Boy band

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"Boyband" redirects here. For the New Zealand musical group, see Boyband (New Zealand band).
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boy bands
Stylistic origins
Early: soul music, disco, power pop, Gospel music, electronic dance music, bubblegum pop, 1960's girl groups. Influences in early 21st century include pop punk, pop rock, pop rap,emo.
Cultural origins
late 1970's United Kingdom & United States, with precursors dating back to the mid 1960's.
Typical instruments
Vocals- electronic backing - sampler - sequencers. Others use rock band instrumentation: electric guitar, bass guitar, drums, keyboards
Mainstream popularity Worldwide, especially amongst pre-teens and teenagers from the 1990's
Other topics
Eurovision song contest, camp (style), pop idol, teenybopper, postmodernism, consumerism, gay culture, kitsch, pop culture, manufactured pop, tweenager, teen idol,gay icon

Boy band refers to a type of pop group featuring several young male singers. The members are generally expected to perform as dancers as well, often executing highly choreographed sequences to their own music. Although there are no distinct traits defining a boy band, one could label a band a "boy band" for following mainstream music trends, changing their appearances to adapt to new fashion trends, having elaborate dance moves, and performing elaborate shows. They can evolve out of church choral or Gospel music groups, but are often put together by talent managers or record producers who audition the groups for appearance, dancing, rapping skills, and singing ability.

The acts are essentially vocal harmony groups (though there are some exceptions, such as groups like A1, The Moffatts, South 65, Marshall Dyllon, Jonas Brothers or McFly). Due to this and their general commercial orientation towards a teenybopper, teens, or preteen audience, the term has negative connotations in music journalism. Boy bands are similar in concept to girl groups.

Contents

[edit] History

Although the word "boy band" did not exist until the 1990s, Boston group New Edition is credited for starting the boy band trend in the 1980s. Maurice Starr was influenced by New Edition and popularised it with his protégé New Kids on the Block, the first commercially successful modern boy band. Starr's idea was to take the traditional template from the R&B genre (in this case his teenage band New Edition) and apply it to a pop genre. Some managers in Europe created their own acts, beginning with Nigel Martin-Smith's Take That in the UK, followed by Louis Walsh and bands like East 17, which by the late 1990s.

TV Producers Bert Schneider and Bob Rafelson got four members to perform catchy pop tunes while also acting in a television series. The Monkees are often considered as the original pioneers among boy bands. Formed in 1965 under the supervision of Don Kirshner, the group became dissatisfied with Kirshner's control and became independent two years later, and worked on their own up to 1970. Although the term is mostly associated with groups from the 1990s onwards, antecedents exist throughout the history of pop music. The Temptations, popular in the 1960s, The Bee Gees, The Jackson 5, The Osmonds, and Earth, Wind and Fire, popular in the 1970s, have also been considered a form of boy band by some[citation needed]. Latino boy band Menudo was founded in 1977.

One of the most successful boy band managers was Lou Pearlman, who founded commercially successful acts such as the Backstreet Boys and *NSYNC, although he was later convicted of unrelated fraud incidents. In the UK, producer Simon Cowell (noted in the U.S. for the American Idol/Pop Idol franchise) is also known for having managed boyband Westlife, which was created by Louis Walsh[1] and promoted by a former boy band member Ronan Keating of Boyzone.

Since 2001, the dominance of traditional boy bands on pop charts began to fade, to be replaced by what Gil Kaufman of MTV describes as "new boy bands" that are "more likely to resemble Good Charlotte, My Chemical Romance, Simple Plan or Dashboard Confessional".[2]


[edit] Current boy bands

Backstreet Boys, New Kids on the Block, Boyzone, Take That, A1 and Westlife are some examples, which are popular among teens and adults. Boy bands are beginning to peak again in the United States after a 5 year mainstream absence, such as the new R&B/Pop influenced boy bands like [[V Factory],]Menudo, NLT, LexingtonBridge, US5, C Note, Day26, Varsity Fanclub,NeverEnding June, V-Factory and B5. Boybands in East Asia continue to do well in the mainstream market as popular groups such as F.T. Island, TVXQ, Big Bang, Arashi, NEWS, KAT-TUN, Super Junior, and Fahrenheit continue to release chart-topping material in different countries of Asia.

