LOVEABLE trio Atomic Kitten are set to release a song they performed live for the first time in Blackburn!

Their cover of The Bangles' 1980s hit Eternal Flame is due to storm up the charts soon.

Thanks to an illness which beset the band in the months running up to May's Feel the Noise gig at Ewood Park, the first performance live of the new single was in front of 25,000 expectant East Lancashire music lovers.

Liz McFarnon, one of the original members of the group before Kerry Katona left and was replaced by Jenny Frost from Precious, said: "The reaction from the Blackburn crowd was great.

"If ever there was a reason to release a single, it was the response they gave us. We were quite wary about doing a cover because we had to give it our own sound and compete with a standard already set. But we have managed to do it, I think anyway, and it sounds really good."

Atomic Kitten has just entered the history books as the first girl group to spend 20 weeks in the Top 40 with one single - beating the Spice Girls record of 18 weeks for Wannabe - and it has become a worldwide hit.