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June 6, 2010 Backstreet’s back. Well actually, as the Backstreet Boys’ 2005 album pointed out, they were “Never Gone.” Yes, other boy bands such as ’N Sync, 98 Degrees and - dare we say - O-Town have gone the way of the rotary phone. Meanwhile, scream-worthy dreams such as the Jonas Brothers and Justin Bieber have risen up the pop ranks and locked down the current teen market. That hasn’t kept the 30-something Backstreet Boys - the best-selling boy band of all time - from forging ahead. In fact, despite the departure of Kevin Richardson in 2006, remaining members Howie Dorough, A.J. McLean, Nick Carter and Brian Littrell have no plans of stopping. They do have plans to sing Tuesday at their summer tour’s Bank of America Pavilion stop. “The fans have been loyal to us for many, many years and there’s a future still in the Backstreet Boys,” the 35-year-old Littrell said from his home in Atlanta. “We’re not touring off of nostalgia. We’re touring off of where the Backstreet Boys are headed in the next five, 10 years.” Yeah, so they’re not Boys anymore. Who cares? With 17 years under their belts, more than 100 million albums sold worldwide and a lengthy list of hits to their credit, the Backstreet men can still incite hysteria virtually anywhere they go. In the near future they’ll tour the United States and South America, then host a sold-out fan appreciation cruise in December. Mayhem, anyone? Their seventh and most recent album, 2009’s “This Is Us,” peaked at No. 9 on the Billboard 200. Littrell says the group, which recently parted ways with longtime label Jive, plans to release another album in 2011. “Musically, I’d love to compare the Backstreet Boys to the Eagles in the future,” said Littrell. “Our catalog in the past is just that, it’s a catalog in the past. We’re working on a catalog for the future and a lot of people get stuck in what was, with songs like ‘I Want It That Way,’ ‘Quit Playing Games’ and ‘Backstreet’s Back.’ And that’s part of who we are, but there’s new music to be sung, there’s new music to play, there are new shows and new choreography to do in the future. I don’t want people to just think of what was. I want them to think of what is coming. There’s a lot of music that’s left for us.” So much for hanging up the matching spacesuits. Littrell says the Boys are built to last. “A lot of the boy bands that have been put together in the past were one or two amazingly talented guys,” said Littrell. “You take Justin (Timberlake) or JC (Chasez) out of ’N Sync, and ’N Sync isn’t ’N Sync anymore. When the Backstreet Boys started 17 years ago, we wanted to stick together and we wanted to make a career out of this and be one of those groups that had longevity and got people anxious about their music. Our fans are older now, but hopefully they’re still as anxious about what is to come.
“I mean there’s a gazillion people out there that want us to die and go away. But there are a lot of people out there that want to see us continue, so I think that’s what drives us.”
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