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To celebrate the release of One Direction’s first album post-Zayn, we take a look at bands that overcame losing members.

One Direction is lucky. Even though Zayn Malik quit the boy band earlier this year, it’s still going strong and celebrating the release of its first post-Zayn record, Made in the A.M., which dropped today (November 13). To commemorate, we take a look at 8 other boy and girl bands that lost members but managed to stay afloat, at least to some extent.

Sugababes

Members lost: 3

These girls should’ve considered changing their name to Bitterbabes. The British girl band was launched in 1998 with 13-14 year old Siobhan Donaghy, Mutya Buena and Keisha Buchanan. In 2000 they released a surprisingly moody and mature record, One Touch, during the promotion of which Donaghy suddenly left, citing in-band bullying and depression as the main reasons. She was quickly replaced by Heidi Range (who already had girl band training in Atomic Kitten), and the band finally became a chart sensation. In 2005, Buena decided to leave the group to raise a daughter and was replaced by Amelle Berrabah. The band’s 2008 album was titled Catfights & Spotlights, making fun of the media’s determination to find drama in the band’s life. Ironically, the very next year the last remaining member of the original line-up, Buchanan, was fired, and her place was taken by Jade Ewan. Soon after, Sugababes took an indefinite hiatus and the original ‘babes formed a new trio, MKS, but it’s yet to gain any major attention from the public. We guess all of these catfights leave no time for the actual music.

Take That

Members lost: 2

It’s not just the girls who can have some grandiose behind-the-scenes drama. Despite having a huge success, Take That’s days in the mid-‘90s were far from pleasant, thanks to the band’s resident bad boy, mister Robbie Williams. His ego and drug problems eventually led to the band’s ultimatum: He either cleans up his act or leaves. Williams chose to leave and quickly became one of the most successful solo performers in the UK, while Take That disbanded a year later…Only to have a glorious comeback a decade later. In 2010, Robbie briefly re-joined the band to record a new album, an EP (which included the X-Men: First Class main theme) and a tour. In 2011 he left again to spend more time with his family and in 2013 Jason Orange also decided to stop taking that. The band continues as a three-piece now but Williams stated that he’d be keen to return at some point. Now’s that’s grown-up talk!

Spice Girls

Members lost: 1

Spice Girls’ debut single “Wannabe” was an instant hit and their career turned into a worldwide high-speed train ride from the get go: albums, tours, a movie, countless advertising gigs. But it’s not easy being the generation’s role models, even if you’re all about girl power. No wonder just two years into their triumph and two albums later, Geri Halliwell decided to call it quits due to exhaustion. The band never truly recovered after losing its own Union Jack-dress-wearing Ginger Spice—the Geri-less album Forever was a failed affair and the band finally said goodbye in 2000. As for Geri, she enjoyed a successful solo career, even though her latest single “Half Of Me “was a tremendous flop (#281 in Australia). Apparently Geri had time to rest since the ‘90s: She joined Spice Girls on several short comebacks, including the performance at the 2012 Summer Olympics closing ceremony.

5ive

Members lost: 1

The spelling of the band’s name is questionable, but their success was not: created by the team responsible for Spice Girls, 5ive were the UK’s version of Backstreet Boys and were popular enough for Queen to let them re-imagine “We Will Rock You.” In 2001 the band seemed to run out of luck, with several members having health issues and ongoing troubles with record companies, which resulted in the decision to split. In a hilarious move, the band tried to re-launch itself as a four-piece in 2006 and once again in 2012 (this time around for The Big Reunion TV show), but neither of the comebacks made any waves. Guess someone should’ve told them that a quartet named 5ive doesn’t make much sense.

The Pussycat Dolls

Members lost: 1

The Pussycat Dolls’ band dynamic was always hard to follow. The Robin Antin-created LA burlesque troupe was turned into a proper band in 2003, and by the time it was ready to loosen up the buttons with their debut record PCD, it had already lost several members. Nicole Scherzinger was put in charge, while the rest of the ensemble was left to do the splits and provide some sensual back-up vocals. The record’s success didn’t convince a red-haired Carmit Bachar to stay (she left in 2008), leaving the band as a five-piece. Unfortunately, the Doll Domination didn’t continue much longer: The in-house fights and Scherzinger’s solo ambitions led to the band’s split in 2010. Robin Antin spent several years developing PCD 2.0 and eventually created a new band GRL, but it didn’t last long either (due to Simone Battle’s tragic suicide last year).

Westlife

Members lost: 1

As the legend has it, almighty Simon Cowell deemed the original line-up of the Irish boy band “too ugly” and convinced their manager to fire three members and find two new better-looking ones. The adjusted band went on to have an immediately successful and long career. Even after Brian McFadden left the band in 2004 to spend more time with his family and launch a solo career, Westlife kept on going strong up until 2011, when they finally decided it was the right time to go: the media obviously found enough “sources” to reveal that the band members were clashing, but it didn’t hurt Westlife’s clean image much.

Danity Kane

Members lost: 3

The 5-piece girl band was created during MTV’s show Making The Band under Diddy’s supervision in 2005. Unfortunately, the ladies took the idea of scripted fights one step too far and brought them to their real lives, which resulted in Diddy firing two members during Making The Band’s finale in 2008. In 2013, four of five members announced they were reuniting, but we should have known better: first, Andrea Fimbers left and then an in-studio fight between Aubrey O’Day and Dawn Richards pretty much buried any chance of happy ending for Danity Kane. The band’s third album was released post-mortem, while O’Day and Shannon Bex launched a new project, an electropop duo Dumblonde, and Dawn Richards continued a solo career. A real missed opportunity for an epic reality show, right?

Destiny’s Child

Members lost: 3

Considering Destiny’s Child was in the making since 1990 and survived multiple name-changes, its “body count” is pretty high. But when we’re talking about the final incarnation of Destiny’s Child, we should consider LaTavia Roberson, LeToya Luckett and Farrah Franklin as official ex-members of the Beyonce-fronted R&B trio. The lawsuits and media battles surprisingly didn’t hurt the band’s popularity. If anything, DC got even stronger after all the line-up drama. No wonder the final line-up proclaimed themselves survivors.

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