November 2, 2021 • 44 mins
What’s it like when you reach the kind of super-stardom Sudden Impact was dreaming of, and what happens when it’s all over by the time you’re 21? Dave gets the real deal from a man who lived it.
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
I've always been curious about what massive fame does to
the frontal lobe that is still being formed. And I
don't I mean, I don't even know if that is
a thing that you can pull yourself outside of yourself
to know.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
You know, you're in a candy store, so you want
more candy, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
This is a very special episode of Waiting for Impact,
because that is Joey McIntyre from New Kids on the Block.
If we're talking about boy band pop stars of the
early nineties, there is no bigger get. He was at
the pinnacle, the absolute best case scenario for the kind
of fame Sudden Impact we're preparing themselves for for a
few years, peeking it. Right around the time Sudden Impact
(00:47):
was pointing, Atcha and Hayden and Vette Nicole Brown were
singing for Michael Bivens and his Sheraton Hotel lobby. New
Kids on the Block were something more than just popular.
They were like multi platinum album stad h tour, deafening
screams of girls in the throes of puberty, huge massive
until they weren't. So then what happens.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
You're spiritually, physically, mentally handed cupcakes all day long, so
you think that's what's feeding you. So how else am
I what's the biggest cupcake?
Speaker 1 (01:22):
In nineteen ninety one, Joey was on top of the world.
But when you're on top of the world, there's really
only one direction you can go.
Speaker 2 (01:29):
When you're so high and you're at the top, any
little slip feels like it's it's over, you know what
I mean? And yeah, so and that's how it's almost
like it was like a party, you know. So for
for me as like a kid, you know, a young kid,
I was like.
Speaker 3 (01:46):
Oh man, the party's over. But wait, why what what?
Speaker 2 (01:49):
And my my buddies are like, yeah, man, I'm not
feeling it. Man, I'm going home, and I'm like.
Speaker 3 (01:54):
But but it was still what do you mean? Like
people are here and music, you know, and they're.
Speaker 1 (01:59):
Like, Joey got the fame and fortune that sudden impact
were after. So while I wait to find out if
Aaron King is going to get back to me, if
I can stop myself from screaming at Joey McIntyre, I'm
going to talk to Joey McIntyre about it, find out
if life as a teen idol was all that it
was made out to be and find out what it
did to him and what you do when the party's
(02:21):
over and you're twenty one.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
When you're fed a certain thing that's what you think
is going to sustain you, you know what I mean,
until you figure something else out.
Speaker 1 (02:32):
This is waiting for impact. A Dave Holmes Passion project.
Speaker 2 (02:50):
I join New Kids on the Block at twelve. And
by the way, is that you're a dog because that
was on the list. That is my that was on
the list that was Yeah, make sure we love you guys.
Speaker 1 (03:02):
Joey McIntyre is busting my chops because when we book
a guest, we send an email telling them to record
from a quiet place in their house, maybe put their
dogs in a crate. And I didn't put my dog
in a crate, and now my dog is barking. Joey
is also busting my chops because he's from Boston and
as we have established, that is what they do there.
But in my place in Los Angeles it is very noisy.
(03:23):
There's also there are people I think building a home
from scratch, like ten feet from my backyard. This is
an absolute sonic nightmare of a day. We'll fix it.
We'll fix it.
Speaker 3 (03:39):
I'm sorry.
Speaker 1 (03:39):
I'll fix it in post. Joey's in a parked car
outside his New York City apartment because he's got kids
and that's as quiet a place as he can find.
The idea of Joey McIntyre just being out there in public,
unguarded is crazy to me because I'm old enough to
remember when he was a teen idol back in nineteen
ninety one. The site of Joey McIntyre would make girls
(03:59):
look use their minds. It all started with a ballad
called Please Don't Go Girl in nineteen eighty eight, and
as Joey notices a framed photograph of a New York
City landmark behind me in my office, I learned something
I did not know about the video for that song.
Speaker 3 (04:14):
Oh my God. Now I'm saying is that CBGB's.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
CBGB in the Bowery in New York City was ground
zero for New York City punk music in the nineteen seventies.
It was full of noise and heroin and vomit. If
you think about the CBGB bathroom too hard, you get hepatitis.
Speaker 3 (04:32):
Fun fact, that's where we did our first video, CBGB's
Yes a Pop boy Band at CBGB's Please don't go, girl.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
Stop this. Swear to God, you stop that.
Speaker 3 (04:43):
I know, isn't that wild?
Speaker 1 (04:44):
In CBG Nobb's.
Speaker 2 (04:47):
Absolutely so the next time you see that, you'll know
and you might recognize it.
Speaker 1 (04:53):
I don't know what's funnier the fact that Joey McIntyre
thinks I watch New Kids on the Block videos regularly
or the fact that he's right. But there you go.
The tender ballad that launched the great American boy band
of the eighties and nineties was filmed on the stage
that gave us the Ramones and television Now it's a
John Varvados and now so weird. What's actually weird is
(05:13):
that I have a framed photograph of CVGB hanging in
my office because I used to live very close to
it in New York City and I never went even
once because I was scared. But Please don't Go, Girl
blew up and the hits kept coming for about three years.
New Kids were the pop group. Joey's a good example
of someone whose plans for pop music success did pan out.
So I wanted to talk to him about the whole
(05:35):
ride and whether he's glad he took it and my
friends Joey gets real.
Speaker 2 (05:40):
I joined New Kids on the Block when I was twelve. Okay,
it wasn't a cattle call. It wasn't a big American
idol search. I think a total of eight people auditioned,
so it wasn't a huge deal at the time. And
you know, for the first three years, we really although
we got to go into a studio and record, we
(06:01):
were really just you know, as an after school thing.
Speaker 1 (06:04):
In nineteen eighty four, after New Edition came back home
from their first world tour and were mailed to check
in the amount of one dollar and eighty seven cents
for their work, the group fired their manager, Maurice Starr.
Starr responded by holding auditions for a new vocal group
five members, just like New Audition, but white. He found
five guys. Joey was the last to join. They called
(06:26):
themselves Nanook at first, and they got signed to Columbia Records,
and Columbia Records said change that name. Track one on
side two of their debut album became their new name,
New Kids on the Block. That first album came out
in nineteen eighty six. It was marketed to R and
B radio stations and it tanked.
Speaker 2 (06:44):
I mean that being said, when I was fifteen, we
got a break and we were gone.
Speaker 1 (06:49):
In nineteen eighty eight, they released a second album, Hanging Tough.
It too was pushed to black audiences and it two tanked.
At least at first Columbia Records was getting ready to them,
and then Q one o five, a top forty station
in Tampa, Florida, began playing Please Don't Go Girl, and
their listeners began requesting it, so Q one o five
(07:13):
now started playing it a lot. Columbia changed their marketing
strategy and began to push the record at top forty stations.
It worked. The album Hanging Tough went on to sell
fourteen million copies. That, of course, is the title track
(07:41):
from Hanging Tough. And if you were alive and under
twenty years old in nineteen eighty nine, your arms are
up over your head right now. You're waving them back
and forth. You can't help it. It's a reflex action.
The album Hanging Tough put five singles into the top ten.
In a flash. New Kids on the Block became huge.
How huge Christmas album?
Speaker 2 (08:01):
We know what?
Speaker 4 (08:02):
Millions of girls all over the world want Santa to bring.
Speaker 1 (08:05):
Them for Christmas.
Speaker 4 (08:12):
My next guest performing the hit single Funky Funky.
Speaker 1 (08:16):
Christmas from their platinum Albune Marry Merry Christmas, Please Welcome
the New Kids of the Life. Yep, that was Arsenio Hall.
I just really wanted you to know about Funky Funky Christmas.
But New Kids' popularity was a very specific kind of popularity,
and so then for those next several years, it was
(08:39):
just adoration for you. I mean, I don't know what
I mean.
Speaker 5 (08:46):
Yes, you know what comes into my mind is like, yes,
of course, of course you know it was adoration, but
you're also it's also us against the world, you know
what I mean.
Speaker 2 (08:56):
It's like when you're coming up and I want to say,
it seems more so back then because it feels more romantic.
Speaker 3 (09:03):
It's almost like a movie, like we're going to show
the world. You know. I don't mean this in.
Speaker 2 (09:07):
A heartless way, because we were defending ourselves back then
a lot, some of us more than others, you know,
But like it's called life, you know, it's called life
where humans on the earth, we're not perfect. We give
each other a hard time, like you know, back then,
we didn't have any.
Speaker 3 (09:25):
Critics on our side, you know what I mean? But
we had the greatest fans in the world.
Speaker 1 (09:29):
Those fans, mostly very young girls, would go on to
buy over seventy million New Kids records in nineteen ninety one.
New Kids were on top. So where personally was Joey?
