At the beginning of the film there's a montage of Jay & Seth smoking weed and goofing off in Seth's apartment set to the song "Backstreet's Back" by the Backstreet Boys. There's a quick throwaway joke about how awesome the Backstreet Boys are. Cut to the end of the movie...Craig, Seth & Jay are in heaven and Craig says you can have anything you want in heaven, all you have to do is wish for it. Seth wishes for a giant blunt, then asks Jay what he wished for. Jay snaps his fingers and "Backstreet's Back" starts playing. The Backstreet Boys then walk out and preform the song, and the movies ends with a giant synchronized dance number to that song with Craig, Seth & Jay dancing with all the angels in heaven.
As it turns out, the behind-the-scenes story of how the filmmakers got the BSB to agree to the scene isn’t much more complicated than that. “Jay has been a huge fan for a long time,” says McLean, who stopped by the EW offices last month with his bandmates to talk about their upcoming US tour and fifth album, In a World Like This. “They reached out to our management. They were done with shooting, but they didn’t have a good enough ending. They were like, ‘We’re screwed if you guys say no.’” So they said yes, dropping by to shoot the whole scene in one day in front of a greenscreen.
According to Dorough, this actually wasn’t the Boys first run-in with This Is the End co-writer, co-director, co-star Rogen. And it may not be the last, either. “We’ve actually created a really interesting relationship with Seth,” Dorough says. “He owes us a favor now. We might see if he’ll either direct our first music video [for the single "In a World Like This"] or cameo.”
Following the example of New Kids on the Block and 98 Degrees, Backstreet Boys will release a new studio album in 2013. "In A World Like This" will be released on July 30, and three days later, the Boys will kick off a North American tour in Chicago.
On Wednesday morning (May 15), the five members of BSB appeared on "Good Morning America" and premiered a new song, "Permanent Stain." The upcoming album's first single, “In a World Like This,” is set to be released on June 25, and is said to be a return to the bombastic hooks of their earlier work.
"We always want to top our previous albums," Nick Carter says in a press statement. "All five of us were determined to create an album where every song could be a single."
Q&A: Backstreet Boys Seek 'Closet Fans' With New Album, Tour
Reunited quintet seize creative control on 'In a World Like This'
For the first time since Kevin Richardson left the Backstreet Boys in 2006, the group has reunited as a full quintet on their new album, In a World Like This, set for release on July 30th. It's a big time for the group, who are celebrating their 20th anniversary with a tour that kicks off stateside on August 2nd in Chicago.
The tour setlists will be full of fan favorites; the group tells Rolling Stone they will play every hit from their last 20 years. However, when it came time to make a new album, the five of them wanted to assert their independence and maturity; they touch on subjects like fatherhood, as four of the band members are parents. The beats and melodies suggest their familiar pop formula in "Show 'Em What You're Made Of" and also borrow from the current dance craze on "In Your Arms."
Members AJ McLean and Howie Dorough were very enthusiastic to talk to Rolling Stone about the trip to London that shaped this record, breaking out old choreography and how A Tribe Called Quest and Metallica helped influence the upcoming BSB documentary.
Talk about the writing process for this album; it was different than previous albums.
AJ McLean: Absolutely. Since we did have complete creative control, we decided to steer this whole ship and this whole process started almost a year ago in London with Martin Terefe. We spent three weeks out there living in a house together, bonding again. Kevin [Richardson] had just come back in the group, so he was kind of reconnecting with everybody and it was an awesome creative process. And we probably wrote about 22 songs; not all of them got cut, but we just kept writing and writing and writing. We had four different writing rooms going every single day, we played a little round-robin and we popped in each room. [We wrote] whatever you were kind of feeling that day or whatever subject matter you wanted to write about. And the whole record just kind of took off from that point and that was the catalyst that led us into making this a very personal record. There were two or three we didn't write; the rest were all written by us with other writers and other producers and we're so excited that we got to have this much creative control.
