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the BOYS are BACK
an insider’s guide to the making of Millennium-and how these five Boys became men in the process.
By: Lori Majewski
When you’ve sold 28 million albums, performed live for more than three million fans, led the current resurgence of pop music, and pried open the formerly nailed-shut door for countless boy bands, what do you do for an encore? For starters, name your new album after the biggest thing to happen in, well, a thousand years: Millennium.
"We set ourselves up for a pretty good sophomore slump," jokes Backstreet Boy Brian Littrell, 24.
On a warm, mid-March day, Brian and his band mates-cousin Kevin Richardson, 27; Nick Carter, 19; Howard "Howie D" Dorough, 25; and Alexander "A.J." Mclean, 21-are lounging in the Orlando Hard Rock Café’s "Lennon Room," a furry-carpeted space set aside for famous visitors. The five seem to be enjoying their final weeks of rest. Soon, Backstreet mania will be in full swing again: They’re off to promote Millennium this spring, and to stage another BSB concert extravaganza internationally this summer.
Truth be told, Backstreet’s barely been away long enough to be considered "back". At the time of this interview, their current single, "All I Have To Give", was still in the Top 10 on Billboard’s Hot 100, and the video is so popular that MTV’s Total Request Live recently forced it into retirement. However, ithas been three long years sinec they recorded their last full album. On the musically mature Millennium, fans willd definitely notice that the competition for young America’s attention-and weekly allowance-is fiercer than ever. Just check out the viewer countdown on Total Request live, with its daily duke-out of teenoriented talent, ranging from 98 degrees, ‘N Sync, and Britney Spears to recent additions Joey McIntyre and Jordan Knight. Are BSB nervous about re-entering the fray? Maybe, but they certainly aren’t letting on.
"We’ve had so much success on the first album, [it] set us apart from everyone else," Brian says confidently. ‘We’re thankful we came first, but everybody that came behind us…we did a lot of opening doors [for them]. I think we’ll continue to do that with this album.
"We were in a great situation," he continues. "As artists, we had time to sit and focus on what got us to where we’re at today, and that’s working hard in the studio and making good songs. It’s not doing a movie together; it’s not doing a pilot for a TV show; it’s not doing all the side things that come along with success," says Brian. "Bring in the millennium. Bring in the Backstreet Boys. How else would you want to bring it in but with a slamming record?"
In May, while Brian was recuperating from heart surgery, his band mates embarked on the new project, splitting up to develop songs on their own with the help of a select group of writers and producers. After what Kevin describes as their "writing trips," the Boys regrouped to select the songs that would make it onto the final cut.
The process was especially meaningful for Kevin, who wrote and even played piano on some songs, including the plaintive "Back to Your Heart," about which he’ll only say, "That song is about somebody." But if he’s not forthcoming about that song, he’s positively garrulous about the album’s attitude-heavy "Don’t Want You Back", which kicks off with the most un-Backstreet of lines: "You hit me faster than a shark attack/You saw my picture on the Backstreet’s Back".
"There’s a genuine fear deep down in all of us," Kevin begins, "of why someone’s talking to you, and why someone’s interested in you. Is it because you’re Kevin or Brian, or is it because you’re in a group called the Backstreet Boys? And not just in dating, but in friendships and in business too."
When they were on the road last year, playing five or six concerts a week, the guys ran into this problem almost daily, according to A.J., who says the hectic lifestyle made him "eat, drink and sleep Backstreet Boys."
"You couldn’t even walk out of your hotel room on a day off and actually not be ‘A.J.’ for the day," he says. "It’s like you’re always in character. You’re always in the public view. God forbid you do anything wrong and somebody sees you. It got tedious."
Tedious, yes, but a learning experience, says Brian: "You have to wake up and realize that you can’t live your life worrying about what everybody thinks, you know?"
,br>After the tour, the quintet began the daunting task of making a record that inevitably would be held up to their incredible pevious sales success. They turned to Swedish songwriter Max Msrtin, who, since he last worked with the Boys, had become the hit-maker with the Midas touch, producing smashes for Robyn, "N Sync, and Britney Spears. "The last album was so huge, so all the songs had to be hits basically, and that’s not easy," says Max, speaking via telephone from Sweden. "The pressure is there; you just can’t touch it. You can’t really talk about it, because that will make them [more] nervous."
In addition, Max would helm the BSB project without his producing partner, Denniz Pop, whose untimely death last year from cancer at age 35 still hangs over both Max and the group. The lingering sadness is captures on the album’s most heartrending ballad, "Show Me the Meaning…", Pop’s final composition. "I personally have strong feelings for [that song]," says Nick wistfully. "Even though it was written before Denniz’s passing, if you really listen to the words, you can picture the way Max Martin is feeling about the loss of one of his best friends." He recalls how, while they were recording it in Sweden, "the vibe was weird. I believe [Denniz] was right there next to us, producing."
Actually, much of Millennium, says Kevin, "is about loss. We’ve had a lot of loss in the last year. Howie lost his sister. Me and Brian lost our grandfather. We lost Denniz. It was a hard time for us mentally and physically. People don’t realize it."
"What’s funny is that it made us mature," continues Howie, ever the optimist, who believes the tragedies have made them better artists. "When you sing, you project, and feelings come out." And Max couldn’t agree more, saying of Millennium, "I’ve never been so happy with an album."
Something that never fails to lift the Boys’ spirits is their fans, who get a big thank-you in the form of Millennium’s energetic "Larger Than Life". "Everytime we’re down/You can make it right/And that makes you larger than life." Borrowed from an old slogan used by the band Kiss, it was suggested by A.J. for the album’a title, but "we thought that might be taken the wrong way-like we’re larger than life. Egos flying!" says A.J.
Look for "Larger" to be a showstopper when they embark on a U.S. tour in September. "We’re going to have the funding to put on the kind of production we’ve always dreamed of," says Kevin. If someone’s never been to a concert before, [it’ll be] something they’ll never forget. If they have, it’ll be the best one yet."
And don’t be surprised if the tour bus has Millennium set on repeat in the CD player. ‘Howie an I were joking yesterday that this is the most I’ve listened to our stuff since the beginning." Says Brian. "It’s stuff we really want to listen to, stuff we have a desire to listen to. It’s a step in the right direction."
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