Who was Joey McIntyre in nineteen ninety one?
Speaker 2 (09:43):
Oh boy, You know, I hesitate because of course you
want the truth and you just want whatever it feels genuine.
Speaker 3 (09:57):
You know, I want to say something perfect.
Speaker 2 (10:01):
I want to say that I was X in nineteen
ninety one, and it fits in perfect with the fact
that I was in one of the biggest pop bands
in the world at the time, and you know, really
at the height and playing stadiums, and you know, certainly
before we kind of like imploded in our beautiful way.
(10:22):
But ninety one, you know, I was eighteen. I was
a little bird man, you know. I there is definitely
some arrested development as far as I am concerned, and
I think that has a lot to do with being
very busy and famous as a teenager.
Speaker 1 (10:41):
Yeah, you said there was some arrested development.
Speaker 3 (10:43):
What do you mean, Well, I don't know.
Speaker 2 (10:45):
I mean, I mean, I say that in comparison to
what I see kids now and how full they are
as people at such a young age.
Speaker 3 (10:55):
I don't see myself that way.
Speaker 2 (10:58):
I think again, maybe that was just because I didn't
go to high school and I didn't have the normal
teenage angsty journey of figuring things out at the same time.
Every time we hear about high school, everyone refers to
it as the worst time in their lives.
Speaker 3 (11:17):
So I mean, I don't Maybe I.
Speaker 1 (11:19):
Dodged a bullet there, but I.
Speaker 3 (11:22):
Don't know it. Just a lot happened to me at
that age.
Speaker 1 (11:28):
Yeah, but I know you now, and you are well
adjusted and put together as far as I can tell.
You're laughing.
Speaker 3 (11:38):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (11:39):
New Kids' third album, step by Step, came out in
nineteen ninety, and it sold three million copies. Still a
big hit, just a lot fewer millions than Hanging Tough.
It was a precarious time for the band, and they
got offered a huge and risky gig. Tell me about
the super Bowl halftime show.
Speaker 3 (11:55):
Oh geez.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
From today's perspective, the super Bowl halftime show seems like
a real coup, a spot for a Springsteen or a
U two or a Katie Perran Left Shark. Now it's
a gig that puts an official stamp on you, says
you are iconic. But up until nineteen ninety one, no
current pop stars had ever played the halftime show. Pre
nineteen ninety one, it was still up with People or
(12:18):
the Grambling State Marching Band or I'm serious here Carol Channing.
The nineteen ninety halftime show featured Master of Presta digitation
Elvis Presto, doing a three D card trick. Sponsored by
diet Coke. The super Bowl is the biggest television event
of the year, more than one hundred million pairs of
eyes on you. I mean, that's the peak.
Speaker 3 (12:40):
No, that was the cliff.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
In nineteen ninety one, New Kids had just come off
their Magic Summer Tour sponsored by Coke, one of the
biggest selling tours of the decade. There were New Kids
on the Block t shirts, there were New Kids on
the Block lunchboxes, there were New Kids on the Block dolls.
There was a New Kids on the Block Saturday Morning
cartoon for God's Sake, and then my favorite, there was
a New Kids on the Block hotline nine hundred nine
(13:04):
oh nine five Kids are New Kids on the Block.
Fans could call and listen to a recording two dollars
for the first minute, forty five cents each additional minute
under eighteen, ask your parents for permission call, And just
to give you a sense of how this thing was
being marketed, I need you to hear this line from
Joey McIntyre. You know, we're not too young to fall
in love.
Speaker 2 (13:24):
And if you don't wanted the special callers, you get
to talk to us live.
Speaker 1 (13:27):
Hang on the line at forty five cents each additional minute,
and eventually I might come on and fall in love
with you. New kids were raking it in, but all
that money wasn't free.
Speaker 2 (13:37):
Everything happened so fast, you know, so when we talk
about you know, we started talking about us at CBGB's
and you think, what are new kids on the block
filming a video and one of the most hallowed rock
and roll clubs of all time.
Speaker 3 (13:51):
But like we were city kids, you know what I mean.
We were a black and white movie, you know.
Speaker 2 (13:56):
And you look at those first four videos and they're
completely genuine, and they they that's.
Speaker 3 (14:03):
What drew people to us.
Speaker 2 (14:06):
And then you know, the business said, wait a minute,
your fans are five years old. Your colors should be fluorescent,
pink and green, and yellow, not black and white. And
then by the six months later, we said, why are
their slippers with our face on them?
Speaker 3 (14:21):
You know what I mean? Like?
Speaker 2 (14:23):
And we was still at any era in nineteen ninety one.
In nineteen ninety that like, it just got away from us.
And it didn't mean that the managers were bad people.
They weren't trying to steal from us. It just got
away from us and happened too fast.
Speaker 1 (14:37):
New kids on the Block wanted to grow up. The
nineteen ninety one Super Bowl halftime show was marketed as
the first all Kids Halftime show, A small world salute
to twenty five years of the Super Bowl, brought to
you by Walt Disney World, and it is something else.
A cast of actual children, small children playing cheerleaders, referees,
(14:57):
and players in a choreographed SLA appstick football game coached
by Roger Rabbit and Goofy people in Chippendale Rescue Rangers
costumes do the Running Man to MC hammers, you can't
touch this. A five year old boy with a bowl
cut sings win Beneath My Wings to the men and
women of the Armed Forces. And then new Kids on
the Block come out and literally two thousand children in
(15:19):
the costumes of our small world run at them. As
I watch this, I realize this halftime show is why
we now have halftime shows with Springsteen and YouTube and
Katy Perry and Left Shark. This one is corny. This
is the one that makes the NFL say, how about
we change course? Here? New Kids on the Block had
the same discussion.
Speaker 2 (15:40):
We didn't want to be performing with Mickey Mouse, you
know what I'm saying. I had just turned eighteen. The
rest of the guys were twenty one, twenty two.
Speaker 1 (15:53):
That's a big difference.
Speaker 6 (15:54):
Yeah, they were ready to move on in a lot
of ways and you know, not be seen in that way,
and so, you know, in many ways, it was that
classic thing of.
Speaker 2 (16:11):
You know, the stress of the outer world was coming
in and it was really nothing personal. We stuck together
and we've certainly obviously over the years, have respected and
loved one another.
Speaker 3 (16:25):
I mean, we just kind of lucked out. But you know,
we didn't want to be there, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (16:30):
We didn't want to be in you know, white and
Gold and have Mickey Mouse and thousand and five year
olds running behind us, like we wanted to maybe not
rock out, but like do it a little differently so,
but the wave had already showed up.
Speaker 3 (16:47):
And do you say no to the Super Bowl halftime show?
Speaker 1 (16:50):
This was the Super Bowl when Whitney Houston sang the
national anthem and it went to number one. It was
at the height of Operation Desert Storm, the original Iraq War.
Before they rebooted the franchise in two thousand and three,
America had war fever. In nineteen ninety one, newscasters like
Arthur Kent and I Swear to God Wolf Blitzer became
heart throbs and in wartime, if you're lucky, sometimes you
(17:13):
dodge a bullet. ABC, who aired the Super Bowl that year,
knew how good war is for ratings, so at the
end of the first half they cut away to a
news package about Operation Desert Storm. They didn't air the
halftime show. Some ABC affiliates did air the halftime show
after the game, but most didn't. Most just went to
the premiere of the big new comedy that the network
(17:35):
was so proud of they gave it the plumb post
super Bowl spot, Davis Rules, starring Randy Quaid and Jonathan Winters.
New Kids on the Block got the biggest stage in
the world, on the highest rated television event of the year,
in a show that was extremely corny and almost nobody
saw it. But the tension in the group was growing
(17:55):
and the culture was changing. As Chris Malanfei told us
in the last episode, the pop charts were beginning to
more accurately reflect America's tastes in music. We were starting
to want something darker, more experimental. The alternative radio format
artists like Nirvana, Pearl Jams, Soundgarden was blowing up. Hip
hop was going mainstream, and the music New Kids on
(18:16):
the Block was releasing wasn't cutting it.
Speaker 3 (18:18):
MTV just almost changed, like you know, overnight.
Speaker 1 (18:23):
It really did. It really did, And I'm wondering what
that feels like to a massive pop act. Did you
feel like, oh, oh boy, we might not be a
part of what's next.
Speaker 2 (18:37):
No, I think, you know, I think it's more specific.
I think I think our journey is just more personal.
When you talk about the music and you think of
the Hanging Tough album and the way we recorded that record,
with the soul and the integrity and the time and
(18:58):
the fun and the work it, you know, we never
felt like, wow, how did that happen? Like we knew
that we put the work in and then, you know,
because it was like everything else, because we were so popular,
you got to rush out the next album. You know,
ours do that all the time, and they still do.