Howie Dorough: This album Kevin came back in and said, "Twenty years have gone by, our lives have changed and not only our lives, but the lives of the fans have changed. And we have a lot more to talk about: we've grown up, our fans have grown up. Now four of us have kids, four of us are married, Nick [Carter's] engaged, we have a lot more to talk about now." And that's what we did on this record: when it came to writing, we touched on subjects and really not putting any boundaries or limits on where we go with our music. We just really took the challenge, even if just taking a trip all together, the five of us over to London, last July. . . . We hadn't all been living in one situation since 12 years ago, if that. But we had a chance to bond, talk freely and write about things freely. I think it made this album more personal for sure.
How did the interactions change between the five of you after the time apart?
Dorough: When Kevin stepped outside of the group about six years ago, the four of us really had to all step up to the plate if we were gonna continue on. Looking back on it, Kevin was always the ringleader of the group, so when it came time we were gonna do it by ourselves, we all had to work together. It made the four of us really strong so when Kevin came back, we all had a lot more to say. We all got to know not only the business, but we learned how to really put together a great show, just really mature. And so now that Kevin's back in the group, the dynamic is different. Kevin is a hard worker, a perfectionist, but now there are five of us that are that way. And I think now we raise the bar on everything that we do now.
Are there moments you're most proud of from a writing standpoint?
Dorough: When we first went over to London, I didn't really know what to expect because the five of us in one room – last time we did that, we took a trip down to the Bahamas and we did it for the Black and Blue record and it was great. But I was a little skeptical because sometimes when you have a lot of cooks in the kitchen you can almost have too many hands in the pot and a lot of the ideas kind of get stifled and creativity doesn't happen. To my surprise, it came out better than I expected it to be and the reaction we're getting gives me encouragement we're finally becoming a self-contained band.
McLean: "Show 'Em What You're Made Of" is one of my personal favorites, myself and Kevin wrote that record with Morgan [Reid] and Prophet, who are two amazing songwriters and producers. Kevin was like, "Why don't we write something that's about our kids or is a positive reinforcement-type song because there is so much negativity out there and bullying and all this crap that's been going on? The world needs positivity." Not only was it my daughter and his son, but it was all of our kids that were influenced and even other people's kids and just fathers, mothers, people that are the kind of people that encourage you to go out and to show 'em what you're made of, give it your all and the song turned out beyond what I ever expected it to be. It became this huge emotional record and I can't wait for us to perform it live, which we are doing in the new tour.
In the tracks, I heard there was a strong dance feel on a few, but that one had a big rock feel. In general, it felt like a big record. Is that indicative of the whole album?
McLean: Yeah, this whole album goes up and down. There are probably three or four up-tempos and then the rest are like mid-[tempo]. Songs like "Permanent Stain," which go from mid-tempo to tempo back to mid-tempo. The Max song, "In a World Like This," is pretty consistent all the way through. And then "Show 'Em What You're Made Of" is one of those just epic records; it reminds me of a U2 record or an Aerosmith record. It's kind of up there, in my opinion, with the hugeness that was "Incomplete." That was a big rock ballad and this song is pretty much right in that same role. And just to hear it live, just in the past two weeks doing it in our rehearsal, it's such a big record. So hopefully it'll be a single at some point.
Do you see this as an opportunity to reach new audiences?
McLean: I hope so. Obviously if people buy the whole album and they hear it and they hear songs that may not sound like your typical Backstreet record, that may encourage people that were closet fans, that maybe didn't want to admit they were fans or fans that have a husband or a brother or a sister that were like, "Oh, Backstreet Boys suck, but I actually like that song." We definitely geared this record towards the masses and we wanted to make a record that wasn't just typical Backstreet Boys for just our fans, but to reach the outside world and people that aren't fans, people that are potential fans. Obviously we've got an amazing core fan base that have stuck with us for the past 20 years and we're so blessed and so grateful for that. But there are so many other people that we want to touch and hopefully this is the album that does it.
What are some of the BSB favorites you're looking forward to playing live on this tour?
