Girls Aloud Ringtones

Girls Aloud were formed on November 30, 2002 in front of millions of viewers on the ITV1 programme Popstars: The Rivals. The concept of the programme was to produce a boyband and a girlband who would be 'rivals' and compete for the Christmas #1 single in 2002. Following the success of Hear'Say (winners of the original Popstars show), several thousand applicants attended auditions across the UK in hopes of being selected for the show. Ten men and ten women were chosen as finalists by judges Pete Waterman, Louis Walsh and Geri Halliwell; however, two finalists were disqualified before the live shows began: Hazel Kaneswaren was found to be too old to participate [4] whilst Nicola Ward refused to sign the contract, claiming the pay the band would go on to receive was too poor. [5] Two new finalists (Kimberley Walsh and Nicola Roberts) were chosen as their replacements.

During October and November, the finalists took to the stage participating in week-by-week live performances every Saturday night (alternating between the girls & boys each week). One contestant was eliminated each week (due to polling the least amount of phone votes) until the final line-ups of the boy band and girl band emerged. The 5 girls who polled enough votes to make it into the band were Cheryl Tweedy, Nadine Coyle, Kimberley Walsh, Nicola Roberts and Sarah Harding. They called themselves Girls Aloud and were managed by Louis Walsh (and Hilary Shaw from 2005). The winning boy band One True Voice were managed by Pete Waterman.

In Christmas 2002 the two bands competed for the symbolic number one position in the Christmas Week UK's singles chart. Girls Aloud won the battle with their single Sound of the Underground (produced by Brian Higgins and Xenomania) which stayed at number one for four weeks. Disney Channel viewers later voted this as best single of 2002-2003 at the Disney Channel Kids Awards. Originally tipped to be more successful than the girls, One True Voice released just two singles and disbanded.

After a hectic start, Girls Aloud took several months to record their album and did not release their second track until May 2003.

They followed their debut single with the number two hit "No Good Advice." This track went on to become one of the biggest of the year and was the first winner of the tongue-in-cheek Popjustice £20 Music Prize. The video, whilst known to have been the girls' least favourite video due to problems in production, was deemed one of the sexiest videos of the year.

Girls Aloud's debut album, Sound Of The Underground, was released in May 2003. It went to #2, behind Justin Timberlake's album Justified. One track, "Girls Allowed", was penned for the girls by ex-Westlife star Bryan McFadden.

Also released in 2003 were the singles "Life Got Cold" (charting at number three), and "Jump" (number two) – a cover of a Pointer Sisters song, which featured on the soundtrack to the 2003 film Love Actually. Both were popular, reaching #3 and #2 respectively, and helped to increase sales of the album, which went platinum after a re-issue at the end of the year.

The new version of Sound Of The Underground included "You Freak Me Out" (which appeared on the soundtrack of Freaky Friday) and also their cover of Girls on Film, originally available as a B-Side on the "Life Got Cold" single. The re-issue also included "Jump". "You Freak Me Out" was scheduled as the final single to be taken from the album and was even performed on CD:UK in early 2004, with presenter Cat Deeley stating it would be the next single. However the plans for this release were scrapped as work began on their sophomore release. ...read more