Boy Band Culture of the 1990s

The Boy Band Culture of the 1990s

“Even in my heart I see/ You're not bein' true to me/ Deep within my soul I feel/ Nothing's like it used to be,” these lyrics are only an excerpt from the music that created a distinct culture during the 1990s. The song titled “Quit Playin’ Games with My Heart,” one of their highest grossing singles, was first released in 1995, on the artists’ self-titled album Backstreet Boys and gained international success in countries, where pop genre was already quite popular, such as Germany, Austria, and Sweden (Backstreet Boys). This song’s success is only an introduction of the Backstreet Boys’ influence on boy band culture of the nineties. This culture consisted of teenage males that put little emphasis on musical instruments but rather focused on vocals and choreography. Although the Backstreet Boys may have been the most popular, they were by no means the only boy band of the 1990s; these bands included *NSYNC, O-Town, Boys II Men, and 98 Degrees. This musical subgenre was much more complex because its success was not only influenced by the vocals produced but also by the aesthetic of the groups. The fact that the media emphasized the groups’ personal looks helped teenyboppers (some even younger) in developing an identity with a common ideal of what beauty and success were and how they correlated. Although boy bands did create their own music and success, many recognize that bands such as New Kids on the Block, The Monkees, and even The Beatles paved the way for the all-male vocalists of the 1990s.

To further understand the success of the nineties music groups, we must familiarize ourselves with the history and success of previous artists. During the early sixties, one band that stood out above the rest was The Beatles. Although they were a British native band, they had thousands of screaming fans awaiting them in the United States. One example of American loyalty was 1964’s airing of the Ed Sullivan show featuring The Beatles, where a total of 73 million viewers tuned in to watch their performance. To this day, The Beatles have the record of holding five consecutive slots simultaneously on the U.S. Billboard’s Top Singles chart (Ayoub). Many attribute their success to their capability to write their own music and freely express themselves. Other factors included their ability to make the rock and roll genre so versatile by creating new sounds with different harmonies and structures. Even though The Beatles were more complex than the nineties’ boy band model, they were similar in the sense that they were both fashionable trend-setters (Wenner). From their fashionable suits to their mop-top haircuts, this 1960’s band created a culture that emphasized physical appearance; a theme that would later recur with boy bands in the 1990s.

As many know, The Beatles were a huge phenomenon during the sixties but they were not the only ones to gain success. In the mid 1960s, a band named The Monkees was introduced, and like many of the nineties boy bands their physical appearance amongst other things was very important. Their physical attributes were especially important because unlike most bands they were created specifically for visual entertainment as a made-for-TV musical group. As they began to appear on television, audience members could not help but to make these band members fashion icons in the United States (The Monkees). Although boy bands of the 1990s did not have their own sitcoms, appearance was equally important due to music videos. The Monkees earlier years also resembled the boy band model of the 1990s in the respect that they focused on their vocals and did not write many of their own songs. As The Monkees progressed though, they began to integrate more instruments as well as write some of their own songs. Even though The Monkees do not necessarily fit in the subgenre of 1990s boy band culture, they were a large influence on the pop scene (The Monkees). While the Monkees did still record during the 1980s, many new bands began taking the stage. These bands consisted of Menudo and New Kids on the Block.

The male group New Kids on the Block was founded by producer Maurice Starr and like the starts of the early 1990s they showed traces of a mainstream pop sound with a lack of instrumentals. Originally, the group did not appeal well to their teen audience but by their second album, they had achieved a much bigger fan base and were being much more publicized. Their second album produced their very first hit single, which soon was ranked within the Billboard Hot 100 Chart (New Kids on the Block). After producer Louis Pearlman realized the potential of the music industry, he soon became involved in producing an all male band inspired by New Kids on the Block’s success. With this new motivation, Louis Pearlman was able to facilitate a well developed talent search that brought together A.J. McLean, Howie Dorough, Nick Carter, Brian Litterell and Kevin Richardson. By April of 1993, Pearlman had hired a songwriter and Johnny and Donna Wright to further enhance the bands musical launch. At the time, Johnny and Donna Wright had just worked for New Kids on The Block and were helping to book the Backstreet Boys gigs at local malls and high schools (Backstreet Boys). With his new found success, Louis Pearlman was able to further build the foundation of the boy band culture in both the United States and Europe by creating other bands such as *NSYNC, LFO, O-Town, and Take 5. By the late 1990s, the strength of boy bands was undeniable.