McLean: That was a really tough part and a long process for us to put this whole setlist together because there are so many songs we haven't performed in years – like the last tour, we did a snippet of "We Got It Going On." Now we do the entire song. And we do the original choreography with a little bit of new choreography. We're bringing back old choreography, stuff that people haven't seen in probably 15 years, from the hat routine to the original "As Long As You Love Me" mike routine, stuff like that that is gonna take fans down memory lane and really bring them back to the "Never Gone" tour, the "Backstreet's Back" tour, the first album. Then we have five new songs mixed in there so it does kind of make it like a new experience and the visual aspect of this entire tour is gonna be what's the most alluring because it's just us five; we don't have a band. It's visually the sickest show I've ever seen. All this video content that we have, it's gonna take you on this hour-and-a-half, hour-and-45-minute journey that is gonna be a whirlwind. And we are putting in every single hit we've ever had with a little bit of a twist here and there. I don't want to give too much away, but there are gonna be a couple of surprises, songs people haven't heard in a very long time and are hopefully gonna be ecstatic about.
Dorough: This is our 20 anniversary and all five of us are back together. It's a big reunion record and tour and we're gonna bring people back on a trip down memory lane with all the hits from the past 20 years. It's a great show we've put together; we have some of our original previous choreographers, Fatima Robinson and Rich+Tone, who worked with us in our early years and have gone on to work with other major artists: Madonna, Usher, Black Eyed Peas, Cee Lo. They put together a great show [in which] we're able to do some of our nostalgic dance moves and some of the signature dance moves that our fans recognize.
Can you give us some previews on the visuals?
McLean: Some of it is hard to explain, really; it's a lot of electronica visuals, it's a lot of landscape visuals, but the way that our stage is set up, we have so many LEDs that it looks like a giant movie screen. The whole premise of the show is we wanted to write out a script and make this like a mini-film or like a Broadway show. It's very theatrical; it's unlike any tour we've ever done before and we're taking it back to the grassroots of just being about us and our music. And I think the fans are gonna freaking love it.
Going back to the writing, were there challenges where you were able to surprise yourselves?
Dorough: There's one song that didn't make the album but will probably be on the soundtrack to the documentary that we're making called Home, and we all picked up instruments. I actually picked up the bass guitar and we recorded it with us playing that and it was fun. The early days that we did over in London are some of the memories I'm gonna take with me for a long, long time.
What was the thinking behind the documentary at this point?
Dorough: We've actually talked about doing a documentary for many years. We grew up watching many other great documentaries that were out there and Nick about a year ago saw this one about A Tribe Called Quest; it really inspired him. Then Metallica did a really, really cool documentary as well and we started thinking, "We really have a story to us. A lot of our fans know a lot of it, but a lot of them don't know a lot of the personal stuff in the early days, where we came from, what it's like making a record, the creative part of it, the good and the bad." We're stepping out of the box not being on our label anymore; we're doing it on our own. We have a lot more creative decisions and business that we're doing on this go round. So we really wanted to show our fans and we actually opened up and things I didn't think we would even touch upon, we did.
We were very honest about this documentary and I'm excited. Hopefully we're gonna get it out for the Toronto film festival and Sundance, end of this year and next year, and then hopefully have a small theatrical release and then DVDs and get it out to all of our fans out there. We've got a great director, Stephen Kijak: he did Stones in Exile and won some awards for that. He's got a great team he put together and made it really us for to be natural on camera. And we're documenting everything, it's all coming out.
The Backstreet Boys Finally Make Their Big Return With a New Album and Tour
The Backstreet Boys sure know how to celebrate their 20th anniversary together!
For seven years, Backstreet Boys fans have waited patiently for the group to return… and now for the first time since 2006, the multi-platinum group announced that they're officially back and releasing a new album, In A World Like This, on July 30.
Shortly after the album's debut, Nick Carter, Howie Dorough, Brian Littrell, AJ McLean, and Kevin Richardson will hit the road on a 25-city North American tour. With New Kids on the Block, Boyz II Men, and 98 Degrees heading out on tour together as "The Package," the boy band drama is bound to heat up again. (Although BSB assured us there has never been a beef between all the boys.)
Although let's face it, fans picked a boy band side way back in the '90s and haven't let up since. Hot on the heels of their announcement, BSB fans took to Twitter, mercilessly hashtagging their Twitter posts with #comeseeyourboys.
The boys – who are now grown men in their 30s and 40s — caught up with Yahoo! Music to dish on what they're fans can expect from their new tour and album.
