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Nick, Brian, Howie, AJ and Kevin. The names don’t trip off the tongue as readily as John, Paul, George and Ringo. Yet when the Backstreet Boys appeared onstage Tuesday night at FedExForum, the shrieks and cheers that greeted the so-called “boy band” were as enthusiastic and sustained if not as frantic and desperate as the cacophonous wall of girlish sound that was the soundtrack to the era of so-called Beatlemania.

“This place is full tonight,” said Nick Carter, 39, the youngest and arguably most clean-cut of the five “Boys.” “Does this mean you still love the Backstreet Boys?”

The positive response to Carter’s essentially rhetorical question came in the form of an ear-rattling rise in the volume and pitch of the cheering, which had never stopped. In fact, the near-sell-out crowd was so excited that it remained on its feet for the entire show, which ran precisely two hours, as if cued to fill a prime-time slot on network television. 

The “commercial” interruptions during this slot, however, were not product plugs but brand affirmations — testimonies of appreciation from the singers to their loyal fans. “We always love coming to your beautiful city,” said Howie “Howie D.” Dorough,  46. “Thank you guys for helping us create our legacy.”

The Backstreet Boys — Carter, Dorough, Brian Littrell, AJ McLean and Kevin Richardson — have been together, off and on, for 26 years — or a few months longer than any Beatle had been alive at the point the Fab Four quit touring in 1966. This longevity explains why the Boys on their current “DNA World Tour” are placing so much emphasis on “legacy” and “family.” As demonstrated in the home movies that occasionally flashed on the huge wedge of video screens suspended above the front of the stage, such concerns extend beyond the Boys’ musical careers: The singers are Backstreet Dads now, with what they call “Backstreet Babies.”

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The women who made up the vast majority of the audience could relate: For the most part, they were not teenagers but mature women, reclaiming their youthful spirit by connecting with a pop group who made music that sustained them when they were kids, students or fledgling young adults. “We’ve all grown up … together, basically,” explained Richardson, 47, the oldest “Boy.” “We appreciate you being part of our family for the past 26 years.”

For many members of this family, the Backstreet Boys concert represented a reunion. Many women arrived at FedExForum in groups, wearing matching T-shirts with slogans pulled from Backstreet Boys song lyrics. “Backstreet’s Back Alright” was a popular slogan, as was “Ain’t No Party Like a Backstreet Party.”

Attending her first Backstreet concert, Debi Tounzen, 48, of Beebe, Arkansas, wore a T-shirt that stated: “I Was Supposed to Marry a Backstreet Boy.” She was accompanied by her non-Backstreet Boy husband, David Tounzen, whose T-shirt offered a humorous response: It advertised a rival boy band, the New Kids on the Block.

Explained David: “She said, ‘I’m buying a Backstreet Boys T-shirt for the concert, do you want one?’ And I said, ‘No, get me the New Kids.'” Explained Debi: “He’s a brat.”

The entertainment began at 8 p.m. with a 25-minute opening set of pop-tinged country by Baylee Littrell, son of Backstreet Boy Brian Littrell. Accompanied by three backup musicians, Baylee — whose debut album arrives later this year — occupied only a small portion of the huge stage, which mostly was hidden behind a curtain until the Backstreet Boys appeared at about 9:15 p.m. in a flurry of effects that explained why the doors of FedExForum were plastered with signs warning patrons that “This Show Contains Haze, Pyro, and Strobe Lighting.”

Hitting their stride almost immediately with “I Wanna Be With You” from their 1996 debut, the Backstreet Boys established the template for what would be a show of impressive harmonies, strenuous choreography, non-stop high energy, Boy-ish banter and — yup — pre-recorded backing tracks (no longer unusual for pop concerts of this size). To interact with audience members, the singers made frequent use of a pentagonal runway that jutted into the crowd like the prow of a ship; similarly angular, metallic shapes arched over the main stage like the ribs of an unfinished building designed by a robot architect. Augmented with elaborate video displays and colorful lighting effects, this stage design conjured a vaguely futuristic atmosphere: “Blade Runner” by way of Hot Topic or MTV. 

The state-of-the-art set design and technology was fitting for an act that is associated with the 1990s but continues to make viable new music (the Boys’ most recent album, “DNA,” debuted in January at the top of the Billboard charts). With a performance style that traces its own DNA to doo-wop and classic Motown, the Backstreet Boys may not be quite funky or soulful enough to qualify as R&B, but they excel at their own influential brand of boy-band pop. As Nick Carter told the crowd, in a good-natured jibe at such one-time rivals as ‘N Sync: “You came to see the boy band.”

Alternating party anthems with expressions of devotion, yearning and heartbreak, the group performed new as well as old songs, including “No Place,” a track on “DNA” that includes the lyric: “You’re my Memphis, New York, New Orleans all rolled into one.” Afterward, Richardson told the crowd: “I don’t know if you heard it or not, but Memphis is in that song.” McLean — the “personality” of the group, with full beard, neck tattoo, nose ring and gaucho hat — added his own Memphis tribute, crooning a bit of Marc Cohn’s “Walking in Memphis” between songs.

Replete with several wardrobe changes, the show built to a rousing finale of back-to-back-to-back-etc. hits, including “I’ll Never Break Your Heart,” “Everybody (Backstreet’s Back),” and the indelible “I Want it That Way,” the one Backstreets Boys recording so popular and ubiquitous that it has obliterated generational and demographic distinctions. After that hit, the Boys linked hand for the obligatory valedictory bow, then came back for a short encore wearing customized Memphis Grizzlies basketball jerseys, with their names on the back. The Backstreet Boys probably do something similar in every city, but Tuesday night it was easy to believe they had gone the extra mile for their enthusiastic Memphis audience — an audience that McLean said felt like “one giant hug.”

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Read or Share this story: https://www.commercialappeal.com/story/news/2019/08/28/backstreet-boys-memphis-review-dna-tour-fedexforum/2064226001/