Are the days numbered for popular boy groups?

Back - Index - Submissions - - What is RSS? Date: Dec 21, 2099 Source: The Providence Journal (Monday, Dec 13, 1999) Submitted By: Nikita8691 Written by Roger Moore They were born in Orlando, boy singing groups formed out of the theme-park talent pool and nutured into stardom by local wizards at the teen music game. With their rise, what used to be called "bubble-gum music" earned a new nickname - "The O-Town Sound". The Backtreet Boys sold out an entire tour - 53 shows, 765,000 tickets worth $30 million - in one day last August. Their CD Millennum sold 500,000 copies in its first day in record stores. The debut CD by Orlando band N'Sync has sold more than 7 million copies. Their music rides high in Top 40 radio and the record charts, concerts grosses and on MTV's Total Request Live. Their rivalry has led to legal battles with their record companies and managers, with figures such as $150 million and $1 billion being kicked around as what is at stake. The Backstreet Boys' record label just signed them to a $60 Million record-contract extension to keep them happy. But come next summer, it could all be over. The Seventeen and Tiger Beat magazine covers, the shrieking legions of fans, the royalty checks, gone before A.J. or J.C. or Howie or Joey can wail, I Want You Back. "I don't think they're going way, but in the next sux months, you'll see them fizzle," said a women who should know, Seventeen magazine's music editor, Heidr Sherman. Sherman said that by summer, "the boys will be out, and the girls will be in," which means good news to Britney, Mandy, PYT and the girl group racing to fill the Spice Void. For N'Sync, Backstreet Boys, 98 Degrees, LFO and other boy-group contenders, "it's been a great teen-pop moment" Sherman said.. "But it can't last forever." "N'sync is cooling off fast, because of lawsuits and everything else [holding up their newest CD]," syndicated music critic Ed Bumgardner said. And Jeremy Helligar, entertainment editor with Teen People adds another nail to the coffin. "After a while..... The audience decides that they've had enough of it," Helligar said. "And kids age out of their love for these boy groups." It's not that the radio programmers and business managers and concert promoters and toy makers and girls' magazine editors and record stores want this to happen. A lot of people are making a lot of money out of this run. "We can't get enough of N'Sync and those other boy groups," Sherman said. "They've done songs that we just can't play too often," said David Isreal, program director of Orlando's 105.1 Fm (WoMX). Backstreet Boy Howie Dorough, in the liner notes to Millennium, predicts that they will "be heard for a thousand years to come, God willing." But the folks in the know, who have watched boy groups and girl groups come and go, say the end is now in sight for Orlando's most famous pre-fab fives. Every Menudo, New Kids on the Block, New Edition or Spice Girls has its moment. And then the moment is gone. "One day, the kids wake up and think that their music's corny and they move on to something else," Helligar said. As comedian Chris Rock put it in one of his many jabs at the pre-fabs in this year's MTV's Video Music Awards, "Didn't you see New Kids on the Block? Don't you know how this movie ends?" Few people understand the fickleness of the young youth market better than Johnny Wright of Wright Entertainment, the man who manages N'Sync and Britney Spears, who used to manage the Backstreet Boys, and before that was the road manager for New Kids on the Block. He well remembers the final days of the New Kids, "when they had become the most hated musical group in America." And he doesn't plan to let that happen again. New Kids' last big hit was, I'll Be Loving You Forever, Wright recalled. "The first song on their next record was a hard hip-hop song, calling a girl a 'dirty dog'. You cannot make a movie like that without losing your audience." Wright uses that New Kids experience to advise his clients. Backstreet Boys broke off with Wright when the group thought he was spending too much time on N'Sync, whom many regard as "Son of backstreet." Wright praises the Boys' efforts to give their sophistication and holds that up as a model for what teen groups such as N'Sync could follow. "If your market range is 12 to 13 years old with your first album, you've got to grow with your audience," Wright said. "Your music has to reflect your growing and their growing. You can't cater to 'a market.' Music has to be a reflection of who you are. Backstreet Boys' music is a reflection of their greater maturity. They're growing up, maybe losing some younger fans but they're capturing an older audience as they do." But that would make the Backstreet Boys the exception to the boy group rule. Generally, when the teen market abandons a group, the bands are all alone....until members try their hands at being solo artists. "It's awfully hard to get a group to age with its audience," Sherman said. Pop music runs in cycles. Rock rules, and then it's the R&B's turn. In the 90's, the angst-ridden metal grunge of Nirvana gave way to the many colors of hip-hop. But when the economy is good and social strife is at a minimum, pop often turns to bubble gum. And times are pretty good right now. How good? "Our marketing people tell us that the average teenager spends $60 a week of her own money," Sherman said. "And she's spending it on CD's, magazines and movies." That's the reason teenage girls have become the dominant music-buying group, according to Soundscan, the music-buying tracking survery. And when girls ages 10 to 17 are driving the music business, "you're going to cater to them," Sherman said. "And if you're going to cater to them, you're going to get together a bunch of cute, young guys....but who cares if Backstreet Boys, N'Sync, 5ive, LFO, all those guys, sound alike? They're cute!" "If the songs are good and your performances are great, there will always be a market for it," Wright said. But Father Time works against that. "Backstreet boys have added a little edge to their music. And I'm convinced that a lot of aduts are buying their CD's. "But - and this isn't good - they're ashamed to admit it, because these are still kids' groups. What happens when the kids grow up?" Comment on this item. Recent Comments Submitted by: johnanz http://imrdsoacha.gov.co/silvitra-120mg-qrms Comment on this item. Next Item: A Not So Serious Look Back At '99: Part I Prev Item: LTL Video Tidbits