Their ability to captivate such a large female audience and influence the decade of the nineties is still not completely explainable, but it can be said that their physical attractiveness and ambiguous lyrics were central factors to the bands’ success. Boy bands of the nineties are known for their consistent theme about love, heartbreak, or relationships (that were either blossoming or faltering); but by ambiguous lyrics, I don’t mean that the theme or messages were never clear. I mean that the lyrics were never specifically aimed at one particular girl; hence, many of the songs did not talk about a brown- haired beauty or blonde bombshell. This point can best be illustrated in *NSYNC and The Backstreet Boys’ music. As the song “I Want it that Way” states, “You are my fire/The one desire/Believe when I say/I want it that way,” these lyrics show that the artists never exactly specify who ‘you’ is, which leaves the audience to their own speculations. Also by using a pronoun such as ‘you’ the female audience was able to envision themselves as the object of their affection. This illusion allowed for their fan base to grow because many young girls loved the idea of being serenaded by young attractive males. As *NSYNC sings in this slow ballad, “It's tearin' up my heart when I'm with you/ But when we are apart, I feel it too/And no matter what I do, I feel the pain/with or without you,” it illustrates that the female is so important that it hurts the boys to live without her. This song is also interesting because the ballad is sung slowly but the melody has an upbeat pop sound, which makes the song easy to follow and dance to. Their ability to make females feel special by directing their songs towards them, in songs such as “Tearin’ up My Heart,” was one of the biggest factors for the boy bands’ success of the 1990s. The lyrics were a strong factor to how these bands achieved success, but it was by no means the only way they became so influential.

Their physical looks were executive directors’ large focus for marketing. They knew that in order for these teen males to be successful they needed to not only appeal to the teenage demographic but also to their parents. In order to harness that look, they chose males that were still young and maintained an innocent image (such boys included Justin Timberlake, Lance Bass, and Nick Carter). Once the boys were accepted as an appropriate form of entertainment, the young teens went wild for these boy bands (Jamieson). Another reason that so many females were drawn to this culture was because the bands typically consisted of five very different looking males. Therefore, if one of the group members did not appeal to the teenage girls then there would most certainly be another that would. This point can be illustrated by the band *NSYNC who had Justin Timberlake (the young attractive boyish look), Lance Bass (the pretty boy/ feminine look), JC Chasez (the tall, dark, and handsome model), Joey Fatone and Chris Kirkpatrick (the older looking bad boys with facial hair). As you can see, these boy bands had an array of members that were chosen in order to appeal to their entire audience; however, there was always one member that stood above the rest. For example, in The Backstreet Boys and *NSYNC, Justin Timberlake and Nick Carter were given more solos and coverage because they were designated as the most attractive in the group. This message led females to believe that a striking physical appearance was a necessity for leadership in boy bands. Basically, the message for society was that you must be the most attractive to distinguish dominance and success. Although these young females pledged their allegiance to these bands by filling sold out concerts and buying every record, these teenyboppers were not always going to be young. Eventually they had to grow up; but how did the boy bands’ model of attractive young males affect these growing females? These teenyboppers of the 1990s were repeatedly reminded of what was deemed as attractive by bands such as *NSYNC, Backstreet Boys, and 98 Degrees. With that constant exposure, these young females were building a subconscious foundation of what they considered attractive and how that related to success. They together were forming an identity that made males in the media a guideline for success and attractiveness. Essentially, these clear faced, fit, and well dressed boy bands began the formation for these young teenagers’ idea of beauty.

As Simon Frith has noted in Music and Identity, “The issue is not how a particular piece of music or a performance reflects the people, but how it produces them, how it creates and constructs an experience.” In this particular instance, these male bands performed through their choreographed dances, singing ability, and appearance on stage/TV. These performances constructed an experience in the sense that the female population began to identify beauty by the standards of these band members. As they began to mature, these girls developed an almost unattainable standard of men, which is why I believe they became so entertained with the men of Hollywood, who were all considered attractive and successful. Thus, boy bands created the foundation for girls’ socially acceptable obsession with the young attractive men of the media, which helped to create a social identity that correlates success with how physically attractive someone is.