(19:18):
They still do, you know, and they swear it's a
good album, but everyone's everybody and everyone plays along with it,
but it's not.
Speaker 3 (19:26):
Really as good as the one that really took off.
Do you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2 (19:32):
It's like you get a freeze in, like Billy listen, listen,
let me, let me get whatever, because no one cares anyways.
But Billie Eilish, you know that that single, I can't
even name it. You know, I'm not a friend that
than anyone. You know, that's an album cut from the
album before. That's not the next hit record. But everybody's
(19:53):
gonna play it, yeah, you know, because they love her.
Speaker 3 (19:56):
The record's not as good, you know. So it's that
that's just the way it works, you know.
Speaker 2 (20:02):
Shots fired against Billy Iowa, shots fired.
Speaker 1 (20:05):
Yeah, I know she's yeah, nobody cares, thank god, so
so you know.
Speaker 2 (20:15):
But my point is is, obviously, you know, our second
album on the third album, but our album have to
hang it tough.
Speaker 3 (20:21):
Step By step was a massive record, that was a
great hit record. Jordan's saying an amazing lead.
Speaker 2 (20:27):
It was awesome, But the album didn't have the thing
because we were rushing it.
Speaker 3 (20:31):
We were recording it in the hotels. We weren't on the.
Speaker 2 (20:34):
Same page creatively, you know. So it wasn't Nirvana that
did it, it was us that did it. So I
felt I never connected our fall if you will, with
Nirvana and grunge.
Speaker 1 (20:49):
New Kids on the Block had stuck together through the
struggle for success, through NonStop touring, through being adored by
young girls and vilified by critics, through that hotline. But
the dress of trying to decide what to do next
while they were on the mountaintop and any tiny misstep
could send them tumbling down was tearing them apart. At
the nineteen ninety American Music Awards, New Kids on the
(21:11):
Block won Best Duo or Group and Best Album for
Hanging Tough. They performed a big medley of their hits
the nineteen ninety one American Music Awards, first of All,
were hosted by Keenan, Ivory Wallians and Bart Simpson.
Speaker 3 (21:25):
I'm really confused, man, where's the host of this sting?
Speaker 2 (21:29):
Honey? Where's that Keen and Ivory Wayans, where is he?
I'm not supposed to do the host here, William? Then
I throw that top.
Speaker 1 (21:36):
Yeah, that's the show. That is Nancy Cartwright, the woman
who does the voice for Bart Simpson, saying words that
are being acted out by someone in a Bart Simpson's suit.
It is terrifying. But at those nineteen ninety one American
Music Awards, New Kids wanted to go a little harder in.
Speaker 3 (21:53):
Our performance that year. You talk about change.
Speaker 2 (21:56):
If you go from our performance at the America Music
Awards in nineteen ninety to our performance in nineteen ninety one,
talk about a sea change. Because we were into hip hop,
we were into different music, so we wanted we wanted
a different look and vibe as well, you know.
Speaker 1 (22:14):
So they performed Games, a hip hoppy single from their
No More Games remix album. Flavor. Flav made an appearance.
Donny Wohlberg wore a War Sucks tank top and sent
the performance out to no good enough away, But I'm
gonna tell you what. We are going out like that,
(22:38):
and it felt a little defensive, and on the inside,
Joey was beginning to panic. They were up for Best
Duo or group again. But unlike last year, when winning
had been an honor, winning this year felt like a
matter of life and death.
Speaker 2 (22:54):
It was us and Arosmith and someone else, you know.
And I just remember, like Danny was next to me,
and I was like, man, you know, I just had
the idea that like, if we won, then it would
give us another year, you know what I mean.
Speaker 3 (23:07):
I think Aerosmith won. We didn't win, you know, but
I'm like, it's over if we don't win, you know
what I mean.
Speaker 1 (23:12):
Aerosmith did win. The other nominee in the category, by
the way, was Bell BIV Devo. In nineteen ninety three,
New Kids on the Block shortened their name to NKOTB,
which I'm going to be a dick and point out
is the same number of syllables, and released the album
Face the Music. Face the Music sold one hundred and
thirty six thousand copies in the States, total, about what
(23:33):
Hanging Tough would have sold in a single week three
years earlier, and the single Dirty Dog Dawg didn't make
the top forty. Jonathan Knight left the band due to
extreme stage fright. The remaining four soldiered on for a
few months and then decided to call it a day themselves.
The New Kids on the Block party was over. Joey
was twenty one, a young man raised on cupcakes.
Speaker 2 (23:57):
I think of often I had. It was just when
The New Kids broke up and I jumped right into
a movie. It was called The Fantastic because it was
based off the Off Broadway longest off probably running show.
Speaker 3 (24:11):
And I didn't think much of it.
Speaker 2 (24:13):
And I had a publicist at the time, and I
think it was like with ET or something, they were
going to be like the ten hottest you know, young
actors or whatever, you know, potentially, you know what I mean.
Do an interview with this guy and I remember like
what he said, what do you want? And my answer
was incredibly superficial. It was incredibly sugary and like a cupcake.
(24:40):
I said, I want to billboard on Sunset Boulevard, I
want to be on the coverage EQ, and I want
to be on David Letterman.
Speaker 3 (24:47):
And I could in retrospect I heard it.
Speaker 2 (24:50):
It was like I heard the silence on the end
of the phone from the decent guy. But he was
a journalist, you know what I mean, And it wasn't
it was it was not the deep answer he looked for,
and you know, he went back to his editor and said,
he's not a guy.
Speaker 1 (25:08):
Joey didn't know what he wanted and he didn't know
how to relax.
Speaker 3 (25:11):
It's like a breakup.
Speaker 2 (25:12):
They say it takes half as long of the relationship
to get over it.
Speaker 5 (25:19):
You know.
Speaker 2 (25:20):
So if we were together, if we had like, you know,
six or seven strong years, you know, we needed a
few years to just zone out and you know, have
a lost weekend. And you know, I remember talking to Donnie.
It's like along the way and we share a work
ethic too, and you know, we just come from working
class families. And he basically said, like there were times
(25:43):
where you you would have to defend playing around a
golf you know, because like, am I doing enough? Am
I retired at twenty one? And it felt slothy, It
felt you know, there were moments of like.
Speaker 3 (25:59):
What am I doing?
Speaker 2 (26:01):
Sometimes the perfect thing to do is to buy the
farm for a few years.
Speaker 1 (26:06):
You know, I know what you said you thought you
wanted in nineteen ninety one. Do you what do you
think you wanted for real in nineteen ninety one? Or
was the public answer also the private answer?
Speaker 3 (26:19):
Yeah, you know, I didn't.
Speaker 2 (26:22):
Want much, you know what I mean, And maybe that's
that's why I was like, you know, I mean, it's
very clear what Donnie Wahlberg wanted, right, I mean, he
wanted to make a rap album and he did and
it was some massive hit. And now the world has
Mark Wahlberg, you know what I'm saying. So he was
just in a different place and I, I'm cut from
(26:43):
a different cloth, you know. I came up in the theater,
you know what I mean. So I wanted the next show.
I wanted the next show. I wanted the next song.
I wanted the next performance. I wanted the next stage.
That's all.
Speaker 3 (26:55):
You know. I love being on stage.
Speaker 2 (26:57):
I love to perform, so you know, and that kind
of hooked up into like, what's the party's over?
Speaker 3 (27:03):
What do you mean? Like, what come on? Man?
Speaker 2 (27:06):
Let's you know, and uh so that's it was. It
was simple. It was simple what I wanted, you know.
It wasn't wasn't a big I didn't have a lot
of big dreams in ninety one.
Speaker 1 (27:15):
My dreams in nineteen ninety one didn't necessarily include working
with Joey McIntyre on MTV in nineteen ninety nine or
seeing the New Kids on the Block Stadium tour at
least twice, and screaming my head off. But all of
those things happened, So maybe I just don't know how
to dream big enough. We'll get into all of that
in a bit. I feel like I need another viewpoint
(27:44):
on the Sudden Impact moment. I know how I reacted
to the Motown Philly video as a twenty year old guy,
but I want to know how it played for the
younger women who also comprised a big part of the
MTV VH one be Et audience. Really, more than anything,
what I want is an excuse used to talk to
Winter Mitchell. She's a digital branding expert, a journalist, a
(28:04):
cultural omnivore like me, and she's the co host of
the excellent podcast Waiting to Exhale. Winter Mitchell, can you
tell me what you're seeing?
Speaker 4 (28:13):
I'm looking at the Boys to Men Boys to Men
Motown Philly official video, and a white a group of
white males called Sudden Impact just flashed across the screen.
Speaker 1 (28:27):
Yes they did, Yes they did. Do you remember seeing
this video in nineteen ninety one oh one hundred percent.
