On a recent flight, a woman seated next to the Backstreet Boys'
**Brian**
As his tiny chihuahua, Little Tyke, sits on his lap, 24-year-old Brian admits he sometimes
uses the dog as a diversionary tatic. "I'll have someone hold him up and be like, 'Look,
everybody. Look at the cute puppy!' Then I can slip by fans unnoticed." Hmmm...chihuahua or
Brian? Don't think we'd be fooled.
ARE YOU GUYS COMPETITIVE?
WHO HAS THE BEST BODY NAKED?
OK, WHO'S GOT THE WORST BODY?
WELL, WHO'S GOT THE MOST HAIR ON HIS BACK?
DO YOU LIVE OUT HERE MOST OF THE TIME?
HOW DO YOU KNOW YOUR GIRLFRIEND'S NOT JUST WITH YOU BECAUSE YOU'RE A BACKSTREET BOY?
ARE YOU GOOD MONEYWISE?
BECAUSE?
WHAT DO YOU DO IN YOUR DOWNTIME?
REALLY? ARE YOU A 100% OK AS FAR AS ALL THE HEART STUFF?
**Howie**
True to his image, Sweet D walks in smiling. No wonder the 25-year-old been labeled BSB's
"friendliest member." He spent most of
his time with us coordinating that night's plans--so now we call him BSB's social master.
DOES YOUR HIGH-PROFILE VISIBILITY EVER GET UNCOMFORTABLE?
HAS HAVING MORE MONEY CHANGED YOUR LIFESTYLE? ANY BIG SPLURGES?
YOU'RE STILL LIVING AT HOME, HUH? WHY?
DO YOU HANG AROUND IN YOUR UNDERPANTS WATCHING TV?
DOES YOUR ROOM STILL LOOK LIKE IT DID WHEN YOU WERE GROWING UP?
DO YOU LIKE PERFORMING OR DO YOU GET NERVOUS?
REALLY? YOU GUYS MESS UP ONSTAGE?
DO YOU GUYS EVER FIGHT?
WHO'S GOT THE SHORTEST TEMPER?
**Nick**
He's 19 now, but Nick wears his youngest-in-the-group badge with pride. And this 6'1" reformed prankster certainly doesn't lack an
ounce of confidence. "Remember, when you're dressing me, you're dressing Shaq!" he told our wardrobe stylist.
WAS THE AGE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN YOU AND THE OTHER GUYS EVER A BIG DEAL?
SO YOU WERE ANNOYING ON PURPOSE?
HOW WOULD YOU DESCRIBE YOURSELF NOW?
SO WHAT DO YOU DO WHEN YOU'RE OFF?
DO YOU HAVE YOUR OWN PLACE? Y
DO YOU HAVE A GIRLFRIEND?
HOW LONG HAVE YOU BEEN SEEING HER?
WHAT DO YOU LOOK FOR IN A GIRL?
SO YOU DON'T DATE JUST GORGEOUS GIRLS?
**AJ**
If there's a hot trend of the moment, all eyes are on the multi-tattooed, pierced, wild-haired
and extensioned AJ. the 21-year-old hipster rebel considers his body his canvas, and we gotta
admit we like art.
WHY THE PINK HAIR?
HAVE YOU EVER MADE A MAKEOVER MISTAKE?
DO YOU GET AGGRAVATION FOR YOUR TATTOOS?
ARE YOU DATING SOMEONE?
WON'T SOME OF YOUR FANS BE BUMMED TO KNOW YOU'VE GOT A GIRLFRIEND?
WHAT GROSSES YOU OUT?
**Kevin**
BSB's oldest member, Kevin is always focused and ready to work. "C'mon, let's go," the
27-year-old says in an effort to round up
the rest of the guys. "So is Kevin the ringleader?" someone asks. "HE wants to be!" Brian
shoots back.
AS THE OLDEST IN THE GROUP, DO YOU ACT BIG BROTHERISH TO THE REST OF THE GUYS?
