Talking to the Backstreet Boys about then and now! The interview of my dreams!!

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♫ There ain't no place, ain't no place like you ♫
Action!
We can count and clap.
At the same time!
So talented.
Hey guys, it's Chika!
You'll never guess who's on the channel today!
Although, they're right here
so you can see them...
It's the Backstreet Boys!
I have been the biggest fan for the longest time.
Everyone! You guys all know that!
I never would have thought
that this day would come.
...Am I dreaming?
Ah thank you.
It's good to see you!
Can somebody pinch me?
Okay, yeah.
It's real. They're here.
The Backstreet Boys are here in Japan right now
and they're promoting their new album
that's coming out called DNA.
I did a video a little while ago
sharing with you guys
what the lyrics mean in the video.
So I hope you guys got to see that
and now we're gonna do an interview.
Cool.
Okay, let me breathe...
You got this, you got this!
I'll give you guys some room.
I'll move over here.
So you guys can squeeze in.
I've got a million subscribers
on my YouTube channel.
A lot of them are huge fans of you guys.
Everyone knows who the BSB are
and your songs.
But I have a feeling that
some of them may not know
each Backstreet Boy as much as they should.
So I thought we could start off the video
with an introduction,
but rather than introducing yourselves,
I thought you could introduce one another.
So for example,
if Howie could introduce Brian.
Let us know what kind of personality he has
and what his role is in the group.
Well, we've lasted this long.
We're getting to know how
we think of each other.
This is Brian-san, ladies and gentlemen.
He is the a...
Like I always say
he is like the boy next door
in the group.
He's like the all-american...
He's definitely not the boy next door
in my neighborhood.
He is great at sports.
He brings lot of comedy with his personality
and his energy.
At the event last night,
you were goofing off the whole time.
Oh, yeah! I like to have fun!
He's got a lot of spunk.
This is like a dating profile!
I want to do Kevin.
Kevin is...
we like to call him the older brother.
He analyzes a lot of things.
He is highly intellectual, very sensitive
which people might not necessarily know.
He is very sensitive.
He's our big brother.
and he cares about everything
that happens in our career and our lives.
That was a good one, Nick.
I'm gonna do AJ's.
Oh boy. Here we go.
My dating profile.
This is A.J.-san.
He probably has the biggest heart
out of any Backstreet Boy that sits here.
I would say that.
The other three are like "...What?"
Well, you know... they're heartless lol
He loves life.
I'm gonna go out there and reach out
and say that he is
somewhat addicted to this lifestyle.
I think in a good way.
He thirsts on being an entertainer.
He thirsts on being a character,
being AJ from the Backstreet Boys.
He's a great singer and great performer as well.
We used to know A.J. as the rebel.
Is that still there?
Not as much anymore.
It's kind of more of a myth
It's a myth lol
There's a great mystery!
Rebel in disguise.
I think I'm gonna do Howie's.
Okay. Perfect.
Howie is...
I would also say has a very big heart
and this is gonna come out wrong
but he also has a very big stomach.
He is a foodie. He likes to eat.
He likes to try different food
from different countries.
He is probably the most daring
when it comes to trying new things.
like he's had scorpion before...
all that kind of stuff.
...which I will never do but
hats off to you.
New food that you found in Japan on this trip yet?
Last night,
I think we had one of my ultimate favorite dinners.
Kevin and I had a chance to go out
with some of the great people
from the label here that work at Sony.
They took us out to eat some Shabu Shabu
and Sukiyaki.
Kevin and I were in heaven.
With enough sake we were on cloud number nine.
Howie also is a very very good family man,
father, and husband.
He loves to perform as well.
He's got an amazing voice.
I'm super envious of how high his voice is.
I have no falsetto.
Mine comes out, sounds like four voices.
Howie is truly truly sweet D.
He is one of the sweetest people
you'll ever ever ever meet.
and I've known him for probably the longest.
Almost 30 years.
Is he the original Backstreet Boy?
That would be me.
Oh that's you.
But I'm the OG
He's the second original.
Are you done?
I'm the last.
Are you finished?
I'm gonna do Nick's.
Nick is also very intellectual.
He is a thinker. He is very creative.
He loves to create all the time.
His mind is always thinking about creative things.
What was the most recent thing you created
besides the album and the songs?
and his son?
Back home, I've been painting a little bit.
He is a good artist.
You know, it's funny because
I don't believe I'm a good artist at all.
But that's not what it's about.
It's about that moment of trying something
and if it looks good or if it sounds good.
