Atomic Kitten

Genre(s) Pop
Years active 1999*–present
* Established 1997
Label(s) Innocent Records (Virgin Records / EMI)
Website AtomicKitten.co.uk
Members
Liz McClarnon (1997-)
Natasha Hamilton (1999-)
Jenny Frost (2001-)
Former members
Heidi Range (1997-1999)
Kerry Katona (1997-2001)

Atomic Kitten are an English girl group from Liverpool composed of Liz "Lil" McClarnon, Natasha "Tash" Hamilton, and Jenny Frost, who replaced original member Kerry Katona in January 2001. Atomic Kitten has sold over 8 million albums and singles around the world. Many of their singles and albums entered the Top 40 charts worldwide such as "Right Now", "Whole Again", "Eternal Flame", "The Tide Is High", and "Ladies Night".

Biography

The group was formed in 1997 by Andy McCluskey of '80s band Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark and included Heidi Range in the original line-up. However Heidi left the group and was only featured on the demo recordings. In 2001 Heidi joined the Sugababes. The group was first called "Honeyhead" but later renamed itself to "Automatic Kittens", the name of the label of its designer, and abbreviated to "Atomic Kitten."

The group's first single "Right Now" debuted in December of 1999 and ended up reaching the British top 10. After the initial success Atomic Kitten made an Asian tour during which it scored their first hit with "Cradle". The album, also titled Right Now, was first released in Japan on March 16, 2000 and subsequently released in the United Kingdom on May 21, 2000 with a slightly modified track list.

Right Now was a modest success upon first release. Initially there were no plans to focus on the global market. The record label was even considering dropping them because of limited success, however they persuaded Innocent Records to record one more single. This one single changed the career of Atomic Kitten because they scored their first number-one hit in the UK in 2001 with "Whole Again". The song and video for "Whole Again" originally featured Kerry Katona however she left the group several days prior to the number-one position because of her pregnancy. The single was remade when Jenny Frost was added to the line-up as Kerry's replacement. The success was such that it was decided to remaster and rerelease the album, which then went to number one on its second appearance on the chart.

The next single "Eternal Flame", a cover version of the 1989 hit by The Bangles, also became a number-one hit.

Second album and independence

Given the success a new album, Feels So Good, was recorded. The songwriting and production agreement with Andy McCluskey was an increasing source of tension within the group and the girls decided to terminate the contract with Andy half way through the recording of the album. Luckily they had the good fortune of getting unexpected support from Kylie Minogue and Susanna Hoffs who both wrote a song for their new album.

The first single of the album was "It's Ok!" and was shot in South Africa. Even though this song performed well in the charts, securing a number three position, it was the next single "The Tide Is High (Get The Feeling)", a remake of the 1965 song by The Paragons (but also made famous by Blondie in 1980), which attained Atomic Kitten its third number-one single.

Natasha announced in April 2002 that she was pregnant, but she had no intention of leaving the group and wanted the scheduled 2002 tour to continue. Natasha also featured in the video "The Tide Is High" and her last duty was the 2002 Party in the Park before finally going on pregnancy leave.

2003 world tour, "Ladies Night"

During January and February of 2003, Atomic Kitten toured around south-east Asia and visited countries like Singapore, Thailand and Korea. Natasha decided to take her newborn baby with her on the tour as well.

The American market had been neglected up to then, therefore on April 2003 an album called Atomic Kitten was released, consisting of tracks from the first two albums. It was promoted by teaming up with Disney for The Lizzie McGuire Movie starring Hilary Duff, however the album only managed to peak at #102 and it was decided to focus on the United Kingdom, Europe and Asia.

A large part of 2003 was spent in the studio recording their third and final studio album Ladies Night. Up to now the girl group mainly relied on songwriters and sometimes co-wrote a song. This time they decided that it was time to be directly involved in the creation of eight of the fifteen songs.

Kool and the Gang asked them to collaborate with them for their Odyssey album because they wanted an updated version of Ladies Night and were looking for a girl group to sing the lyrics. Atomic Kitten liked the idea and inquired whether they could use it for their next album as well which was subsequently named Ladies Night in honor of this collaboration. The album and singles were slightly less successful than the two previous albums.

November and December 2003 were spent on an arena tour in the United Kingdom making Atomic Kitten the second girl group after the Spice Girls to do an arena tour.

No longer a group, but still recording sometimes

Their career was going well, however on January 23, 2004 Natasha decided that she wanted to spend time out of the group and spend more time with her son Josh. The group released a single "Someone Like Me / Right Now 2004" as a goodbye, but was reunited on Valentine's Day to release the charity single "Cradle 2005", a new version of the original on their album Right Now, which charted at No. 10. The proceeds of the single went to World Vision.

Atomic Kitten was featured on the soundtrack of Disney's Mulan II in 2005 which was their third time as a featured artist.

Atomic Kitten recorded a one-off single, "All Together Now (Strong Together)", in association with Goleo VI, the official mascot of the FIFA World Cup 2006. The track is taken from the official Goleo VI World Cup 2006 album and was released on CD and digitally in Germany, where the World Cup was held, on 16 June 2006. However even though the single was listed by the HMV website for release in the UK many weeks prior to the competition, the single was taken off from schedule and deleted from the catalogue, due to the amount of competing football records that were being released at that time. The proceeds of the single went to SOS Children's Villages.

