NKOTBSB Bring Out The Kid In Me
NKOTBSB at Nassau Coliseum photo courtesy of @DonnieWahlberg via twitter
It was an evening full of cheers, squeals and tears. A night where attendees turned back the hands of time and transported themselves back to the 1980s and then fast forwarded to the 1990s as they came face to face with their adolescent crushes and in some cases their first loves, yes I’m talking about the New Kids On The Block/Backstreet Boys tour.
The evening began with an electrifying performance by Matthew Morrison of Glee fame, an incredible singer and dancer in his own right, got the crowd going with cuts from his self-titled solo effort in addition to mash-ups and covers featured on Glee, ”Don’t Stand So Close To Me / Young Girl,” “Gold Digger” and “Sway.” He ended his set with “Don’t Stop Dancing” (from his album) who he dedicated to the “triple threats” who inspired him to sing, dance and act, Gene Kelly, Patrick Swayze and Michael Jackson by incorporating iconic dance moves from each including Swayze’s Dirty Dancing moves and Michael Jackson’s moonwalk.
After a brief intermission the lights were turned down and a white sheet hung over the stage images of each member of the New Kids on The Block and Backstreet Boys were projected on the makeshift screen and with a giant swoop the sheet came down unveiling all 9 members of the super group. Set to Coldplay’s “Viva la Vida” they performed a medley of their hits, NKOTB’s 2008 “Single” and BSB’s 2001’s “The One.”
It was a tag team performance full of explosives, gyrating, falsettos, and the occasional a cappella. After one group got done singing and dancing their chart toppers the lights would turn down and then turned back up revealing the other group as they took the reins. It was a nonstop adrenaline pumping show.
“I know there are two generations in this room” stated NKOTB’s Joey McIntyre to a screeching crowd in between songs, “for us it feels like 1989 and i know for a lot of you it feels like 1999,” he said. “No matter what magical time travel journey you’re on there’s no reason why it needs to stop,” he concluded to deafening cheers.
Prior to the performance, my expectations weren’t very high not because of anything either group had done, but because I thought, I was too old to care anymore. The truth is I had hung up my Backstreet Boys tees a long time ago, and although I had an appreciation for the New Kids, I was too young to enjoy them in their heyday, but the Backstreet Boys were my boy band. Although I swore at the age of 14 that I’d love them forever by age 16, I had moved on and buried my BSB merchandise and paraphernalia along with my childhood in boxes in the attic of my parents’ house. It wasn’t until the images of the guys flashed on a white sheet center stage that my cynicism melted away and my eyes filled with tears. They weren’t the nonsensical, exuberant tears of my youth but instead tears of gratitude and relief that for that brief moment I remembered what it was like to be that happy and worry free. I cried out of excitement but also out of sadness because no matter how hard I tried I could never recapture that innocence and sheer joy that I felt when I popped in a new BSB CD and for the next three hours, I forgot my age and celebrated how happy they made me.