Speaker 4 (28:35):
I was a very very big Boys to Men fan,
I rooted for them. If I want to talk about
like the black you know, harmonizing group universe that sort
of like that Motown Philly what do you call that
new Jack swing that came out? But I also want
to talk about the universe of R and B like
guys singing groups that look like bank tellers, and I
(28:58):
feel like they were like the top of that with
the ones at the very bottom, the ones that saying
I want to sex you have color me bad. So
they were like of the black of the not the
black of the bank teller singing harmonizing group.
Speaker 7 (29:15):
They were like the kings and champions of that. I love.
Speaker 1 (29:17):
They were fully in the Alex Vanderpool era. Yes, as
the crawl in the video tells you, Yeah, they were
all turned out in sport coats and shorts right right,
fresh summer idea. There's a lot of visual information in
the Motown Philly video. There's all the East Coast family stuff.
(29:38):
There are references to Temple University and to the Performing
Arts High school where boys and men came together. There's
a scene at Geno's Stakes, and at a couple of
different moments, words across the bottom of the screen say
coming soon, the Alex Vanderpool era. This is a reference
to a character on All My Children at the time,
a preppy nerd named Alfred Vanderpool. In the liner for
(30:00):
Boys to Men's debut album, the guys are listed by
their names and by the nicknames Michael Bivens wanted them
to be known by. So wan Ye was squirt, Sean
was Slim bass voice, Mike was just bass, and Nathan,
the preppiest member of the group was Alex Vanderpool. The
nicknames didn't really stick and nobody seemed to press the issue,
but it speaks to Michael Bivens' ambition in the world
(30:22):
of marketing. He was always looking for a way for
the listener to connect to the music and to the artist,
a way to build buzz, which is what he was
doing with Sudden Impact here. So did it work. Did
Sudden Impact make an impact on you as a young viewer?
Speaker 4 (30:39):
Absolutely not, No, no, because I wasn't thinking. Here's what
you need to understand, David. This era was coming in
like a.
Speaker 7 (30:50):
Steamroller, so like this trying to.
Speaker 4 (30:53):
Sort of pick up where the new kids on the
block were slowly fallen off. Era was just that era
came to a fast like end that was just like
like done, And so I don't think Sudden Impact had
a chance.
Speaker 1 (31:09):
And help I tell Winter about my obsession with this story,
what I've learned about Vet, Nicole Brown and Hayden, and
what Michael Bivens was building with the East Coast family,
and how weird it is to me that Sudden Impact
never had their moment. But Winter was young in nineteen
ninety one, so to her it makes perfect sense.
Speaker 7 (31:27):
As compelling as a story you told me was. There
was never.
Speaker 4 (31:31):
Any moment that they were going to pop off. There
was just when they pop up on the screen. Again,
the bank Teller aesthetic works because it was like, we're
not super sexy, but you can bring us home to
your parents and they will be like, that's a nice guy.
(31:52):
He's cute, he.
Speaker 7 (31:53):
Seems like a good guy for you.
Speaker 4 (31:55):
That aesthetic to me where like all of these sort
of like it was like the this is of Jodasy,
which is like, you don't want these guys coming near
your daughters, but boys to men will take you to prom.
Speaker 7 (32:08):
And there was the whole Waanyi and Brandy of it.
Speaker 4 (32:11):
All these white guys don't offense, These white guys.
Speaker 7 (32:15):
But they're in that two second moment.
Speaker 4 (32:18):
While I remember it, it didn't create a sudden impact
and it was never going to. They just didn't have
the esthetics, no offense to them.
Speaker 1 (32:28):
The missing piece of the puzzle is what Michael Bivens
was thinking signing them at this moment, as new kids
on the Block were huge? Was there a moment of
new kids on the block was coming for us? Now
I'm coming for them?
Speaker 7 (32:40):
Of course.
Speaker 4 (32:41):
I mean in nineteen ninety they were the big new
kids on the block, was the biggest group in town,
in the world.
Speaker 1 (32:48):
They were huge.
Speaker 7 (32:49):
I mean, you couldn't get bigger than that.
Speaker 4 (32:51):
So seeing an opportunity for competition, and also from Michael
Bibbins's perspective, I don't know him, I'm not speaking on
his behalf, but considering that Bobby was on his way
to you know by now what he was almost married
to Whitney. He was a fantastic solo artist. At this point,
they didn't know what their legacy was.
Speaker 1 (33:10):
Going to be.
Speaker 4 (33:11):
He was taking a chance on anything, and I think
he was trying to capture wherever.
Speaker 7 (33:17):
It was going to be.
Speaker 4 (33:17):
So like young boys that are like street boys who
can harmonize these you know good like college going, you
know young adult men who can harmonize. Like he was
just trying to capture whatever it is on top of
what was he was creating with BBD.
Speaker 1 (33:34):
While I was working on this show, Waiting for Impact,
a Dave Holmes passion project, a docu series called This
Is Pop came out on Netflix, a bunch of one
hour episodes, each one featuring a different pop act. There's
a Boys to Men episode that I watched, and something
that really jumps out at me is how much work
Boys to Men had to do to get ready for
their big break. They didn't even meet Michael Bivens. They
(33:55):
didn't even try to sing for him until they knew
they were the best. We don't know whether Sudden Impact
had to do the same amount of work, or whether
they got a leg up because they were handsome white
guys who looked a little like new kids on the block.
We can't know for sure what Michael Bivens was thinking
or to what degree race factored into his decision to
work with them, But in twenty twenty one, we have
(34:15):
to ask the question, mostly because we haven't heard them.
Speaker 7 (34:19):
The problem with this all is that I have no
idea if they're good or not. I'm not Michael.
Speaker 4 (34:24):
Bivens, So I can't say from a industry perspective, as
an industry like you know, taste maker, decision maker, if they.
Speaker 7 (34:37):
Would have gone on.
Speaker 4 (34:39):
To great success, you know what I mean, Like, there's
no there's just no way to predict without really knowing.
Speaker 7 (34:46):
Second thing is, I feel really bad because.
Speaker 4 (34:49):
All America got was like two seconds of them, which
is completely amazing marketing.
Speaker 7 (34:58):
By the way, like Michael Bivens, you know, he knew
I have this, this group is going all the way.
I gotta shove in all this other stuff that I got.
Speaker 3 (35:09):
I get it.
Speaker 4 (35:10):
It's like a total like Benny Medina puff Daddy, Like
I get that sort of like ability to sort of
like make it happen, make it work.
Speaker 1 (35:20):
But yeah, we've been calling it the the Michael Bivens
extended cinematical.
Speaker 4 (35:24):
Exactly exactly, and so I get the whole point of it.
Speaker 7 (35:29):
But these guys have even had a chance. They didn't
even have a chance, and that feels really shitty. I
feel shitty for them.
Speaker 4 (35:39):
But I also, having worked in the industry this long now,
I also them.
Speaker 7 (35:44):
The breaks dims, the breaks.
Speaker 4 (35:46):
I mean, there's a lot of people we look at,
we look back on, and we, you.
Speaker 7 (35:51):
Know, wonder what happened to them?
Speaker 4 (35:52):
Remember the brew haha over Gretchen Mall that was such
a big deal and all.
Speaker 1 (35:59):
Cover of sanity fair out of nowhere.
Speaker 4 (36:02):
This is the one, This is the one. And I
couldn't pick her out of a lineup now.
Speaker 1 (36:07):
Oh yeah, you know, yeah, twenty plus years of Sienna Miller,
I still don't know which one.
Speaker 7 (36:13):
She doesn't know she is. But there is there any
way possible to redeem.
Speaker 4 (36:21):
These these these gentlemen, because I would love them to
have some redemption.
Speaker 7 (36:25):
They should, They deserve a redemptive arc.
Speaker 1 (36:27):
You know by now that I agree with Winter. It's
never too late for redemption or even just to meet
sudden impact once and for all. And it is never
the wrong time to reboot the Alex Vanderpoole era. So
let's return to the block where Joey McIntyre wants a
new kid, and one of those kinds of famous where
you can't just go next door and not be famous,
(36:48):
is now sitting in a parked car zooming with me
on his smartphone. After initially just trying to stay super
famous in the wake of New Kids on the Blocks breakup,
he took some time off, took a step back, and
regrouped breath. He returned in nineteen ninety nine with a
solo album called Stay the Same. That album got a
couple hit singles, couple videos on the TRL charts. That's
(37:09):
where we met.
Speaker 2 (37:10):
Now.
Speaker 1 (37:11):
We definitely did episodes of Total Request live together, but
I cannot find any of them. What I could find
on YouTube was this. I found a clip from a
celebrity episode of Say What Karaoke, which I am co
hosting with Jerry Springer and Joey McIntyre duets with Jamie
Lynn Sigler, Medo from the Sopranos on Aerosmith, and run
(37:32):
DMC's Walk This Way. Okay, Yeah, I typed those words.