That's what art is all about.
It's not about what other people think.
It's about how you feel when you're doing it.
Subjective.
Exactly.
Then a lot of times, people are like,
"Oh I actually like your painting!"
I'm like" Really? "
We are all extremely creative.
That's why we're in the Backstreet Boys
and why we work together.
Because when we're together,
we create this force
that we can bounce things off
one another and we help each other.
We are each other's ying and yang.
He is very spontaneous on stage.
He is fearless on stage.
He's got a great voice,
He has relative pitch.
It's in my DNA.
It's in his DNA.
It really is.
He is a great dad and a great husband
and I love him.
Thanks, Dawg.
We can stay together for another 25 more years.
Yeah, it was good!
Could have gone south.
It could have went bad.
It's like renewing your vows kind of.
We're married essentially.
This was my first wives...
all of these guys.
You've been together 25 years and
it's just incredible that you are nominated
for a Grammy for "Don't Go Breaking My Heart".
How does that feel?
It was a lovely surprise.
It's our 8th nomination.
Yeah, we were woken up early in the morning
on our cell phones to emails and text messages
from friends and family like,
"Oh we saw the announcement! Congratulations."
We were blessed with an amazing song
from Stuart Crichton.
He's a Scottish guy that
grew up listening to our music as well
was a fan of the BSB
and was kind of inspired by our Vegas show
and went back in the lab
and specifically wrote "Don't Go Breaking My Heart"
for what he felt like the BSB needed to be
in 2018 and 19.
We unanimously chose that song
as the first single,
which doesn't normally happen all the time.
You get all five guys that say "This is the song!"
and it's been really the catalyst for the DNA album
to basically set the bar for where the work
and the records should be.
and the song should be.
So we're very excited and very surprised .
Thank the Academy as well
for throwing our hats in the creek.
You are definitely keeping us fans busy.
TV appearances and radios...
It's not that you ever went away
and you know, we say the Backstreet is back
you guys have always been here.
But still it feels nostalgic, kind of.
It brings me back to when I was in high school
and like going back home
and I had to press record on all these different TVs
because you're on so many shows.
It's kind of like that all over again for me.
It feels good for us.
That's a good feeling.
To be creating music that is resonating
in popular culture.
Like you said, we've continued to make music
and sometimes it resonates on a large scale.
Sometimes it doesn't.
But that's what happens when you have a career.
and that's what we've always wanted.
If you could go back and relive a day
in the last 25 years of your career,
what day would it be?
Like for me, 25 years down the road,
this would be the day I'd want to relive.
For me, the day that I remember the most is
the day we met Brian.
Because I feel like that was the magic moment for us
It started right on that day
when he visited us
in this house that we were living in.
I just remember things clicking
from that moment.
It's like that magical...
Like you met that person
that you're gonna be with.
Yeah, we talk about the marriage thing.
Like you've met the person you're
gonna fall in love with.
So we met the group
we were gonna fall in love with.
That was April 20th, 1993.
Wow you remember the date.
Yeah. I mean, I would agree with you
I would pick that particular day to relive
just because it was like a whirlwind of emotions.
I was traveling from my hometown
in Kentucky down to Orlando.
I met these guys for the first time.
They were busting on my country accent
at that time.
It was scary.
It was extremely scary to be away from home.
But I knew that I had my cousin with me
so if there was anything that went down,
I had somebody to lean on.
Then we ended up leaning on each other
for the past 26 years.
I would say for me personally,
outside of the group,
I would love to relive my wedding
because everybody always says it goes by so fast.
Blink your eyes and you're like
"What happened?".
But internally within the group,
for me, one of the days that
stands out in my mind
is the day we got our star
on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
Because I remember it being
a really big moment for us.
But at the same time, I think for some reason,
I didn't take it as big of a thing
that I should have, by...
like some of other guys inviting
their family members to come.
I think I had my mother-in-law
and my brother-in-law came.
But I didn't really go out of my way
to push my wife to try to come out.
And she surprised me.
I remember just seeing her and
just breaking down in tears,
and I've never done that before.
I was just so overwhelmed with joy.
I just started crying like a baby
in front of all these guys.
and they're like "what the heck?"
It was a really emotional day for all of us.
It just really made me feel so proud
of what we do, our fans and the speech
that was given to us by Max Martin
the gentleman who put all of our
amazing hits together
over the years as well.
We picked a fan to do a speech for us.
Yes... for us as well.
Just all the love and support we had there
from everybody was just overwhelming.