ANYBODY EVER THREATEN TO LEAVE THE GROUP?
WHAT WOULD YOU DO IF YOU LOST YOUR HAIR?
IF YOUR MANAGER SAID," WHAT'S WITH THE EYEBROWS? WE GOTTA CHANGE THEM, "WOULD YOU?"
WHAT DO YOU DO IN YOUR FREE TIME?
DO YOU HAVE A GIRLFRIEND?
I KNOW YOU WENT THROUGH A TOUGH TIME LOSING YOUR DAD.
DID IT SAVE YOU?
DO YOU DREAM ABOUT GOING TO YOUR HIGH SCHOOL REUNION AND SAYING, "CHECK ME OUT!"?
ARE THEY GONNA MAKE YOU GET UP AND PERFORM?
CAN YOU BE DOING THIS IN SIX YEARS WITH THESE GUYS OR IS THERE NO WAY?
-That seems to be the big thing with the press. Now that we've gotten kinda successful,
they're like,"Ah, they'll be gone in a year" or "They won't last." But I feel like as long as
we keep making hit records and nobody gets thrown in jail or goes crazy, we can make records
as long as we want.
Nick Carter and Howie Dorough asked who they were. Without missing
a beat, Howie answered, "We're in a church choir group." Keeping
totally straight faces, Nick and Howie told her they were former
juvenile deliquents who once saw some kids fighting on a "backstreet".
Instead if joining the brawl, they started singing, and would ya
believe, it stopped the fight? They told her it was an omen, so now
they travel the world singing as the Backstreet Boys. Hey it's not
often these guys aren't recognized, so can you blame 'em for having
a little fun? And that's just what they deserve now that the band has
written, produced, and delivered album number two: Millennium. Teen
spent some rare downtime with AJ McLean, Brian Littrell, Kevin Richardson,
Nick and Howie and got to hear some major personal dish.
-We have our little pow-wows and our ins and outs, but we all have the same goals and we
have our plan in progress--a new album, the whole thing all over. Here we go again!
-Oh my gosh, you just stumped me. That's a first-time question, so...
-I'd rather keep my peace.
-Probably Howie.
-My girlfriend has an apartment out here. But I live in Orlando, so we're both East and West
Coast.
-You have to be very careful, Being in this business, you get a lot of friends and family
members that you never knew you had and people trying to get in touch with you. You have to
have a thicker guard.
-I try to be. A lot of people really flip out when they come into a lot of money and lots of
people look at us as being multimillionaires. Let me tell you, it's not like that. I have $20
in my wallet.
-Because my girlfriend's got the rest of it!
-Try to remain as normal as possible. I watch a lot of Sports Center and play a lot of
basketball, tennis, golf.
-Yeah, I just went for a check-up, and everything's good.
-It sometimes gets awkward. But I try to keep a normal life. I still go to the grocery store.
I go to the malls. It's very flattering when people come up and ask me for an autograph.
-I grew up in a middle-class family, and nothing was ever just given to me. I always had to
work for it. I always said if I ever made any money, I wanted to take care of my family. So I
fixed up my parents' house. We refinished the floor and put in central air and heat and fixed
some landscaping.
-I come from a large family of five kids, and I'm the baby. We're all really tight. I used to
have an apartment with Kevin and Brian, but I always ended up at my parent's house anyway.
-Not in my underpants! Boxers. But never underpants. I've got a lot of sisters, so I don't
want them seeing too much!
-The only thing I changed is the bed. I used to have one of those captain's beds that pulled
out from the bottom when you had your friends sleep over. The bed was really high and had
this circular mirror and bells like in a captain's room. It kept me down to reality. I
finally got a bigger bed, though.
-I love performing. That's where I'm most comfortable. I'm usually a little bit nervous right
before I go on or especially if I make a mistake at the beginning of the show.
-Yeah, and whoever messed up usually has a giggle on his face.