I said them out loud. I am now looking at
them and they still don't make any sense to me.
Joey got back into theater, playing the lead in Jonathan
Larson's Tick Tick Boom off Broadway, which I went to
see and his performance made me cry so hard. People
turned and looked. That is not a joke. He started
touring again theaters, this time instead of arenas, different more
(37:55):
intimate experiences. He got back on track, back to doing
the things he loved, except this time with a feeling
of gratitude for them. Did you have a sense for
what twenty twenty one would look like for you in
nineteen ninety Nah?
Speaker 3 (38:08):
No, No, I mean you know I love live performance, man.
I mean I love to make records too.
Speaker 2 (38:15):
I mean I do love to sing in a studio
and write music and that that electricity that you get
about songwriting, and oh man, this is good, you know
what I mean. And let me keep trying, and let
me keep swinging at it and let me get the
vocal and make some magic. But like if I'm doing
(38:36):
Shakespeare in New Jersey, I mean, it's a beautiful theater.
But like if I'm if I'm doing Shakespeare and it's
paying seven hundred bucks a week, then I'm good, you
know what I mean.
Speaker 3 (38:45):
That's that's my journey. Like I've earned that. That's what
i want to.
Speaker 2 (38:49):
Do, you know, and I'll always have it, Like I
love an intimate setting and I and I'm lucky enough
to play arenas too.
Speaker 1 (38:56):
So yeah, and two thousand and eight, New Kids on
the Block got back together, and in the last few
years they've played big summer package tours with Nelly and
TLC or Tiffany, Debbie Gibson and Salt and Peppa. I
have been to these summer shows and they are insane.
Those five year old girls who rushed the Super Bowl
stage in nineteen ninety one, they're thirty five now. They
(39:18):
got a babysitter at home and a plastic tumbler of
Pinogregio in their hands. They are ready to throw down.
And I mean this from the bottom of my heart.
If you get a chance to see New Kids live, go,
I wouldn't have thought in nineteen ninety one that, in
you know, twenty nineteen, twenty twenty, I'd go to Hollywood
Bowl and see New Kids on the Block. Ye half
the time of my life.
Speaker 2 (39:37):
Yeah, but I did, Yeah, and we do. You know,
I think the quick math is number one. Take fourteen
years off, you know, as a group and as a band,
because you know, so many bands could have to certain
degrees similar experiences, but they don't because bands don't stay
(39:57):
together for a lot of different reasons, you know. And
we were able to move on.
Speaker 8 (40:05):
And have lives and then get back together fifteen years later,
and you know, our fans were ready to, you know,
and now we get to with time and a little maturity,
you know, we get to look back and embrace those
moments with a sense of humor, but with a lot
of love and admiration for what we were able to share.
Speaker 2 (40:29):
And we benefit from this time. And now you know,
we're like family with our fans, you know. And so
you know we're not going anywhere. And you know, now
it's a combination of our work and our intention and
our connection with our fans and the right kind of
management to you know, facilitate that, you know what I mean,
(40:54):
to keep the party going in a healthy way, in
a fun way.
Speaker 1 (40:57):
Joey McIntyre got what he wanted from his life, and
all it took was being grateful for what he already had. Joe,
thank you so much. Thank you Bunny for taking the time.
Speaker 3 (41:07):
I hope you get a nugget or side where it's warm.
Sudden impact.
Speaker 1 (41:12):
Sudden impact. We're finding them. But the whole East Coast
family story is really interesting. Like people would just go
to where Bell Bivdevou was staying when they toured and
just singing Michael Bivens's face, and then sometimes he would
sign them ivette Nicole Brown, actress from Community and various
other things. She was one of them. She was a singer,
(41:34):
she was a solo act as part of the East
Coast Family. Yeah, I'll send you a video.
Speaker 2 (41:41):
Those are fun times, man, I don't think it happens
like it's almost like well Motown Philly, right, I mean
it's that motown, you know, like just get me in
front of her man, you know, and we came from.
Speaker 8 (41:53):
That, and.
Speaker 3 (41:56):
It's sweet. It's sweet.
Speaker 2 (41:58):
I'm glad you're celebrating that and kind of going back
into that world.
Speaker 3 (42:03):
So I look forward to seeing what you'll find.
Speaker 1 (42:06):
So Hayden has put in a good word for me
to Aaron Kin. I have followed up with an email
to the address that is on Aaron's YouTube channel. And
after a few days, I check my email and there
is a message from Aaron Kin. And I hesitate for
a moment before I click on it, because what if
he wants to leave this all behind him? What if
he doesn't want to talk at all? What if I'm
(42:27):
out of story and it's only episode four. It's like
that certified mail notice back when I got kicked out
of college. I know something important is in the post.
I just don't know what it is until I open
that message up. This email contains the future. I click
it open and there they are ten short words and
a lot of exclamation points. Hey Dave, yeah, that would
(42:50):
be awesome. Let me know. Oh my god, we have
made contact with Sudden Impact. We will talk to the
legendary in Kane, the man in the middle, the guy
in the bow tie. On Waiting for Impact, a Dave
Holmes passion project. This has been an exactly Right production.
(43:15):
Written by Me Dave Holmes, produced by Hannah Kyle Crichton, recorded,
mixed and sound designed by Andrew Eapen. Additional engineering and
assembly by Annalise Nelson. Music by Ben Wise, artwork by
Garrett Ross. Executive produced by Karen Kilgarriff, Georgia hart Starr
(43:35):
and Danielle Kramer. Follow the show on Instagram, Facebook, and
Twitter at exactly right and follow me at Dave Holmes.
For more information, go to exactly Rightmedia dot com. Binge
the show add free on stitchr Premium for a free month.
Head to stitcher Premium dot com, slash impact and enter
(43:56):
promo code Impact when you select a monthly plan, send
Subscribe and leave us a review on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher,
or wherever you get your podcasts.
I've always been curious about what massive fame does to
the frontal lobe that is still being formed. And I
don't I mean, I don't even know if that is
a thing that you can pull yourself outside of yourself
to know.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
You know, you're in a candy store, so you want
more candy, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
This is a very special episode of Waiting for Impact,
because that is Joey McIntyre from New Kids on the Block.
If we're talking about boy band pop stars of the
early nineties, there is no bigger get. He was at
the pinnacle, the absolute best case scenario for the kind
of fame Sudden Impact we're preparing themselves for for a
few years, peeking it. Right around the time Sudden Impact
(00:47):
was pointing, Atcha and Hayden and Vette Nicole Brown were
singing for Michael Bivens and his Sheraton Hotel lobby. New
Kids on the Block were something more than just popular.
They were like multi platinum album stad h tour, deafening
screams of girls in the throes of puberty, huge massive
until they weren't. So then what happens.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
You're spiritually, physically, mentally handed cupcakes all day long, so
you think that's what's feeding you. So how else am
I what's the biggest cupcake?
Speaker 1 (01:22):
In nineteen ninety one, Joey was on top of the world.
But when you're on top of the world, there's really
only one direction you can go.
Speaker 2 (01:29):
When you're so high and you're at the top, any
little slip feels like it's it's over, you know what
I mean? And yeah, so and that's how it's almost
like it was like a party, you know. So for
for me as like a kid, you know, a young kid,
I was like.
Speaker 3 (01:46):
Oh man, the party's over. But wait, why what what?
Speaker 2 (01:49):
And my my buddies are like, yeah, man, I'm not
feeling it. Man, I'm going home, and I'm like.
Speaker 3 (01:54):
But but it was still what do you mean? Like
people are here and music, you know, and they're.
Speaker 1 (01:59):
Like, Joey got the fame and fortune that sudden impact
were after. So while I wait to find out if
Aaron King is going to get back to me, if
I can stop myself from screaming at Joey McIntyre, I'm
going to talk to Joey McIntyre about it, find out
if life as a teen idol was all that it
was made out to be and find out what it
did to him and what you do when the party's
(02:21):
over and you're twenty one.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
When you're fed a certain thing that's what you think
is going to sustain you, you know what I mean,
until you figure something else out.
Speaker 1 (02:32):
This is waiting for impact. A Dave Holmes Passion project.
Speaker 2 (02:50):
I join New Kids on the Block at twelve. And
by the way, is that you're a dog because that
was on the list. That is my that was on
the list that was Yeah, make sure we love you guys.
Speaker 1 (03:02):
Joey McIntyre is busting my chops because when we book
a guest, we send an email telling them to record
from a quiet place in their house, maybe put their
dogs in a crate. And I didn't put my dog
in a crate, and now my dog is barking. Joey
is also busting my chops because he's from Boston and
as we have established, that is what they do there.
