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Millennium Review From Yahoo! Music/SonicNet (Warning... it's negative)
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Date: May 15, 2099 for sending this in. [Note from Caitlin... this is a horrible review. If you would like to give SonicNet and Tim Cavanaugh a little piece of that good old Backstreet Pride then click here to send your opinions about this review via email.] by: Tim Cavanaugh Over the past few days, MTV's "Total Request Live" e-mail ticker requests for the Backstreet Boys' new hit, "I Want It That Way," have contained some sharp rock criticism. "A.J. has such hot moves," writes Beth (OR). "I have loved BSB since the first time I saw them," opines Traci (TX), while Kathie (MS) weighs in with "I love Kevin the best and they kick 'N Sync's Ass!" But along with this fulsome praise, one vaguely sour note was struck by Carmen (N.J.). "Hi Carson! I love you and your show!," Carmen writes excitedly. "So please play the Backstreet Boys''I Want It That Way!' I love that video and the BBoys didn't disappoint their fans this time!" "Disappoint their fans?" Has the globally phenomenal quintet reached a developmental stage at which fan disappointment is even conceivable? Maybe. The BSB fan base possesses a neo-classical perspective with a vanishing point that lies somewhere around age 19, and by that yardstick the Boys might be a bit long in the tooth. Indeed, the band seems to be alluding to these intimations of mortality with the epochal title of their new album, and in particular with the back cover photo, which shows all five boyz dressed in fly/ angelic baggy white suits, photographed from behind and walking toward some vague point of light in the distance. Can a "B-Rok is dead" scam and an ill-advised experimental album be far behind? That would be an unhappy career turn, if it happens. If the Backstreet Boys bring anything to the table of popular music, it's a genetically engineered sense of place, so flawless and uninflected that it makes you wonder what happened to the raw, edgy trailblazing of Menudo. Teen idol musicians tend to be fairly generic and undistinguished, but even in this milieu BSB stands out as more generic and undistinguished than most. That's probably the key to their success. It's also elemental to the fans, who act out the same devotions their mothers and older sisters once performed for NKOTB or Sean Cassidy. Where do they all learn to be fans, in exactly the same way that other teenyboppers were fans before them? The bands you can explain: They're cobbled together by shrewd managers who can read the popular mind like surfers read the waves. But where do the fans learn their moves? More important, why don't adults appreciate the excitement -- this last vestige of pure pop music love, before they move on to become followers of punk, alt.rock and other self-serious art forms, with all the cliquishness, pretension and contempt for outsiders that such fandom entails. If the fans are getting a little more attention in this review than the Backstreet Boys themselves, it's because they deserve it. The band is as lazy as its fans are devoted. For a CD that is essentially critic-proof to begin with (a negative review would have roughly as much fiscal impact as a thumb-down for The Phantom Menace), this one still manages to disappoint. Its synth-string surges and bland guitar licks create a room-temperature sameness in which even the intended hits, like "I Want It That Way" and the in-your-face "Larger Than Life," can't be distinguished from the rest of the pack. You'd be hard pressed to keep the sound of any specific song in your head for more than three seconds. It's also worth noting that, even by teen-idol standards of harmlessness, the Backstreet Boys come off as a fairly G-rated bunch. BSB tries to bring a kind of televised grittiness to their image, what with A.J.'s phat tattoos and the group's rough-and-tumble name (for reasons that are not entirely clear, "back streets" have traditionally been considered more urban and real than "front streets"; in any event, the boys are from Orlando). But until the inevitable addiction narratives and date rape scandals come out to herald the decline of their careers, these fellows can't even muster the disembodied faux-riskiness of Ricky Martin or the New Kids. The closing track -- a song called "The Perfect Fan," which sounds like it should be a come-on to budding stalkers -- is actually a paean to strong families. Yeecchhh! In the vacuum left by such underperforming bandroids, the rabidness of the fans is the only thing you can cling to. These girls deserve a better object for their boundless energies. The Backstreet Boys are no Hanson, and America should be ashamed that it can't give its teenagers something better. Still, the fans do their best, and God bless them for it. Eat 'em up, girls! Someday you'll be embarrassed that you ever listened to the Backstreet Boys. You shouldn't be. [Another note from Caitlin... Are you furious yet? This guy sounds like he's mad at the world and he's taking it out on the BSB and their fans. Email him your opinions about this review by clicking here.]
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