B*Witched band member Keavy Lynch on the band's difficult reunion, and their NZ tour

Edele confronts on the girls on the pressures of being a lead singer. Photo / itv YouTube

They were Ireland's answer to the Spice Girls.

In the late '90s, as girl bands popped up around the world thanks in part to the surge of "Girl Power", few managed to make the big league (anyone remember Girl Thing?).

But on May 25, 1998, a group of four, quirky looking girls dressed in double denim with an Irish jig that could rival Riverdance, released their debut single, C'est la Vie - and for four years, the world was their Irish oyster.

Two albums. Eight singles. Four number ones. Three million albums sold worldwide. Appearances on daytime TV. The youngest girl group ever to have a number one in the UK. Global domination, in other words.

"It took us by surprise," band member Keavy Lynch told news.com.au.

"We were just four girls with a little dream in Ireland and suddenly it was like, 'This is actually happening'."

They rubbed shoulders with the pop elite. All Saints. Spice Girls. 5ive. S Club 7. Steps. Atomic Kitten. And while it all looked like happy sailing on the outside, on the inside, trouble was brewing in pop paradise. And soon, the pop empire the girls built would come crumbling and crashing down.

The girls had originally formed as an all-singing, all-dancing foursome in 1996, but when they were signed to Sony Music in 1997, the direction of the group began to change.

"It's funny, we started out all of us singing more, but when record company management got involved it kind of started going a different way and Edele (Lynch) was pushed out front," Keavy explained.

"That didn't make the rest of us feel very good."

With Edele becoming the face and lead singer of the band, it left identical twin sister, Keavy, along with band mates Sinead O'Carroll and Lindsay Armaou, in the background.

Feeling isolated, unpopular and untalented, the three back up singers plodded along, as Edele took the reigns, and the spotlight.

"Back then, it was literally every day, every hour that you were awake was all about the band," Keavy said.

"Back in the day there was no room for that (jealousy), we were bubblegum pop and we were happy, happy, happy. There was no room for one of us to have a bad day or be grumpy with each other, that just wasn't allowed back then."

But the comedown was coming.

By 2002, the girls were working on a third album. Their lead single had been chosen, but while en route to Africa, the girls received a shock call from their manager.

Sony had dropped them. Their management was dropping them. In the music scene, B*Witched were considered a done deal. Over and out.

"Something went wrong, somebody ripped it from under our feet, we were very lost," Keavy said.

"It was very shocking and a lot went with that."

For 11 years, the girls faded from music. Devastated and distraught, left to pick up the pieces of their lives without the safety of a music label, or a security team.

Keavy, in particular, felt the full force of the blow.

"It was hard, I think maybe I found it harder than the girls," she said.

"I was a relatively quiet person, I was a yes person, and that really took its toll in that type of industry. I ended up feeling very lost about who I was. I was exhausted and it was just really, really tough.

"For a few years outside the band I was like, 'What is going on, what do I want to do with myself?'

In a 2013 documentary she said: "I just became Keavy from B*Witched and when that was snatched off me, I was like, 'Who am I?'"

"I guess I was a ticking bomb, and the bomb exploded. I was a twin in the band and living in my twin's shadow."

But in 2012, the band were offered an opportunity to return to the limelight.

UK documentary series The Big Reunion reunited bands from the 1990s; B*witched joined the likes of Liberty X, 5ive, The Honeyz and Atomic Kitten as they attempted to heal wounds and claw their way back into the industry.

"It took a while to convince us to do it all again but when we said yes we went on the journey of putting ourselves back together," Keavy told news.com.au.

B*Witched's reunion was nothing short of ... uncomfortable. Awkward. Car-crash television at its best, as the three "back ups" took on Edele and their feelings at being discarded by "the machine".

"I would be afraid that it would get too intense again. I think I just lost who I was, I didn't know who I was," Sinead told Edele during the reunion.

"I felt lonely a lot of the time. You guys understood each other, but no one understood me," Edele replied.

"It made me feel quite lonely at times."

"The first meeting, I think that was surprising for everyone. Everyone was expecting ours to go by with a breeze, there was a breeze but it was quite a chilly one," Keavy laughs in hindsight.

"It was a bit of a shock for everyone, but you know, it was very different to anything we'd done before. The reality side of TV wasn't around back in our day so the Big Reunion was the very first experience we had of that.

"It was really strange. We had no idea what questions were going to be asked, we didn't know how it was going to feel sat together in a room after such a long time.

"It had been a good eight years since we'd all been together. It was really intense, emotions were high. Some of it was great. some of it wasn't."

"I think in some way it was quite therapeutic for it to happen as a group that we did that in the end, cause we were able to move past it all and be different this time around and be solid again."

Happier times? Photo / News Corp Australia

The band figured out their differences, and since, have been a strong foursome. The reunion went so well, they've decided to stick around.

"It was only supposed to be for one night only but that went so well, it turned into a nationwide tour. We did two sold out arena tours in the UK in one year," Keavy said.

"It was phenomenal, to take about 12 years off and then come back and do that straight away, we couldn't have asked for anything better.

"This time around when we came back we said it needs to be different. No one wants to come back and feel like they're stood in the background and not getting to actually do what we all love to do which is sing, we managed to make it work where we all share it out this time."

And after 18 long years, Australian fans will finally get their first glimpse of the girls in action, joining Atomic Kitten, S Club 3 (!?) and Liberty X in a "live concert spectacular" which comes to New Zealand on February 3 and 4.

"It's amazing, it really is an absolute dream, I can't believe we get to do it all again, 18 years later. We're so, so lucky," Keavy said.

"It's a bit different now, we're not striving for that next number one or to be at the top of the charts again. Actually, there's real relief in that, when you take off the pressure."

B*Witched will play Auckland's ASB Theatre with Atomic Kitten, S Club 3 and Liberty X on February 3 and 4.