THERE'S NO DENYING it: at the peak of their career, the Backstreet Boys were the biggest thing in pop music.
In the '90s their pre-packaged beats and harmony-infused hooks were the fun and frothy yang to the dark and brooding yin of alternative rock's primal screams. While following a formula that evolved from the Monkees, they managed to create a rabid worldwide fan base that still enables them to make records and headline tours like the one that brings them to the Halifax Metro Centre on Saturday.
Calling from his home in West Hollywood, A.J. McLean is pumped to talk about the tour despite a recent bout of strep throat — "It's still a little scratchy, but definitely getting through it . . . it's all about ginger tea, ginger shots and vocal rest" — but at the same time he comes across as down-to-earth and sincere as he talks about the group's meteoric rise and the ongoing effort to make music that makes sense to them as they enter their 30s, as well as to fans who are now more concerned with careers and families than MTV and lip gloss.
Certainly when McLean was teamed up with Nick Carter, Howie Dorough, Brian Littrell and Kevin Richardson (who left in 2006 to pursue a career in musical theatre), they didn't have many illusions about pop music success. Maybe there'd be an album and a few hits, but not a 15-plus year run resulting in six albums selling over 100 million copies. "That's just nuts, you kinda have to pinch yourself," McLean says.
"I've been saying this for years, that it still hasn't hit me. Even at the tippy-top of our career, with the Millennium record and Black and Blue, I don't think it hit me that we're the group that we're looked at as.
"We're still just four guys that love to sing and dance, a bunch of dorks from Florida and Kentucky that get to do what we love to do. We're just normal guys, but people put you up on a pedestal . . . and that brings a certain pressure. But we're not perfect and we don't pretend to be perfect."
McLean has joked that if the Backstreet Boys ever collaborated on a book about their experiences, it would rival War and Peace in terms of size, with a litany of Hard Day's Night-style moments where legions of fans kept them barricaded in hotels. "Sometimes it'd be fun, other times it could be scary, or even sad," he recalls.
"We were constantly reminded of how crazy things could be; on the Black and Blue round-the-world trip we were in Rio and we were just doing radio and TV interviews in a hotel, and 48,000 kids showed up. It was a little nutty; that's the sort of thing you'd see happen to Michael Jackson or Madonna. We're just a bunch of good ol' boys from the South.
"We just thought we were making pop music, but something like that is very awe-inspiring and it's a kick in the butt to remind you what you're actually doing."
Such a book would also have to deal with the man responsible for Backstreet Boys, boy band guru Lou Pearlman, recently sentenced to 25 years in prison for a number of failed financial scams. Working with former New Kids on the Block manager Johnny Wright, he put the Florida quintet (as well as *NSync and, to a lesser extent, acts like Aaron Carter and O-Town) into the spotlight, but understandably McLean's feelings about his former manager are bittersweet at best.
"I think everything happens the way it's supposed to, either good, bad or indifferent, but karma is a bitch," he sighs. "We do pay tribute to him for just giving this thing a chance to take off, and we will forever be in his debt for that.
"At the same time, Justin (Timberlake) said it perfectly: what goes around comes around. It's what we expected was going to happen at some point, we just didn't know when. It's unfortunate and sad, but we've managed to come out on top as better businessmen and I hope as better artists."
On their latest album, Unbreakable, Backstreet Boys don't shy away from danceable pop and earnest ballads, but there are also tracks that don't rely as much on big production and show real growth in terms of sound and writing.
Making records now is a big change from what McLean refers to as the "dictatorship" of their early days when everything was planned out for them. But he says he feels the reason the group is still around is because they learned early the importance of fighting for creative control.
"We've definitely earned it, and we've definitely learned a lot from songwriters and producers that we've worked with," he says. "Now we see bands like the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Radiohead take control over their careers and to hell with the record companies, making it all about the music and the creativity.
"I love it, I'm in full support of it, and I think that's why we've been more hands-on with this record than with any previous record, and I can only imagine where we'll be with the one that we'll start making next year. We'll be more in the loop with the sound and the songwriting, and we've often talked about getting to the point where we're doing all the writing ourselves.
"We're not there yet, but we're always learning about the writing process and the production expertise we've been fortunate enough to be involved with."
