite to perform at the 'Big BUZZ' Magazine's Showbiz Awards in Belfast. This would be the first of many performances in Northern Ireland for InFOCUS as they performed at every major festival in Belfast over the next few months becoming hugely popular with the local girls and they still visit the city regularly. More Dublin performances followed for InFOCUS as they performed at the three night 'Helen Jordan Stage School Show' at the Olympia Theatre and at Temple Bar Music Centre. The band went on to perform at festivals the length and breadth of Ireland while their fan base spread out of Dublin and became countrywide Any spare time was spent in the recording studio laying down their self-written tracks funded by their festival income. At this time it was very important for InFOCUS to show their critics they could sing live and write and perform their own material (Love You Again, Be An Angel). The style of music the band had adopted was very much uplifting ballads with the emphasis on harmonies (Sweet Diversion, Say Goodbye). The image of the band was very clean cut and they alternated all black and all white costumes for performances.

Around this time, InFOCUS made their TV debut on children's TV show 'Den2' and also their first visit to Britain where they performed to 20,000 in Aberdeen at the 'Chernobyl Remembrance Concert' alongside Louise and Mikey Graham. At the end of the Summer InFOCUS performed at the famous 'Rose of Tralee' Festival alongside Westlife, Sonique and Madasun and they also headlined the Irish 'Nickelodeon Tour'. It was their performances on these shows that led to the band receiving an invite to appear on Nickelodeon TV where they made their UK TV debut the following month. After a few more festival performances and completing their first promotional CD. InFOCUS were asked to perform at POP 2000; the largest pop festival ever in the UK over three days and featuring chart toppers S Club 7, Atomic Kitten and Billie Piper. However just before they headed off on their first UK promotional tour they were waiting to make an appearance on RTE's 'Open House' when news was received that they had been accepted as a support act for top boy band A1 for a number of concerts on their tour. The boys were ecstatic and headed off for their three week tour of the UK, ready to perform next to all the big names. InFOCUS went down a storm at POP 2000 and were televised by Nickelodeon, Disney and Trouble channels over the three-day event. The A1 dates went brilliantly and afterwards InFOCUS were asked to sign to A1's agents Concorde, one of the big UK Artist Agencies that also look after All Saints, Sugababes and many more. The manager of STEPS had spotted InFOCUS on the A1 tour and asked for them to support the Brit award-winning group on the opening night of their 'Steps into Christmas' Tour at Birmingham NEC. It was an amazing opportunity for the band and they went on to support STEPS on a number of other dates including Wembley and all the Irish concerts, earning InFOCUS the honour of being the first ever band to perform on the stage of Belfast's brand new Odyssey Arena. The band enjoyed performing every night to huge crowds and were preparing for a Christmas rest when the opportunity came along for them to support another chart topping band. This time it was 5IVE and InFOCUS backed them up at the end of the year on a number of dates in Ireland and the UK. Since signing to Concorde InFOCUS have returned to the UK regularly for promotional visits performing at Under 18's Clubs and Radio Road Shows.

In early 2001 InFOCUS received a call from RTE, the national television broadcaster of Ireland saying that the band had been selected to perform one of the finalists in Euro-Song on the basis of their previous performances on the station. The song 'Every Kiss Is A Lie' was one of eight that the public had to choose from to represent Ireland in Eurovision. A few weeks later live on the show InFOCUS received the highest number of tele-votes nationwide for their performance of the song. However because of a regionalised voting system that didn't take population variances between areas in to account they were declared second and didn't go forward to Copenhagen. InFOCUS received a lot of national media attention due to the controversy surrounding the result. They still count the song among their favourites and perform it regularly. It was at this time that InFOCUS picked up their first award for 'Best Irish Newcomer in UK Pop' from the 'Irish World' Newspaper. It's the biggest selling Irish paper in the UK and InFOCUS won the award above four other Irish acts that were starting out in the UK.

Next up for InFOCUS was the Irish leg of the Westlife Tour, where they supported the chart topping band for the record breaking 11 nights at the Point Depot, Dublin and their three concerts at the Odyssey, Belfast. The boys found it an invaluable experience as every night they got a great reaction and made new fans, many of who knew them from gigs and television appearances. InFOCUS made their MTV debut around this time when they were interviewed on 'Select' by Natalie Casey and a performance appearance shown as part of the 'MTV Crashes Dublin Weekend'. It was back to the UK then for the boys where they set out on the 'CrazyDance' tour with breakthrough band of 2001 Blue.

Back in Ireland InFOCUS brought traffic to a halt when they performed at the FM104 'Big Day Out' in the centre of Dublin where they debuted their version of Madonna's 'Like a Prayer'. They then set out on the Irish festival circuit performing far and wide around the country, from Donegal to Wexford, from Cork to Derry. Behind the scenes the boys were working on a change of style to give InFOCUS the edge that would move them away from comparisons with other Irish boy bands. They started work with a new producer and the fruits of their labour can be heard in the collaboration's first offering 'Take A Look Back'. The boys also started looking at a styling change and soon were togged out in quite different gear which seems to be going down a bomb with fans on the Smash Hits Summer Pop Tour at Butlins where they perform alongside chart acts Point Break, allSTARS and Girls @ Play. Atomic Kitten and Mis-teeq were on the bill at last year's tour so InFOCUS are hoping for similar success in the near future.