But in my place in Los Angeles it is very noisy.
(03:23):
There's also there are people I think building a home
from scratch, like ten feet from my backyard. This is
an absolute sonic nightmare of a day. We'll fix it.
We'll fix it.
Speaker 3 (03:39):
I'm sorry.
Speaker 1 (03:39):
I'll fix it in post. Joey's in a parked car
outside his New York City apartment because he's got kids
and that's as quiet a place as he can find.
The idea of Joey McIntyre just being out there in public,
unguarded is crazy to me because I'm old enough to
remember when he was a teen idol back in nineteen
ninety one. The site of Joey McIntyre would make girls
(03:59):
look use their minds. It all started with a ballad
called Please Don't Go Girl in nineteen eighty eight, and
as Joey notices a framed photograph of a New York
City landmark behind me in my office, I learned something
I did not know about the video for that song.
Speaker 3 (04:14):
Oh my God. Now I'm saying is that CBGB's.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
CBGB in the Bowery in New York City was ground
zero for New York City punk music in the nineteen seventies.
It was full of noise and heroin and vomit. If
you think about the CBGB bathroom too hard, you get hepatitis.
Speaker 3 (04:32):
Fun fact, that's where we did our first video, CBGB's
Yes a Pop boy Band at CBGB's Please don't go, girl.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
Stop this. Swear to God, you stop that.
Speaker 3 (04:43):
I know, isn't that wild?
Speaker 1 (04:44):
In CBG Nobb's.
Speaker 2 (04:47):
Absolutely so the next time you see that, you'll know
and you might recognize it.
Speaker 1 (04:53):
I don't know what's funnier the fact that Joey McIntyre
thinks I watch New Kids on the Block videos regularly
or the fact that he's right. But there you go.
The tender ballad that launched the great American boy band
of the eighties and nineties was filmed on the stage
that gave us the Ramones and television Now it's a
John Varvados and now so weird. What's actually weird is
(05:13):
that I have a framed photograph of CVGB hanging in
my office because I used to live very close to
it in New York City and I never went even
once because I was scared. But Please don't Go, Girl
blew up and the hits kept coming for about three years.
New Kids were the pop group. Joey's a good example
of someone whose plans for pop music success did pan out.
So I wanted to talk to him about the whole
(05:35):
ride and whether he's glad he took it and my
friends Joey gets real.
Speaker 2 (05:40):
I joined New Kids on the Block when I was twelve. Okay,
it wasn't a cattle call. It wasn't a big American
idol search. I think a total of eight people auditioned,
so it wasn't a huge deal at the time. And
you know, for the first three years, we really although
we got to go into a studio and record, we
(06:01):
were really just you know, as an after school thing.
Speaker 1 (06:04):
In nineteen eighty four, after New Edition came back home
from their first world tour and were mailed to check
in the amount of one dollar and eighty seven cents
for their work, the group fired their manager, Maurice Starr.
Starr responded by holding auditions for a new vocal group
five members, just like New Audition, but white. He found
five guys. Joey was the last to join. They called
(06:26):
themselves Nanook at first, and they got signed to Columbia Records,
and Columbia Records said change that name. Track one on
side two of their debut album became their new name,
New Kids on the Block. That first album came out
in nineteen eighty six. It was marketed to R and
B radio stations and it tanked.
Speaker 2 (06:44):
I mean that being said, when I was fifteen, we
got a break and we were gone.
Speaker 1 (06:49):
In nineteen eighty eight, they released a second album, Hanging Tough.
It too was pushed to black audiences and it two tanked.
At least at first Columbia Records was getting ready to them,
and then Q one o five, a top forty station
in Tampa, Florida, began playing Please Don't Go Girl, and
their listeners began requesting it, so Q one o five
(07:13):
now started playing it a lot. Columbia changed their marketing
strategy and began to push the record at top forty stations.
It worked. The album Hanging Tough went on to sell
fourteen million copies. That, of course, is the title track
(07:41):
from Hanging Tough. And if you were alive and under
twenty years old in nineteen eighty nine, your arms are
up over your head right now. You're waving them back
and forth. You can't help it. It's a reflex action.
The album Hanging Tough put five singles into the top ten.
In a flash. New Kids on the Block became huge.
How huge Christmas album?
Speaker 2 (08:01):
We know what?
Speaker 4 (08:02):
Millions of girls all over the world want Santa to bring.
Speaker 1 (08:05):
Them for Christmas.
Speaker 4 (08:12):
My next guest performing the hit single Funky Funky.
Speaker 1 (08:16):
Christmas from their platinum Albune Marry Merry Christmas, Please Welcome
the New Kids of the Life. Yep, that was Arsenio Hall.
I just really wanted you to know about Funky Funky Christmas.
But New Kids' popularity was a very specific kind of popularity,
and so then for those next several years, it was
(08:39):
just adoration for you. I mean, I don't know what
I mean.
Speaker 5 (08:46):
Yes, you know what comes into my mind is like, yes,
of course, of course you know it was adoration, but
you're also it's also us against the world, you know
what I mean.
Speaker 2 (08:56):
It's like when you're coming up and I want to say,
it seems more so back then because it feels more romantic.
Speaker 3 (09:03):
It's almost like a movie, like we're going to show
the world. You know. I don't mean this in.
Speaker 2 (09:07):
A heartless way, because we were defending ourselves back then
a lot, some of us more than others, you know,
But like it's called life, you know, it's called life
where humans on the earth, we're not perfect. We give
each other a hard time, like you know, back then,
we didn't have any.
Speaker 3 (09:25):
Critics on our side, you know what I mean? But
we had the greatest fans in the world.
Speaker 1 (09:29):
Those fans, mostly very young girls, would go on to
buy over seventy million New Kids records in nineteen ninety one.
New Kids were on top. So where personally was Joey?
Who was Joey McIntyre in nineteen ninety one?
Speaker 2 (09:43):
Oh boy, You know, I hesitate because of course you
want the truth and you just want whatever it feels genuine.
Speaker 3 (09:57):
You know, I want to say something perfect.
Speaker 2 (10:01):
I want to say that I was X in nineteen
ninety one, and it fits in perfect with the fact
that I was in one of the biggest pop bands
in the world at the time, and you know, really
at the height and playing stadiums, and you know, certainly
before we kind of like imploded in our beautiful way.
(10:22):
But ninety one, you know, I was eighteen. I was
a little bird man, you know. I there is definitely
some arrested development as far as I am concerned, and
I think that has a lot to do with being
very busy and famous as a teenager.
Speaker 1 (10:41):
Yeah, you said there was some arrested development.
Speaker 3 (10:43):
What do you mean, Well, I don't know.
Speaker 2 (10:45):
I mean, I mean, I say that in comparison to
what I see kids now and how full they are
as people at such a young age.
Speaker 3 (10:55):
I don't see myself that way.
Speaker 2 (10:58):
I think again, maybe that was just because I didn't
go to high school and I didn't have the normal
teenage angsty journey of figuring things out at the same time.
Every time we hear about high school, everyone refers to
it as the worst time in their lives.
Speaker 3 (11:17):
So I mean, I don't Maybe I.
Speaker 1 (11:19):
Dodged a bullet there, but I.
Speaker 3 (11:22):
Don't know it. Just a lot happened to me at
that age.
Speaker 1 (11:28):
Yeah, but I know you now, and you are well
adjusted and put together as far as I can tell.
You're laughing.
Speaker 3 (11:38):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (11:39):
New Kids' third album, step by Step, came out in
nineteen ninety, and it sold three million copies. Still a
big hit, just a lot fewer millions than Hanging Tough.
It was a precarious time for the band, and they
got offered a huge and risky gig. Tell me about
the super Bowl halftime show.
Speaker 3 (11:55):
Oh geez.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
From today's perspective, the super Bowl halftime show seems like
a real coup, a spot for a Springsteen or a
U two or a Katie Perran Left Shark. Now it's
a gig that puts an official stamp on you, says
you are iconic. But up until nineteen ninety one, no
current pop stars had ever played the halftime show. Pre
nineteen ninety one, it was still up with People or
(12:18):
the Grambling State Marching Band or I'm serious here Carol Channing.
The nineteen ninety halftime show featured Master of Presta digitation
Elvis Presto, doing a three D card trick. Sponsored by
diet Coke. The super Bowl is the biggest television event
of the year, more than one hundred million pairs of
eyes on you. I mean, that's the peak.
Speaker 3 (12:40):
No, that was the cliff.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
In nineteen ninety one, New Kids had just come off
their Magic Summer Tour sponsored by Coke, one of the
biggest selling tours of the decade. There were New Kids
on the Block t shirts, there were New Kids on
the Block lunchboxes, there were New Kids on the Block dolls.