source GOT BACKSTREET
新好男孩回來了——這幾個不再是“男孩”的流行明星已經成熟。他們之間還有人在經商——總而言之，現在稱呼他們為音樂藝術家更為貼切。
在他們事業最鼎盛的階段，沒有人可以否認新好男孩是流行音樂界最耀眼的明星。
90年代，他們輕快的音樂和完美的合聲和當時盛行的搖滾樂比起來顯得十分明朗。他們借鑒了部分Monkees樂隊風格的同時，又成功地贏得了遍佈全球的狂熱歌迷們的喜愛。正是有了這些堅實歌迷們的支持，現在他們仍然出著專輯，開展引人注目的巡迴演唱會，就像星期六他們將要在哈利法克斯市的Metro Centre舉行的演唱會一樣。
AJ從西好萊塢的家裏打電話過來，他已經迫不及待地講巡演的事了，雖然演出過程中有成員喉嚨發炎了，所以現場聲音聽起來會有一些影響，還好後來總算克服了。這都是中國薑茶的功勞，再加上休息，所以聲音恢復得很好。當談到組合迅速的成名並持續不斷努力做音樂，AJ顯得很謙虛，他真誠的說，在滿30歲以後繼續做音樂對新好男孩們來說是非常有意義的事，對新好歌迷來說也是很有意義的事，歌迷們現在關心的是事業或家庭，而不再是MTV和lip gloss了。
顯然，當AJ和Nick,Howie,Brian還有Kevin（06年離隊追求自己的事業）組成新好男孩的時候，他們並沒有成為流行音樂頂級組合的幻想。也許他們想像會有一張專輯和幾首暢銷的歌曲，但決不會料到會成為今天堅持了15年並出了6張大碟，賣出一億張唱片的新好男孩。“那太刺激了，你會想捏捏自己看這到底是不是真的。”AJ說。
“’然而我並沒有認為這是多了不起的事‘，這麼多年來我一直這樣說。甚至在我們事業最顛鋒的時候，那時我們的兩張專輯Millennium和Black and Blue大賣，但我還是覺得我們並不是被外界宣揚的那般了不起。”
“到今天我們仍然是那四個熱愛唱歌和跳舞的小夥子，幾個來自於佛羅里達和肯塔基的“阿鄉”（原文為dork），我們只是做著自己想做的事。我們只是普普通通的人，但是人們卻把你當成偶像來崇拜，那讓我們很有壓力。我們並不完美也沒有去裝完美來讓人你覺得自己完美。”
AJ開玩笑說，如果讓新好男孩們合作寫一本關於他們經歷的書，那絕對可以和《戰爭與和平》媲美了，他回憶到，（有時）眾多歌迷堵在酒店門口，他們連出門都很困難。有時這很有趣，便很多時候這很恐怖，有時真的是種悲哀。
“我們經常都遇到一些瘋狂的事情，比如在藍與黑世界巡演的時候，我們到了裏約，當時我們只是在酒店做廣播和電視採訪，突然約48000多名歌迷湧了出來。這種事發生在邁克爾.傑克遜或者是麥當娜身上很正常，但對我們來說那真的是太瘋狂了。我們只是幾個普通的來自奧蘭多的男孩。”
“我們時常覺得自己只是簡單地在做流行音樂，不過像這樣瘋狂的事很令人敬畏，像有人踢了你屁股一腳讓我們很深刻的認識到自己到底在做什麼。”
我們先來看看這個——著名男子組合經紀人Lou Pearlman，他因一系列經濟騙局最近被判處25年徒刑。現在新好正在（準備）重新和Johnny Wright合作。Johnny是組合New Kids on the Block的前經紀人。也讓這支佛羅里達五重唱（即新好）引人矚目，（但同時還有超級男孩，從更小範圍來說，還有Aaron Carter和O-Town），真要靜下心來想，AJ更喜歡讓他苦樂參半的前經紀人。
“我覺得事事都是按它所屬的方向發展，可能好，可能壞，也可能不好也不壞，但是命運真不是個東西，“AJ歎息到，”我們的確希望不要再遇到這樣的事，為此我們也願意付出代價。”
“就像Justin唱的那樣：種什麼因，得什麼果。我們期盼的東西總是會發生，但我們卻不知道到底是什麼時候。這很不幸，也很悲傷，幸好我們依著商人的方式成功地做到了男孩組合的最好，我也希望我們是以音樂藝術家的身份受到肯定。”
他們最近的一張專輯——Unbreakable，從風格上，新好男孩們並沒有避開流行舞曲和動人的情歌，但裏面還有歌曲並不是依靠龐大的製作團隊來自我炒作，而是（有些歌曲）真正顯示出他們唱功和創作能力的提高。
現在做專輯比起早期剛出道時有了很大的變化，AJ把早期做專輯比成是“獨裁統治”，那時候每件事公司都已經為他們制定好。他說這麼多年組合依然存在，正是因為他們很早就意識到創造性的爭取有效的控制的重要性。
“無疑，我們學會了把握自己的能力，我們還從合作過的曲作家和製作人那裏學到了很多東西”，AJ說，“現在看到Red Hot Chili Peppers 和Radiohead這些組合自己掌握自己的事業，感覺太棒了，讓唱片公司都見鬼去吧，做音樂就做音樂，只和音樂和創造力有關。”
"這很好，我完全支持他們（指RHCP和Radiohead）的做法。你看，比起以前的專輯我們更親自著手于這張專輯，我想這就是原因。我現在很期待明年我們會和哪些人在什麼地方合作下一張專輯，我們會更注力於唱功和寫歌的環節，我和其他新好男孩們還經常談論什麼時候所有的歌都由我們自己來寫。”
“暫時我們還沒有嘗試一整張專輯的創作都由我們自己來幹。不過我們一直在進步詞曲創作和歌曲製作的專業知識。這很酷，你知道的。”
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