I would go back to
one of our very first actual shows
when we were doing this
middle school/high school tours.
Going into these gymnasiums
and nobody knew who the heck we were,
we had no record deal.
We had two or three songs
that we had cut back in Orlando
and then we did some covers
And to just... seeing that size of a show
and then to think here we are right now
back in Japan
and the fact that we did the Tokyo Dome.
Three nights in a row sold out.
That's unbelievable.
and hopefully we can come back and do that again.
We're waiting. We're waiting for the dates!
We're like "where is Japan on the list?"
We're working on it.
It's definitely coming.
We're penciling in as we speak.
Kevin?
I might go back to...
There were a lot of great moments
that would be fun to relive over.
But maybe that first time we hit the stage in...
Was it Nordenberg?
First time we ever performed
in front of a big audience.
We released the single in the U.S.
which was called
"We've Got It Going On"
and it made it to like number 60 something
on the dance charts only.
It didn't really chart
on the pop radio charts or anything.
But we heard that in Germany
and Austria and Switzerland
they were loving the song.
and so we just went over there.
They're like "you're gonna do this radio show
with a bunch of other artists".
We had no idea that the song
was already a smash hit.
When we hit the stage,
the crowd went berzerk
They went insane,
bananas, crazy.
We couldn't believe it.
We couldn't even hear ourselves singing.
That was a pretty exceptional moment
where I, finally for the first time, was like,
"You know what?
This thing is gonna happen."
This might work. This ain't no joke.
Going forth, what are your dreams?
You guys have done so much like
what's something that you dream about
or you wish would happen in the future for you?
Winning a Grammy would be nice.
That would be nice.
That dream would be nice to have.
The Grammys are next month, right?
Yes. February 10th.
It would be nice to be able to continue
to make music together
hopefully for 25 more years.
I think now that we're all fathers and husbands.
We base our schedule a little bit differently now
around our personal lives to try to make it easier,
have that healthy balance between
home life and work life.
But to be able to continue to make music
and to continue to travel the world and tour
and bring our shows
to all of our fans around the world
would be a blessing.
So hopefully we can keep doing that.
I think this is the first album
where you're all dads, right?
Yeah.
So how has that been?
I know you have been working on it for two years.
Thankfully there is FaceTime
and there's all these different ways
you can connect.
We've been away for four or five days now.
We'll be away a little bit longer
and there's gonna be times
when we can't be there
for our children when we want to.
Thankfully though, recently we've been in Vegas
and some of the guys live in LA
and they've been able to bring their families to Vegas.
I live in Vegas so.
We've been able to be a part of our families,
which is really really important to us.
We're gonna bring them out on the road
when we go, this next tour, over in Europe.
I would like to say it's like a worldwide..
What do you call it? Like a school for them.
it's gonna be the first time
for me and my son to do this.
But you know, we miss them
and we try to stay connected with them
when we are away.
I was gonna add to that.
I was the first Backstreet Boys Dad
So when Baylee was young - my son,
it was kind of this give-and-take situation
because being a father for the first time
and not really knowing how or what to expect.
But I remember being out on the road and on tour,
and Baylee growing up on the tour bus
on the Never Gone tour in 2004, many years ago.
And then after the tour was over,
like "I wanted to go home"
Some of the guys were like...
There was little qualms going on like
"Nah, man, we got to stay out.
We gotta stay on the road"
and I'm like "No, you don't understand.
I have a family."
Now, everybody has families.
So now it's like that-give-and-take
where you understand
where each other is in their life
outside of being a Backstreet Boy.
We do a lot of things outside of
just being a Backstreet Boy
So I think now that we're all family men.
We get to talk about those stories and go
"Oh, I understand why I was so mad at you then,
but I get it now that I have kids."
We've all been at those different stages in there
and we will continue to be at those different stages
at different times in our lives.
My husband and I, we have a daughter.
7 months old.
Pudding.
Pudding, yes.
Oh my gosh Pudding! Brian knows your name!
Ohayougozaimasu, Pudding!
She is like "That's not my real name."
She is asleep. She is out.
I know it's a nickname, but
My husband and I are both terrible singers,
but we love going to karaoke
I'm sure you guys have gone to Karaoke
in Japan before.
And because we're both bad,
we don't feel bad singing.
in front of each other.
But while I was pregnant, I was like,
"Oh no! What if she hears our singing
and that transcends...
Well, she might already have it
because of DNA.
But since you guys are amazing singers,
I'm sure you sing to your kids a lot.
What are some of your favorite songs
to sing to your kids?