There was a New Kids on the Block Saturday Morning
cartoon for God's Sake, and then my favorite, there was
a New Kids on the Block hotline nine hundred nine
(13:04):
oh nine five Kids are New Kids on the Block.
Fans could call and listen to a recording two dollars
for the first minute, forty five cents each additional minute
under eighteen, ask your parents for permission call, And just
to give you a sense of how this thing was
being marketed, I need you to hear this line from
Joey McIntyre. You know, we're not too young to fall
in love.
Speaker 2 (13:24):
And if you don't wanted the special callers, you get
to talk to us live.
Speaker 1 (13:27):
Hang on the line at forty five cents each additional minute,
and eventually I might come on and fall in love
with you. New kids were raking it in, but all
that money wasn't free.
Speaker 2 (13:37):
Everything happened so fast, you know, so when we talk
about you know, we started talking about us at CBGB's
and you think, what are new kids on the block
filming a video and one of the most hallowed rock
and roll clubs of all time.
Speaker 3 (13:51):
But like we were city kids, you know what I mean.
We were a black and white movie, you know.
Speaker 2 (13:56):
And you look at those first four videos and they're
completely genuine, and they they that's.
Speaker 3 (14:03):
What drew people to us.
Speaker 2 (14:06):
And then you know, the business said, wait a minute,
your fans are five years old. Your colors should be fluorescent,
pink and green, and yellow, not black and white. And
then by the six months later, we said, why are
their slippers with our face on them?
Speaker 3 (14:21):
You know what I mean? Like?
Speaker 2 (14:23):
And we was still at any era in nineteen ninety one.
In nineteen ninety that like, it just got away from us.
And it didn't mean that the managers were bad people.
They weren't trying to steal from us. It just got
away from us and happened too fast.
Speaker 1 (14:37):
New kids on the Block wanted to grow up. The
nineteen ninety one Super Bowl halftime show was marketed as
the first all Kids Halftime show, A small world salute
to twenty five years of the Super Bowl, brought to
you by Walt Disney World, and it is something else.
A cast of actual children, small children playing cheerleaders, referees,
(14:57):
and players in a choreographed SLA appstick football game coached
by Roger Rabbit and Goofy people in Chippendale Rescue Rangers
costumes do the Running Man to MC hammers, you can't
touch this. A five year old boy with a bowl
cut sings win Beneath My Wings to the men and
women of the Armed Forces. And then new Kids on
the Block come out and literally two thousand children in
(15:19):
the costumes of our small world run at them. As
I watch this, I realize this halftime show is why
we now have halftime shows with Springsteen and YouTube and
Katy Perry and Left Shark. This one is corny. This
is the one that makes the NFL say, how about
we change course? Here? New Kids on the Block had
the same discussion.
Speaker 2 (15:40):
We didn't want to be performing with Mickey Mouse, you
know what I'm saying. I had just turned eighteen. The
rest of the guys were twenty one, twenty two.
Speaker 1 (15:53):
That's a big difference.
Speaker 6 (15:54):
Yeah, they were ready to move on in a lot
of ways and you know, not be seen in that way,
and so, you know, in many ways, it was that
classic thing of.
Speaker 2 (16:11):
You know, the stress of the outer world was coming
in and it was really nothing personal. We stuck together
and we've certainly obviously over the years, have respected and
loved one another.
Speaker 3 (16:25):
I mean, we just kind of lucked out. But you know,
we didn't want to be there, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (16:30):
We didn't want to be in you know, white and
Gold and have Mickey Mouse and thousand and five year
olds running behind us, like we wanted to maybe not
rock out, but like do it a little differently so,
but the wave had already showed up.
Speaker 3 (16:47):
And do you say no to the Super Bowl halftime show?
Speaker 1 (16:50):
This was the Super Bowl when Whitney Houston sang the
national anthem and it went to number one. It was
at the height of Operation Desert Storm, the original Iraq War.
Before they rebooted the franchise in two thousand and three,
America had war fever. In nineteen ninety one, newscasters like
Arthur Kent and I Swear to God Wolf Blitzer became
heart throbs and in wartime, if you're lucky, sometimes you
(17:13):
dodge a bullet. ABC, who aired the Super Bowl that year,
knew how good war is for ratings, so at the
end of the first half they cut away to a
news package about Operation Desert Storm. They didn't air the
halftime show. Some ABC affiliates did air the halftime show
after the game, but most didn't. Most just went to
the premiere of the big new comedy that the network
(17:35):
was so proud of they gave it the plumb post
super Bowl spot, Davis Rules, starring Randy Quaid and Jonathan Winters.
New Kids on the Block got the biggest stage in
the world, on the highest rated television event of the year,
in a show that was extremely corny and almost nobody
saw it. But the tension in the group was growing
(17:55):
and the culture was changing. As Chris Malanfei told us
in the last episode, the pop charts were beginning to
more accurately reflect America's tastes in music. We were starting
to want something darker, more experimental. The alternative radio format
artists like Nirvana, Pearl Jams, Soundgarden was blowing up. Hip
hop was going mainstream, and the music New Kids on
(18:16):
the Block was releasing wasn't cutting it.
Speaker 3 (18:18):
MTV just almost changed, like you know, overnight.
Speaker 1 (18:23):
It really did. It really did, And I'm wondering what
that feels like to a massive pop act. Did you
feel like, oh, oh boy, we might not be a
part of what's next.
Speaker 2 (18:37):
No, I think, you know, I think it's more specific.
I think I think our journey is just more personal.
When you talk about the music and you think of
the Hanging Tough album and the way we recorded that record,
with the soul and the integrity and the time and
(18:58):
the fun and the work it, you know, we never
felt like, wow, how did that happen? Like we knew
that we put the work in and then, you know,
because it was like everything else, because we were so popular,
you got to rush out the next album. You know,
ours do that all the time, and they still do.
(19:18):
They still do, you know, and they swear it's a
good album, but everyone's everybody and everyone plays along with it,
but it's not.
Speaker 3 (19:26):
Really as good as the one that really took off.
Do you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2 (19:32):
It's like you get a freeze in, like Billy listen, listen,
let me, let me get whatever, because no one cares anyways.
But Billie Eilish, you know that that single, I can't
even name it. You know, I'm not a friend that
than anyone. You know, that's an album cut from the
album before. That's not the next hit record. But everybody's
(19:53):
gonna play it, yeah, you know, because they love her.
Speaker 3 (19:56):
The record's not as good, you know. So it's that
that's just the way it works, you know.
Speaker 2 (20:02):
Shots fired against Billy Iowa, shots fired.
Speaker 1 (20:05):
Yeah, I know she's yeah, nobody cares, thank god, so
so you know.
Speaker 2 (20:15):
But my point is is, obviously, you know, our second
album on the third album, but our album have to
hang it tough.
Speaker 3 (20:21):
Step By step was a massive record, that was a
great hit record. Jordan's saying an amazing lead.
Speaker 2 (20:27):
It was awesome, But the album didn't have the thing
because we were rushing it.
Speaker 3 (20:31):
We were recording it in the hotels. We weren't on the.
Speaker 2 (20:34):
Same page creatively, you know. So it wasn't Nirvana that
did it, it was us that did it. So I
felt I never connected our fall if you will, with
Nirvana and grunge.
Speaker 1 (20:49):
New Kids on the Block had stuck together through the
struggle for success, through NonStop touring, through being adored by
young girls and vilified by critics, through that hotline. But
the dress of trying to decide what to do next
while they were on the mountaintop and any tiny misstep
could send them tumbling down was tearing them apart. At
the nineteen ninety American Music Awards, New Kids on the
(21:11):
Block won Best Duo or Group and Best Album for
Hanging Tough. They performed a big medley of their hits
the nineteen ninety one American Music Awards, first of All,
were hosted by Keenan, Ivory Wallians and Bart Simpson.
Speaker 3 (21:25):
I'm really confused, man, where's the host of this sting?
Speaker 2 (21:29):
Honey? Where's that Keen and Ivory Wayans, where is he?
I'm not supposed to do the host here, William? Then
I throw that top.
Speaker 1 (21:36):
Yeah, that's the show. That is Nancy Cartwright, the woman
who does the voice for Bart Simpson, saying words that
are being acted out by someone in a Bart Simpson's suit.
It is terrifying. But at those nineteen ninety one American
Music Awards, New Kids wanted to go a little harder in.
Speaker 3 (21:53):
Our performance that year. You talk about change.
Speaker 2 (21:56):
If you go from our performance at the America Music
Awards in nineteen ninety to our performance in nineteen ninety one,
talk about a sea change. Because we were into hip hop,
we were into different music, so we wanted we wanted
a different look and vibe as well, you know.
Speaker 1 (22:14):
So they performed Games, a hip hoppy single from their
No More Games remix album. Flavor. Flav made an appearance.