You guys have been together for 20 years – what has that been like?
Howie: A lot of time. No, it's been great! Some moments it has gone by fast and some moments it feels like it has been a really long time. We've known each other more than half of some of the guys' lives.
Kevin: It feels like it's gone by really fast. It is hard to believe.
Brian: It feels like 40.
Kevin: I was 21 when I hooked up with these guys and I am 41 now.
Howie: We've been a part of all of these chapters of our lives and it is cool. All of us were in this group when we first started in our 20s. Those first 10, especially to me personally, are some of the best memories. I don’t know how I could top those but we actually are topping those in different ways. We're getting older and we're sharing different experiences now with each other— the fact that each of us is now blessed with families. For the rest of our lives, I don't think we'll be able to not think about each other. We've impacted each other so much like that.
You guys seem pretty close…
Brian: Oh yeah, really tight.
Kevin: We have our moments where we are really close and communicating really good and we have our moments where we all need to get away from each other and are like, 'Get outta my face.' [We're] like siblings. It's more like a family.
What was the inspiration behind your new album, In A World Like This?
Kevin: To make music that we were connected to lyrically, and to come up with something sound-wise that we really haven't done before. Hopefully we'll bring our fans along with us and maybe gain some new fans.
AJ: Just life inspiration. There are a couple songs that were inspired by all of the bullying that has been going on. There is a song that Kevin and I wrote that all of our kids inspired us to write. You know, it is just a very personal album for all of us.
Howie: This is the first album that we've done completely on our own. We are without a label. Jive [Records] has always been really great to us, but it is also nice to be in the driver's seat. We really have 100 percent of our input in this album.
How did the split with the label come about?
Nick: The contract just ran out. It was a seven-album deal.
Brian: It really worked out!
What can we expect from the new tour?
Kevin: Twenty years of music.
Nick: All of our hits and five or six new songs. We are gonna dance again. We're pushing ourselves in rehearsals. We want to put on a show that fans who've seen us in the past remember and relate to. And we're suffering from it in rehearsals.
Brian: Lots of Epsom salt.
Nick: We want to look tight. It's almost like we're back in the beginning in some ways. We brought our amazing choreographers in. We have Rich + Tone and Fatima [Robinson] and they're putting together an amazing show… they're taking all of their experience and we're taking all of our experience and we're putting it all into one massive show that hopefully is going to be one to remember for everyone.
Who takes the longest to learn the steps?
Howie: I'll be it.
Kevin: I am probably behind him. I have a point that I reach during the day with new choreography that I just can't retain any more and I need to sleep on it. Then the next day, it is in my body. But once I get it, I'll freak it.
Howie: For me, I'll get it, but I just have too many other things going on in my brain. I'll totally mess up on a dance move that I have no reason to have mess up on. Sometimes my head will just be somewhere else, thinking about, 'What bills haven't been paid yet for the group? How are we gonna pay for this?' Business-wise, I just can't stop the brain from going there. As I've gotten older, unfortunately, that side of my brain is working at another level.
Take an Exclusive Trip Down Memory Lane With the Backstreet Boys
They really mean it this time. Backstreet's back, alright?
After decades of churning out chart-toppers and wooing girls with their slick moves and snappy jams, the Backstreet Boys — Nick Carter, AJ McLean, Howie Dorough, Brian Littrell, and Kevin Richardson — are officially back and kicking off their 20th anniversary with a new album, "In a World Like This."
The album, which hits shelves July 30, will also mark the start of their North American tour beginning three days later in Chicago. This will be the first time all five members have hit the stage as a group since 2006, and their twitter hashtag #comeseeyourboys already has fans drooling.
While the boys say their admirers — formerly teenage girls, now grown women — can expect plenty of classic BSB moments, don't expect them to hit the stage with baggy jeans and bowl haircuts. Their vibe is a little more — dare we say it? — manly.
They are all married with children, with the exception of Carter, 33, who got engaged in February. In an exclusive interview with omg!, the multi-platinum pop group shared how they've grown up together over the past 20 years and dished on everything from their signature dance moves to why they sported all those baggy clothes.