The girls will reunite for a one-off performance of "Whole Again" at a benefit concert for the Michael Shields appeal which will be held at the Liverpool Empire Theatre on December 4, 2006.

They performed as a group in Hong Kong on December, 31st, 2006 for Nokia New Year's Eve.

It was decided on the 2nd of January that Atomic Kitten will release the last track from their Platinum album Ladies Night and have decided it to be Nothing In This World. It will get a release in April of 2007 and will be return with Bratz: the Movie, and the song will call Rehab

Atomic Kitten will duet with new pop singer |Lisa Louise Coleman]]

Solo careers

* Natasha Hamilton is scheduled to release of the single "The Way You Move".
* Liz McClarnon made a reasonable performance from the start and her single "Woman In Love / I Get the Sweetest Feeling" entered the chart at no. 5 and debuted higher than the last three singles of Atomic Kitten. No exact date is known for her next single "Happy" , her solo debut album is scheduled for 2007.

* Jenny Frost only reached no. 47 with her debut solo single "Crash Landing" and will release "Bad Girl", a track originally set for - and recorded by - Lisa Scott-Lee. [citation needed]

Personal life

* Natasha Hamilton has had two children and is scheduled to marry A Footballer this summer.

* Jenny Frost has recently split up with DJ Dom Thrup.

* Liz McClarnon has recently started dated hit40uk producer Dan Cocker.

People

* Jennifer Frost (born 22 February 1978, in Liverpool, United Kingdom), started her musical career in the girl-band Precious and replaced Kerry Katona in 2001. After the split of Atomic Kitten, Jenny has embarked on a solo career and released her first single "Crash Landing" on 10 October 2005.

* Natasha Maria Hamilton (born 17 July 1982, in Liverpool, United Kingdom) joined Atomic Kitten after Heidi Range left the group. In January, 2004, she decided to take a break from Atomic Kitten because she wanted to spend more time with her son Josh. She is currently working on her first solo release "The Way You Move."

* Kerry Jayne Elizabeth Katona (born 6 September 1980, in Warrington, United Kingdom), was one of the original members of Atomic Kitten. Kerry was featured on the original Right Now album in 2000, but left in January 2001 because she had become pregnant. Her place in the group was taken by Jenny Frost.

* Elizabeth Margaret McClarnon (born 10 April 1981, in Liverpool, United Kingdom), was one of the original members of the group. While in the band, she co-wrote many of their songs. Her solo single "Woman In Love" was released on 14 February 2006.

* Andy McCluskey (born 24 June 1959, in Liverpool, United Kingdom), was the lead singer and primary songwriter for the group OMD. In 1997 he founded Atomic Kitten and wrote and produced many of the early songs. In 2002 the girls terminated the songwriting/production agreement with Andy.

Discography

Albums

Date Title UK Chart[16] UK Copies Certification Comments
16 March 2000 Right Now #39 unk Original release
8 June 2001 Right Now #1 ~600,000 2x Platinum Reissued featuring Jenny Frost
9 September 2002 Feels So Good #1 ~1,000,000 [20] 2x Platinum
22 April 2003 Atomic Kitten #102 unk. US only
10 November 2003 Ladies Night #5 ~300,000 Platinum
5 April 2004 Greatest Hits #5 ~100,000 Gold
2 May 2005 The Collection - 83,781 unk. UK only. Charted at #7 in the UK compilation chart
30 August 2005 Access All Areas: Remixed & B-Side - unk. CD + DVD (double layer) (multi-region) released in Asia only

Singles

Date Title United Kingdom Worldwide Certification Comments
# Copies #
From: Right Now
1999 "Right Now" #10 120,000
2000 "See Ya" #6 104,000
2000 "Cradle"
2000 "I Want Your Love" #10 72,000 unk
2000 "Follow Me" #20 44,000
2001 "Whole Again" #1 (4 weeks) 934,600 [17] #8 Platinum
2001 "Eternal Flame" #1 (2 weeks) ~400,000 [17] #12 Gold
2001 "You Are" #31 (NL) NZ, Aus & EU only
From: Feels So Good
2002 "It's OK!" #3 ~200,000 #20 Silver
2002 "Tide Is High (Get The Feeling)" #1 (3 weeks) ~400,000 #6 Gold
2002 "The Last Goodbye/Be With You" #2 210,000 #10
2003 "Love Doesn't Have To Hurt" #4 140,000 #28
From: Ladies Night
2003 "If You Come To Me" #3 180,000 #15
2003 "Ladies Night" #8 150,000 #30
Reissues
2004 "Someone Like Me/Right Now 2004" #8 75,000 #45 Re-issue
2005 "Cradle 2005" #10 32,000 #60 Charity reissue
2006 "All Together Now" #16 (Germany) FIFA World Cup release 2006
2007 "Nothing In The World" #TBA (Germany) Atomic Kitten Re-Release 2007

DVDs

Year Title Certification Comment

2001 So Far So Good Also available as video
2002 Right Here, Right Now
2003 Be with Us Gold 
2004 The Greatest Hits Live at Wembley Arena
2005 Access All Areas: Remixed & B-Side CD + DVD (double layer)

Bibliography

* McLeish, Ian (5 August 2002). Atomic Kitten: So Good, So Far. Carlton Books. 1842226193.
 

  

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