Look out tweens, the boys are back in town
Hundreds of glow sticks lit up the sold-out crowd at Gibson Amphitheatre in Los Angeles on a recent Friday night. Prepubescent girls snapped pictures on their mobile phones and out-screamed each other as younger children were hoisted onto parents' shoulders for better views.
The cheers morphed into hysteria as Big Time Rush emerged.
It has become a familiar scene: five seemingly interchangeable young guys linked by a band name and an ability to dance with military precision, deliver harmonies and exude boy-next-door charm.
Big Time Rush are part of a new boy-band wave building in the US and likely to hit Australia soon. Witness the hysteria over Simon Cowell's creation One Direction, in Sydney this week before heading to Melbourne at the weekend, including a much anticipated Logies performance. Even boy band ''veterans'' are joining the fray, with New Kids on the Block and Backstreet Boys performing in Sydney next month.
Judging from the hype around One Direction, and recent sold-out shows in the US for young groups such as British heart-throbs the Wanted and R&B teen sensations Mindless Behavior, the re-emergence of the boy band has only just begun.
In what seems to be as predictably cyclical as the stock market, bubble-gum bands are back and trying to fill a void left by the maturation of Justin Bieber and other precursors. As always, they're working extra hard in competing with each other to stand out.
Mindless Behavior's Jacob ''Princeton'' Perez says he is aware their popularity could fade as quickly as it arrived. ''In this camp, they really believe in working hard. Our manager always told us to never get comfortable because it can all go away really fast,'' he says. ''A lot of people think it came out of nowhere, but we've been at it for three years.''
Since Big Time Rush were assembled for the Nickelodeon show of the same name in 2009, the band's TV series has become a hit and spawned two albums, blockbuster tours and a slew of made-for-TV films, including the Beatles-themed Big Time Movie, which attracted 13 million viewers when it aired in the US this month, according to Nielsen.
Big Time Rush follow a mould, once perfected by the Monkees, in which a fictional artist-based sitcom extends to profitable tours, music and merchandise. Their current album, Elevate, made its debut at No.12 on the Billboard 200, they have sold more than 3 million digital tracks, and their self-titled TV show, now in its second season, averages a respectable 3.6 million viewers in the US.
The Wanted, managed by the man behind Bieber, Scott Braun, hit No.1 on the iTunes pop chart with their US single Glad You Came. It has now sold more than 1 million copies in the US since its release in October.
BTR member Kendall Schmidt says their latest success proves they're more than a novelty. ''We'd all be lying if we said the first thing we planned to do was sing in a boy band. We all knew we were signing up for an opportunity of a lifetime,'' Schmidt, 21, says. ''We are trying our best to make it our band and not something we signed up for.''
Not all the up-and-coming boy bands are ''Svengalied'', but most are the product of industry masterminds looking to capitalise on the budding hormones of juveniles.
One Direction (ages 18 to 20) were pieced together by Cowell and former Pussycat Dolls frontwoman Nicole Scherzinger after they auditioned as solo singers on the British edition of X Factor in 2010, and then collectively came third.
The group recently wrapped an opening slot for Big Time Rush - often receiving better reviews than the headline act.
They just announced their first US headlining tour and there is buzz that Nickelodeon is in talks to have the group anchor a show similar to Big Time Rush's.
''We all know how hard it is to crack America,'' band member Liam Payne, 18, said before their album Up All Night interrupted Adele's chart-topping US run by knocking her off the No.1 spot (it is only the second disc of 2012 to do so and the first time a British group have made their debut at No.1 in the US). ''When you come over here, you're one of four or five New Kids on the Block out there.''
Mindless Behavior's co-manager, Keisha Gamble of Conjunction Entertainment, and the company's chief executive, Walter Millsap, saw a void in the R&B market after B2K (a disciple of 1980s sensations New Edition) fell out of fashion more than 10 years ago. So along with Vincent Herbert, the head of Streamline Records, they auditioned teens for the new group. ''It had been 10 years since there had been a boy band that catered to the urban community,'' Gamble says. ''Little girls want something to latch on to. There's only been Justin Bieber, so it was perfect timing for something like this to come along.''
Herbert says the goal was to calculate a ''bulletproof'' strategy for the band. Since he has a joint venture with Interscope and clout from signing Lady Gaga, he was able to accelerate them into a deal and secured slots on tours with the Backstreet Boys, Bieber and Janet Jackson. The band's first album, #1 Girl, made its debut at No.2 on Billboard's R&B/hip-hop chart last year.
Last year, the boys quickly amassed more than $US100,000 in merchandise sales on Interscope's online store and were second behind Lady Gaga in terms of sales. ''We took our time thinking about the marketing,'' Herbert says. ''I don't believe in losing. You look at their album and every song is about girls. Girls at 14 and 15 years old are excited about boys.''
Not everyone is buying into the hype. Carson Daly, who was host of MTV's Total Request Live during the boom of boy bands in the late 1990s, is sceptical this new wave of cute groups will rise to the heights of their predecessors. ''We moved further away from the produced pop bands. The Spice Girls, 'N Syncs and Backstreet Boys - that was an era that I think is over.''
Mindless Behavior's co-manager, Keisha Gamble of Conjunction Entertainment, and the company's chief executive, Walter Millsap, saw a void in the R&B market after B2K (a disciple of 1980s sensations New Edition) fell out of fashion more than 10 years ago. So along with Vincent Herbert, the head of Streamline Records, they auditioned teens for the new group. ''It had been 10 years since there had been a boy band that catered to the urban community,'' Gamble says. ''Little girls want something to latch on to. There's only been Justin Bieber, so it was perfect timing for something like this to come along.''
Herbert says the goal was to calculate a ''bulletproof'' strategy for the band. Since he has a joint venture with Interscope and clout from signing Lady Gaga, he was able to accelerate them into a deal and secured slots on tours with the Backstreet Boys, Bieber and Janet Jackson. The band's first album, #1 Girl, made its debut at No.2 on Billboard's R&B/hip-hop chart last year.
Last year, the boys quickly amassed more than $US100,000 in merchandise sales on Interscope's online store and were second behind Lady Gaga in terms of sales. ''We took our time thinking about the marketing,'' Herbert says. ''I don't believe in losing. You look at their album and every song is about girls. Girls at 14 and 15 years old are excited about boys.''
Not everyone is buying into the hype. Carson Daly, who was host of MTV's Total Request Live during the boom of boy bands in the late 1990s, is sceptical this new wave of cute groups will rise to the heights of their predecessors. ''We moved further away from the produced pop bands. The Spice Girls, 'N Syncs and Backstreet Boys - that was an era that I think is over.''
Los Angeles Times