"We've known each other more than half of some of the guy's lives," Dorough, 39, shared. "In our 20s, those first 10 years are some of the best memories. I don’t know how I could top those, but we actually are topping those in different ways. We're getting older and we're sharing different experiences now with each other."
Join us on a trip down memory lane with our special "Then and Now" Q&A with the Backstreet Boys.
Then: Your style could be described as ___.
Brian: It was like hip-hop? Urban baggy?
Nick: We definitely went through a lot of wardrobe transitions through our career.
AJ: Lots of baggy, baggy stuff. We thought we were Kris Kross.
Kevin: That was what was in back then. That's what we liked. We were kinda athletic. We wore a lot of jerseys.
Now: Your style could be described as ___.
Kevin: Refined.
AJ: A little more couture.
Brian: European? European cut suits? Like "Mission Impossible."
Nick: Refined. More modern and sleek.
Then: Your signature dance move was?
All: Backstreet's back [hands].
Now: Your signature dance move is?
Kevin: Our signature dance move is this (stands up and starts snapping doing the step and touch.). Step, touch. Step, touch.
Brian: Noooooo.
AJ: Step touch, step touch and maybe a ball change.
Brian: Sit down on some stools!
The amount of hair products you used then versus now?
AJ: I've been losing my hair for the better part of 10 years, especially in the beginning, and now I finally have some. So I am using more products now than then.
Howie: I used to have longer hair so I used a lot more back then. I spent a long time preparing my presence in the past. Now it is like, less time. I don't use a flatiron.
Nick: The same. I always had long hair. But you didn't have long hair all the time, Howie. You went through Caesar cut and then you went to the Steve Perry look.
Then: Your tour must have item was ___ ?
Brian: This was before the time of the Internet and computers.
Kevin: We had weights and stuff. We had a basketball goal.
Nick: That was the best. That was important.
Brian: We had a ping pong table.
AJ: We had a pool table once. Lots of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches in our dressing room all the time.
Now: Your tour must have item is ___ ?
Kevin: Chiropractor. (Laughs)
Howie: Wine.
AJ: Masseuse.
Nick: Alcohol, chiropractor. Vitamins. We tried juicing on this last tour. It was good for us.
Brian: Advil. Food processor.
Then: Your fans threw ____ on the stage?
Kevin: Stuffed animals.
AJ and Nick: Panties, bras.
Howie: Jewelry.
Now: Your fans throw ____ on the stage?
Brian: Now they throw Depends!
Nick: They actually don't.
Then: Your fans were __?
AJ: Young!
Kevin: They were junior high, high school, some college.
Now: Your fans are ___?
AJ: Now it is like a night out with your girlfriends to come and see us. They'll rent a limo and have a couple cocktails and have a nice night and kick back.
Kevin: Now some of them are mothers and career women.
Nick: Now they're crazier! If they're still outside the hotel, they're crazier than they were before.
Then: When you were on your tour bus, you did ____ ?
Brian: We used to play video games!
Nick: Lots and lots of video games. We still play video games.
Now: When you were on your tour bus, you ____ ?
Kevin: Now it is going to be feeding bottles. My wife is expecting another baby.
Howie: We used to drink and now the bottle service is going to the kids. We used to order bottle service at the club, now it is just baby bottle service.
Kevin: That needs to be a song lyric. Seriously. [starts rapping] 'Used to get bottle service at the club, now we give it to the bub.'
Then: What was the biggest highlight of the '90s?
AJ: Probably getting signed was the first big highlight. Then "Millennium."
Brian: Our first gold record.
Nick: Does it have to pertain to us? Because Bill Clinton's cigar was a big one.
Kevin: I did not have sexual relations with that woman.
One last burning question: Is the Boy Band beef true?
Nick: We actually did a song with Boyz II Men and we never released it.
ALL: No, that's not true!
Backstreet Boys Welcome 'Backstreet's Back' Puns In Wake Of Reunion
Fivesome talk to MTV News about their upcoming album In a World Like This, and why nothing's really changed after 20 years.
If you've been seeing a lot "Backstreet's back" puns lately, it's for a good reason. All five Backstreet Boys are together again, about to launch the latest phase in their two-decade long career.