[edit] Music genres

Although most boy bands consist of R&B and pop influences, other music genres, most notably power pop, country music, folk music and pop rap are also represented. South 65 and Marshall Dyllon, for example, were both considered country music boy bands. Il Divo, created by Simon Cowell, are a boy band that perform Operatic pop. Since 2001 there has been some crossover with power pop and pop punk, though this is obviously from boy bands that play live instruments. One key convention for boy bands to follow is to follow what genres are fashionable, as opposed to creating something original. For example, as of 2008, boy bands often imitate pop punk, 1960's garage rock, post punk revivalists, pop rap, power pop (a perennial genre) and dance-punk.

[edit] Criticism

In the 1990s, bands such as the Backstreet Boys and Lyte Funky Ones have disliked the term "boy band" and have preferred to be known as a "Male Vocal Group". Boy bands have been accused by the music press[who?] of emphasizing the appearance and marketing of the group above the quality of music. Other criticisms include deliberately trying to appeal to a pre-teen audience, lacking originality in the music and being effeminate. Such criticisms can become extremely scathing:

“ After scouring the country for five boys who could belt out tunes while doing the splits, (Lou Pearlman) assembled a clean-cut collection of effeminate white and Latino-looking boys, all pink cheeks and crew cuts with peroxided tips. Just like the Backstreet Boys and *NSYNC, there's the cute blond guy, one with curly hair, the dark one with big dimples, the guy with the funny facial hair and the less cute, but really sensitive, guy.

Pearlman herded them into a tiny apartment, forcing these guys in their late teens and early 20s to share bedrooms (hey, less opportunity for illicit sexual activity - at least with the opposite sex), and forbade them to stay out past midnight. He dressed them in coordinated red and silver "rave" outfits and spoon-fed them sugary-sweet lyrics like "Would I cross an ocean just to hold you ... Would I give up all I have to see you smile?" And then he set them loose on concert halls full of 12-year-old girls, who dutifully screamed their lungs out in a kind of mass orgasm fueled by all that scrubbed-clean testosterone.[3]

 ”

[edit] In Popular Culture

As a result of these criticisms, boy bands have sometimes been a target for parody in popular culture:

  • In a week-long spoof in 1999, wherein talk show host Conan O'Brien, inspired by Making the Band, created his own boy band called Dudez-A-Plenti, after randomly selecting five singers, narrowed down from the population of the entire world. A series of sketches culminated in a performance of a song O'Brien apparently made up himself: "Baby, I Wish You Were My Baby".
  • Chambers Dictionary, which is known to contain humorous definitions, defines a boy band "a pop group, targeting mainly the teenage market, composed of young males chosen because they look good and can dance and sometimes even sing."
  • The 2001 film Josie and the Pussycats featured a fictional boy band named "Du Jour." Their hit single, "Backdoor Lover," satirizes the effeminate style of many boy bands and their members.
  • In the Boyz 'N Commotion episode of the Disney Channel series That's So Raven, Raven wants a boy band named the Boyz in Motion to perform in front of her friends. In another episode, Raven wants the Boyz in Motion to perform in an emergency plan video for Donna Cabonna. The Boyz in Motion are sometimes referred to as The Boyz.
  • The Australian musical "Boyband" centres around a fictional boyband 4orce and their journey through the 1990s. Two seasons were staged at The Seymour Centre in 2005 and 2006.[4]
  • Eminem lyric from "The Real Slim Shady" states "I am sick of you little girl and boy groups, all you do is annoy me"
  • Australian film BoyTown is about a fictional boyband who had their golden age in the 1980s, and reform to sing songs about divorce and picking the kids up from school and to go on one last tour.
  • New Zealand radio station The Edge created a cliché boyband, called Boyband in 2006. It consisted of Fat Boy, Gay Boy, Mummy's Boy, Bad Boy and Hot Boy. They achieved a small success in the country, with their cover of The Kinks' song "You Really Got Me" reaching number one on the New Zealand music charts for one week.
  • The Arrogant Worms made a parody song called "Boy Band" which includes lyrics such as "Cause we're singing in a boy band, the words are stupid and the music's bland".
  • The song "Title of the Song" by comedic a cappella band Da Vinci's Notebook provides a line-by-line dissection of the themes commonly found in boy band songs. (Example lyrics: "Acknowledgment that I acted foolishly / Increasingly desperate pleas for your return / Sorrow for my infidelity / Vain hope that my sins are forgivable / Appeal for one more opportunity / Drop to my knees to elicit crowd response / Prayers to my chosen deity / Modulation and I hold a high note")