That's not a Backstreet Boys song.
Oh, I had so many BSB songs...
but then I'm like
That's the only stuff I know".
For me, it's interesting when you're a father
and you pull out the songs that
these most random songs
that you wouldn't even think
would be a part of your DNA as a person.
But for me, it's like some old,
classic, folk kind of songs.
Like almost classic rock and l'll sing like,
"Nights in White Satin" every now and then to him
I'll sing "A Horse With No Name" by America.
All these like a guitar based songs.
Or sometimes maybe a Gordon Lightfoot song.
No, seriously! Like the most random stuff ever!
When I think about it I'm like, Wow
is that really deep inside of me?
Is that really a part of who I am?
And so... It's funny.
When Baylee was little for me
there was a young lady
that had just come on the market
named Norah Jones.
We would put her CD in.
He loved Norah Jones.
He also loved our music.
But my son is very eclectic.
He loves like Tony Bennett and Lionel Richie.
Just all kinds of different things.
He knows rock music, pop music,
gospel music.
He is an entertainer himself.
Yeah, he is.
He is a pretty good singer, too.
That might be in his DNA.
I'm not sure. We'll have to test it.
Whenever I hear John Mayer's
"Say What You Need to Say",
I used to sing that to Mason all the time
when he was born.
That song when I hear it
It's like a snapshot
of when Mason was first born.
It gets me emotional.
He is 11 now and it goes so fast.
Crazy.
For me, my oldest, for Ava when she was young
Her very first album that she loves is Frankie Valli.
Then we moved into the Beatles
because of my wife.
She is the biggest Beatles' fan in the world.
and then I kind of subjected her to Prince,
Michael Jackson and Stevie Wonder.
And then my youngest...
anything Moana.
I have heard Moana more than I want to.
Any Disney princess movie, pretty much.
That or The Greatest Showman.
My oldest has a big crush on Zac Efron.
Is that what you sing to her?
What do you sing?
or whatever song you sing to Ava.
To Ava?
Well, sadly it's one of ours.
She loves "Shape of My Heart".
That's her favorite BSB song.
That and "The Call", which is weird.
I don't know why she liked that one.
That helps her sleep.
I think for me,
I don't actually do a lot of karaoke
because for the past 25 years
the only songs I know is BSB.
Most songs that are on the radio.
I don't know the words so
if anything, I end up making up words,
changing up all the words.
So the kids don't really know the songs properly,
but I've even changed some of our BSB songs.
♫ Wash your body, everybody ♫
That's a good bath time song!
♫ wash your body right♫
And when they were little, it was like
You know, "The Wheels On The Bus"
or "Peanut Butter Jelly Time", actually.
♫ Peanut butter jelly time
Peanut butter jelly and a baseball bat♫
They love that song!
I actually put on "No Place".
Did she cry?
I was singing the ABCs to her,
which I thought she liked.
and then she would cry
so I turned on "No Place"
and she stopped.
That's good!
At least we know we've got a baby follower.
Our youngest fan.
Love the video.
Thank you guys so much for sharing your families
and kind of something personal with us.
Did you always know you were going to have
your families in that video?
We have families.
Like I said before, it's important to us.
But we also have fans.
This is actually the perfect example.
Fans like yourself who have families
who are also going through
that part of their lives as well.
We just thought felt it would be kind of a treat
to give our fans a little glimpse into our personal lives
and show what it's all about.
What we've been doing at the same time.
and maybe in a way
our fans can empathize with us
and see that they're just like who we are a
and so that's why we did that
with the music video.
We've been traveling our whole lives
and we're getting ready to go on tour.
There's sometimes when we leave our families
back home. We can't be there like right now.
But when we go home, there is no place that
we would rather be than with them.
They keep us grounded.
They're a very integral part of us as family men
and Backstreet Boys.
I love it.
I think it's one of my favorites.
I mean, I love all of them.
But there's just this new feeling
when I watch "No Place".
Good, thank you.
That's awesome.
Glad it turned out that way.
The videos that you've shot so far.
Is there any funny story?
I know a lot goes on behind the scenes
because I make a lot of videos myself
I have over 700 videos on YouTube
and behind the scenes is where
the juicy stuff, right?
the funny stuff happens
Is there anything in the last three videos?
Nobody split their pants or anything.
Has that happened before?
It was a very day.
It was a very long. It was a one day shoot.
It was funny because
the surface that
we were dancing on was very reflective.
It was like a black mirror almost.
And after every take they'd have to clean it off
and make it look clean.
