Where We Are

Photographer: Kevin McDaid.Westlife's ninth album, Where We Are, follows a yearlong sabbatical that the bandmembers took after celebrating their tenth anniversary with the concert video 10 Years of Westlife -- Live at Croke Park Stadium (2008). Where We Are was billed as a slight change in direction by the boy band, whose formula for chart-topping success had become overly predictable in recent years. In search of a fresh approach, they worked with a lot of American songwriters and producers, most notably Ryan Tedder of OneRepublic, who co-wrote and produced two of the album highlights, "Shadows" and "Where We Are." They also worked extensively with the veteran American R&B hitmakers Louis Biancaniello and Sam Watters, who are credited with three songs ("How to Break a Heart," "Leaving," "Sound of a Broken Heart"). Another album highlight, "The Difference," comes courtesy of Anne Preven and Scott Cutler, formerly of the Los Angeles alternative rock band Ednaswap, whose song "Torn"