[edit] Success in the genre

Though their music attracts a strong following, the commercial success of specific boy bands does not tend to last long. As the fans (mostly teen girls) age and musical tastes evolve, they tend to outgrow such groups' appeal. If success is sustained, often one or more members of the band will leave and seek a solo career (particularly if they have some songwriting ability). Some boy band members who later became successful solo acts include Michael Nesmith, Jordan Knight, Robbie Williams, Justin Timberlake, Jesse McCartney, Ronan Keating, Brian McFadden, Nick Lachey and Ricky Martin.

Others have gone on to success in other areas. For example, Mickey Dolenz went on to become a successful television producer and theatre director. David W. Ross, formerly of Bad Boys Inc, has become an actor and screenwriter. Sam Watters from Color Me Badd became a Grammy nominated songwriter and producer and Donnie Wahlberg from NKOTB has become a movie actor.

[edit] Top selling pop music boy bands

Boy Group Country Sold Genre Studio Albums Members Years Active
1. Backstreet Boys USA 200 Million+ [5] Pop 6 4 - 5 1993-present (16 years)
2. New Kids on the Block USA 80 Million+ [6] Pop 5 5 1984–1994, 2008-present (12 Years)
3. 'N Sync USA 56 Million+ [7] Pop 5 5 1995 - 2005 (10 Years)
4. Westlife Ireland 40 Million+ [8] Pop 6 4 - 5 1998-present (11 Years)

[edit] Top selling R&B music boy bands

Boy Group Sold Genre Studio Albums Members Years Active
1. Jackson Five 150 million+ [9] R&B 6 4 - 5 1967 - 1990 (23 years)
2. Boyz II Men 85 million+ [10] R&B 5 3 - 5 1990 - present (19 years)
3. New Edition 28 Million+ R&B 6 6 1983 - present (26 years)

[edit] Best-selling boy band albums

Album Boy band Worldwide Sales Year Genre
Millennium Backstreet Boys 40 Million 1999 Pop
Backstreet Boys Backstreet Boys 30 Million 1997 Pop
Black & Blue Backstreet Boys 24 Million 2000 Pop
Step by Step New Kids on the Block 19 Million 1990 Pop
Hangin' Tough New Kids on the Block 16 Million 1988 Pop
No Strings Attached 'N Sync 15 million 2000 Pop
II Boyz II Men 15 million 1994 R&B
*NSYNC 'N Sync 13 Million 1997 Pop

[edit] References

  1. ^ Press Association - Louis Walsh Profile
  2. ^ Gil Kaufman (2007). "The New Boy Bands". MTV. http://www.mtv.com/bands/b/boy_bands/050207/index.jhtml. Retrieved on November 8 2007. 
  3. ^ Janelle Brown, "Sluts and Teddy Bears", Salon.com, 2001.
  4. ^ http://www.boyband.com.au
  5. ^ [1]
  6. ^ [2]
  7. ^ Pedro Ruz Gutierrez (2007). "Pearlman's money woes follow him downtown". The Orlando Sentinel. http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/local/orange/orl-mpearlman2807jan28,0,7354100.story?coll=orl-news-headlines-orange. Retrieved on November 8 2007. 
  8. ^ [3]
  9. ^ 150 million sales
  10. ^ 85 million sales

[edit] External links

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