Because you want that reflection
and you want to have to do
as little in post-production
as possible to get things to look right.
So that was kind of funny.
because there'd be some screaming matches
going on between the people cleaning.
But anything that's crazy or funny?
I just remembered while they were cleaning that off
we had shot... I don't even know.
Fifty to a hundred takes of that
dancing and we had done
I think maybe like a week before
or maybe two or three days of preparing
that choreography for the video.
I just remember being so sore
and tired by the end of that shoot.
Because we had gone to like 2 or 3 o'clock
in the morning.
I couldn't believe how many takes we did
and how our bodies held up
but we were sore the next day.
It was a lot of dancing
over and over and over again.
I guess it gets you in shape
for the tour coming up, right?
Yes.
Chances, I mean, really...
A.J., you directed it, right?
I co-directed it with my longtime friend,
René Elizondo
Nothing really funny per say
but we definitely had to work around
the actual train station schedule
to wait for trains to come and go
to get certain shots.
Union Station in downtown LA.
Beautiful, beautiful location.
But we definitely were at the mercy of
the actual trains being used
and there were some interesting people
there waiting to catch their trains.
Watching us shoot the video
like 3:00 in the morning.
But that's downtown LA.
No place.
There's a lot of footage that didn't get used.
All of our kids
they love to be on camera.
I'm sure there was quite a lot of funny stuff
that happened.
Was it like just shoot however you want
Was there a lot of freedom there?
It was up to us
what we wanted to do with our family.
Just something that we do in our everyday life
like me and my family, we love to go hiking,
we like to play ball in the yard,
we like to roast marshmallows on the fire pit.
That's what we did.
It's like your best interpretation of you at home.
You're always wearing that cooking hat?
I'm always the chef.
Chef Brian!
We wanted it to be inviting
and invasive in a good way
where people see your home or see your pool
or see you laugh and joke and kissing your wife
having a glass of wine.
Just being a homebody.
My shots were supposed to be at the beach.
But it ended up being the coldest day
of the year in Florida.
I didn't even know that.
Last minute, change things up
It was supposed to be beach, pool and tennis.
We ended up...scratching all that.
I'm actually in a jacket
and wearing blankets on there.
Where was that playground at?
That's actually my backyard.
Oh nice.
If you look up "6, 9, 8, 4..."
Nah, I'm just playing.
It was funny, Howie yesterday
you were like "the blonde kid is mine!"
You just kept saying it dude!
He said it like three times.
Because I know that, probably a lot of people
were wondering about that.
At first I was like "He's really blonde!"
Actually, he is my Irish twin.
or Scandinavian twin.
and I'm more Irish than you are.
Yeah, you're Scandinavian twin.
We just got our DNA tests
and we're finding out a lot about ourselves.
Can I get you guys to sing
a bit of No Place for everyone watching?
Oh, that's something that we haven't done.
We've never done that live yet.
Let's give it a shot.
"I've been" That's the key. Relative pitch.
♫ I've been all around the world ♫
♫ done all there is to do ♫
♫ But you'll always be the home ♫
♫ I wanna come home to ♫
♫You're a wild night with a hell of a view ♫
♫There ain't no place, ain't no place like you ♫
♫ I said, there ain't no place, ain't no place like you ♫
That's a first
OMG, I'm going to cry
You boys can sing!
We're gonna do that at live soon.
We gotta start rehearsing.
Mr Relative, you were half step high.
No, I wasn't.
Somebody is awake!
Look at that!
You're the perfect fan!
Can I hold her?
You can spill all your food on all of our faces!
Come here!
I like them better on the radio
than it person.
Can you guys sing her the ABCs?
Yeah!
What a treat! Oh my gosh.
Thank you guys so much!
If you could say something to the fans
See you guys soon all over the world on tour!
We hope you love DNA.
We've put a lot of love and heart
into making this album.
We're very proud of it and it comes out very soon.
Peace and love to our fans all over the world.
Arigato!
Alright guys, thank you so much for watching
and thanks to the Backstreet Boys
for the most incredible 20,
maybe 30 minutes of my life.
Thank you for all that time
and for sharing all of your stories.
Alright guys, be sure to go get DNA
by the time this video is out, it's in stores.
I've already reserved it,
so I can't wait for my copy!
That's great. Thank you.
Give us a big like!
Bye!
Pudding. Show everyone.
"I'm the perfect fan"
She is the perfect fan!
当たり前だろ！
Alright guys. Thank you so much for watching!
Give me a big like!
Bye!