And no, they aren't tired of that joke being made in the wake of their reunion with Kevin Richardson. "We're playing it up now," Brian Littrell told MTV News. "It's like we manifestoed it when we created that song," Richardson added, referring to their 1998 hit, "Everybody (Backstreet's Back)."
"I wanted to create with them again," Richardson added about rejoining the group last year after a six-year hiatus. "I stepped away and we kept in communication. And I gave them my blessing and they gave me their blessing and it was all good."
The guys will release their Max Martin-produced "In a World Like This" on June 25. Working with the super producer was a full-circle moment for fivesome, as he helped shape their careers, producing some of their biggest hits including "I Want It That Way," "Shape of My Heart" and "The Call."
"It's definitely a symbiotic relationship that we share," Nick Carter said of working with Martin again. "Like Kevin said, we've changed each other's lives. Everything seems right now. It just seems like the right fit. The right time for him because he's a really busy man, but what we created together from our hits... they're kind of like masterpieces in his mind. So he wanted to live up to that in a certain way. So that's why it took this long to maybe come back around. It was just the right time for both of us."
In a World Like This also happens to be the name of their upcoming summer album and tour, which kicks off in August with Pauly D and Jesse McCartney. So, what does that phrase mean to the guys?
"I think 'In a World Like This,' both in a pop world that we've been living in for the past 20 years, and just the world that we live in with all the different things, positive things [and] negative things going on in this entire world," A.J. McLean said. "We're still here 20 years later, living in this world that we've created. And I think it's positive actually. It does kind of sound a little dark, but I think it's positive."
Backstreet Boys Warn Fans: Expect Lots Of 'Testosterone' On Summer Tour
BSB open up to MTV News about making a set list from 20 years of hits, plus their thoughts on tourmates Pauly D and Jesse McCartney.
What do you get when you take the Backstreet Boys, and then toss in Jesse McCartney and DJ Pauly D for good measure? "A lot of testosterone," according to BSB's Howie Dorough.
The boy band recently dished to MTV News about their upcoming summer tour, and told us that while they certainly aren't newbies when it comes to the road, their experience means they feel ready for anything. In 2011 and 2012, they went on massive tours with New Kids on the Block, and those jaunts were something like a traveling pop wolf pack.
"We just finished a tour with nine of us," A.J. McLean said of the NKTOTBSB run, adding that for the new tour, Pauly D being on the lineup ensures there will be "lots of fist pumping going on."
The In a World Like This Tour celebrates the boy band's 20-year anniversary and kicks off August 2 in Chicago. It will cross North America for five weeks before wrapping up September 8 in San Francisco.
"We're excited [because] we actually worked with Jesse before," Nick Carter said of McCartney, who opened for the guys on their Never Gone Tour in 2005. "We had a great time with him and, obviously, the relationship has stood."
"And Pauly D has a great fanbase. Now it'll be Double Ds, between me and him, on the road," Howie D joked.
Just days before the tour kicks off on July 30, the band will release their album, In a World Like This. (Their upcoming single, which shares its title with the tour and LP, drops on June 25.) The fivesome admitted that whittling down two decades of music, while still incorporating new tracks, is proving to be a challenge.
"The thing about the tour is we have 20 years' worth of music to celebrate with our fans, so that's going to be cool," said Kevin Richardson, who returned to the group last year. "But we also have an album that we're very proud of, [and] we want to share some of that new music with them live, so we're going to have a combo of both. And we're going to be bringing back some of the old moves."
Backstreet may have also worked out a system to guarantee everyone goes home happy each night.
"What we're thinking about doing — Howie brought up a great idea — is like almost having a wild-card song," Richardson explained. "So every night, every show, we'll maybe have a list to choose from. And I don't know how [the fans] can do this, maybe they can tweet it. It would be almost like 'Wheel of Fortune' or you spin the wheel [to choose a song]. Every night, it kind of rotates 'cause inevitably we're going to leave out something the fans want to hear. But every night they'll have a shot to hear [it]."
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| 2001 What's Going On? recording |
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| 2001 What's Going On? videoshoot |