-We've has a few scraps here and there over just silly, stupid things.
-Probably Nick. Just because he's the youngest of the group and everybody's always kind of
picking on him. Now he's getting bigger...
-When we first started I was like 13, so there was a big difference between me and the next
youngest,AJ, who was 16. But I've learned a lot over the years--how to communicate, how to be
respectful and how not to be a pest, which I was when I was younger.
-Yeah, I like to get a laugh out of things. I was a prankster back then.
-I'm a very quiet person. I consider myself a modern-day hermit. I don't like to party. I'm
happy if I'm in my hotel room just chillin'.
-I play video games and sports with my friends. I got to the movies and drive around in my
car.
-Yeah, I'm a real big fan of the beach and the ocean, so my place has just about everything
to do with the ocean. It's on a small canal, so I'm thinking about getting a boat.
-I'm seeing somebody.
-That's classified. That's kind of the secret part of my life, you know?
-You don't really know until you meet the person. She could be tall, or small...
-When I was in school I wasn't very attractive to girls in school. But I remember a girl who
I dated who was sweet and really kind. I've dated girls who might now have been that
attractive, but they were just as kind and as sweet-hearted as anybody.
-The guys actually said, "Why don't you dye you hair pink?" I was shocked. These guys are
used to it now, and it kind of ticks me off that nothing shocks them anymore. Like, if I dye
my hair blue, they're all, "Man, that looks cool."
-I had my hair put in braids, and I pulled it back into a ponytail. When I saw it, the first
thing I said to myself was, "What was I thinking?" I ended up taking them all out. I sat on
my butt for eight hours getting those things tied in my head and it didn't even pay off! I
looked absolutely stupid.
-I don't care. I'm the complete opposite of every clean-cut, decent-looking guy you could
thing of, yet I have the biggest heart in the world. I got my first tattoo two years ago, and
I haven't been able to stop. I've got 10 of them right now. I'm going to get one tomorrow on
my stomach. It'll be a 69, my lucky number.
-I just broke up with my girlfriend of five years, but I've been with my new girlfriend now
for almost nine months.
-When the group first started, we weren't supposed to have girlfriends, or if we did, we were
supposed to say that we didn't. But now it's gotten to the point where the fans accept us for
who we are and realize, "OK, these are five good-looking guys. They have to have normal
lives. Unless they're all gay"--which we're not--"they have to have girlfriends."
-I've never blown my nose. My mom probably did it when I was a baby, but I can't do it. I can
stand to see blood and puke, but when it comes to anything mucus-oriented or phlegm or
soemone spitting, I gag.
-It just happens, yeah. It's like my big brothers growing up. They were always on me about
things, but I knew that they loved me and cared about me. These guys are like family. We've
been together for six years, and we've gone through a lot together. It sounds kind of corny,
but we fight like brothers and we love each other like brothers. We've never had fist fights,
though.
-No, it's never come to that, luckily.
-I'd probably go ahead and shave it. That'd be cool. I'd probably look pretty freaky with
these big ol' eyebrows.
-I wouldn't let anybody touch my eyebrows because I don't want to look like a made-up girl or
whatever. They're big ol' Groucho Marx brows. I think you just have to be happy with what God
gives you.
-I hang out with my best friend, who's a rap artist. I co-produced some stuff with him. I
mostly do normal things like go skiing, go to the beach, surf, write music.
-I'm dating someone right now. I've known her for seven years and she really means a lot to
me, so we'll see what happens.
-I was 19 years old when he passed away. I was 21 when I met the fellas.
-It motivated me. When my father got sick I moved home to Kentucky. After he passed a way, I
lived there for almost a year, and then I was like, "I can't stand this anymore." Life is too
short. I just followed my heart, and it brought me back to Orlando.
-My reunion is coming up. I'm from a really small town in Kentucky. There were only about 100
people in my graduating in class. Everybody is really happy for me.
-Nah, I'm just going to go and hang out and catch up.