Donny Wohlberg wore a War Sucks tank top and sent
the performance out to no good enough away, But I'm
gonna tell you what. We are going out like that,
(22:38):
and it felt a little defensive, and on the inside,
Joey was beginning to panic. They were up for Best
Duo or group again. But unlike last year, when winning
had been an honor, winning this year felt like a
matter of life and death.
Speaker 2 (22:54):
It was us and Arosmith and someone else, you know.
And I just remember, like Danny was next to me,
and I was like, man, you know, I just had
the idea that like, if we won, then it would
give us another year, you know what I mean.
Speaker 3 (23:07):
I think Aerosmith won. We didn't win, you know, but
I'm like, it's over if we don't win, you know
what I mean.
Speaker 1 (23:12):
Aerosmith did win. The other nominee in the category, by
the way, was Bell BIV Devo. In nineteen ninety three,
New Kids on the Block shortened their name to NKOTB,
which I'm going to be a dick and point out
is the same number of syllables, and released the album
Face the Music. Face the Music sold one hundred and
thirty six thousand copies in the States, total, about what
(23:33):
Hanging Tough would have sold in a single week three
years earlier, and the single Dirty Dog Dawg didn't make
the top forty. Jonathan Knight left the band due to
extreme stage fright. The remaining four soldiered on for a
few months and then decided to call it a day themselves.
The New Kids on the Block party was over. Joey
was twenty one, a young man raised on cupcakes.
Speaker 2 (23:57):
I think of often I had. It was just when
The New Kids broke up and I jumped right into
a movie. It was called The Fantastic because it was
based off the Off Broadway longest off probably running show.
Speaker 3 (24:11):
And I didn't think much of it.
Speaker 2 (24:13):
And I had a publicist at the time, and I
think it was like with ET or something, they were
going to be like the ten hottest you know, young
actors or whatever, you know, potentially, you know what I mean.
Do an interview with this guy and I remember like
what he said, what do you want? And my answer
was incredibly superficial. It was incredibly sugary and like a cupcake.
(24:40):
I said, I want to billboard on Sunset Boulevard, I
want to be on the coverage EQ, and I want
to be on David Letterman.
Speaker 3 (24:47):
And I could in retrospect I heard it.
Speaker 2 (24:50):
It was like I heard the silence on the end
of the phone from the decent guy. But he was
a journalist, you know what I mean, And it wasn't
it was it was not the deep answer he looked for,
and you know, he went back to his editor and said,
he's not a guy.
Speaker 1 (25:08):
Joey didn't know what he wanted and he didn't know
how to relax.
Speaker 3 (25:11):
It's like a breakup.
Speaker 2 (25:12):
They say it takes half as long of the relationship
to get over it.
Speaker 5 (25:19):
You know.
Speaker 2 (25:20):
So if we were together, if we had like, you know,
six or seven strong years, you know, we needed a
few years to just zone out and you know, have
a lost weekend. And you know, I remember talking to Donnie.
It's like along the way and we share a work
ethic too, and you know, we just come from working
class families. And he basically said, like there were times
(25:43):
where you you would have to defend playing around a
golf you know, because like, am I doing enough? Am
I retired at twenty one? And it felt slothy, It
felt you know, there were moments of like.
Speaker 3 (25:59):
What am I doing?
Speaker 2 (26:01):
Sometimes the perfect thing to do is to buy the
farm for a few years.
Speaker 1 (26:06):
You know, I know what you said you thought you
wanted in nineteen ninety one. Do you what do you
think you wanted for real in nineteen ninety one? Or
was the public answer also the private answer?
Speaker 3 (26:19):
Yeah, you know, I didn't.
Speaker 2 (26:22):
Want much, you know what I mean, And maybe that's
that's why I was like, you know, I mean, it's
very clear what Donnie Wahlberg wanted, right, I mean, he
wanted to make a rap album and he did and
it was some massive hit. And now the world has
Mark Wahlberg, you know what I'm saying. So he was
just in a different place and I, I'm cut from
(26:43):
a different cloth, you know. I came up in the theater,
you know what I mean. So I wanted the next show.
I wanted the next show. I wanted the next song.
I wanted the next performance. I wanted the next stage.
That's all.
Speaker 3 (26:55):
You know. I love being on stage.
Speaker 2 (26:57):
I love to perform, so you know, and that kind
of hooked up into like, what's the party's over?
Speaker 3 (27:03):
What do you mean? Like, what come on? Man?
Speaker 2 (27:06):
Let's you know, and uh so that's it was. It
was simple. It was simple what I wanted, you know.
It wasn't wasn't a big I didn't have a lot
of big dreams in ninety one.
Speaker 1 (27:15):
My dreams in nineteen ninety one didn't necessarily include working
with Joey McIntyre on MTV in nineteen ninety nine or
seeing the New Kids on the Block Stadium tour at
least twice, and screaming my head off. But all of
those things happened, So maybe I just don't know how
to dream big enough. We'll get into all of that
in a bit. I feel like I need another viewpoint
(27:44):
on the Sudden Impact moment. I know how I reacted
to the Motown Philly video as a twenty year old guy,
but I want to know how it played for the
younger women who also comprised a big part of the
MTV VH one be Et audience. Really, more than anything,
what I want is an excuse used to talk to
Winter Mitchell. She's a digital branding expert, a journalist, a
(28:04):
cultural omnivore like me, and she's the co host of
the excellent podcast Waiting to Exhale. Winter Mitchell, can you
tell me what you're seeing?
Speaker 4 (28:13):
I'm looking at the Boys to Men Boys to Men
Motown Philly official video, and a white a group of
white males called Sudden Impact just flashed across the screen.
Speaker 1 (28:27):
Yes they did, Yes they did. Do you remember seeing
this video in nineteen ninety one oh one hundred percent.
Speaker 4 (28:35):
I was a very very big Boys to Men fan,
I rooted for them. If I want to talk about
like the black you know, harmonizing group universe that sort
of like that Motown Philly what do you call that
new Jack swing that came out? But I also want
to talk about the universe of R and B like
guys singing groups that look like bank tellers, and I
(28:58):
feel like they were like the top of that with
the ones at the very bottom, the ones that saying
I want to sex you have color me bad. So
they were like of the black of the not the
black of the bank teller singing harmonizing group.
Speaker 7 (29:15):
They were like the kings and champions of that. I love.
Speaker 1 (29:17):
They were fully in the Alex Vanderpool era. Yes, as
the crawl in the video tells you, Yeah, they were
all turned out in sport coats and shorts right right,
fresh summer idea. There's a lot of visual information in
the Motown Philly video. There's all the East Coast family stuff.
(29:38):
There are references to Temple University and to the Performing
Arts High school where boys and men came together. There's
a scene at Geno's Stakes, and at a couple of
different moments, words across the bottom of the screen say
coming soon, the Alex Vanderpool era. This is a reference
to a character on All My Children at the time,
a preppy nerd named Alfred Vanderpool. In the liner for
(30:00):
Boys to Men's debut album, the guys are listed by
their names and by the nicknames Michael Bivens wanted them
to be known by. So wan Ye was squirt, Sean
was Slim bass voice, Mike was just bass, and Nathan,
the preppiest member of the group was Alex Vanderpool. The
nicknames didn't really stick and nobody seemed to press the issue,
but it speaks to Michael Bivens' ambition in the world
(30:22):
of marketing. He was always looking for a way for
the listener to connect to the music and to the artist,
a way to build buzz, which is what he was
doing with Sudden Impact here. So did it work. Did
Sudden Impact make an impact on you as a young viewer?
Speaker 4 (30:39):
Absolutely not, No, no, because I wasn't thinking. Here's what
you need to understand, David. This era was coming in
like a.
Speaker 7 (30:50):
Steamroller, so like this trying to.
Speaker 4 (30:53):
Sort of pick up where the new kids on the
block were slowly fallen off. Era was just that era
came to a fast like end that was just like
like done, And so I don't think Sudden Impact had
a chance.
Speaker 1 (31:09):
And help I tell Winter about my obsession with this story,
what I've learned about Vet, Nicole Brown and Hayden, and
what Michael Bivens was building with the East Coast family,
and how weird it is to me that Sudden Impact
never had their moment. But Winter was young in nineteen
ninety one, so to her it makes perfect sense.
Speaker 7 (31:27):
As compelling as a story you told me was. There
was never.
Speaker 4 (31:31):
Any moment that they were going to pop off. There
was just when they pop up on the screen. Again,
the bank Teller aesthetic works because it was like, we're
not super sexy, but you can bring us home to
your parents and they will be like, that's a nice guy.
(31:52):
He's cute, he.
Speaker 7 (31:53):
Seems like a good guy for you.
Speaker 4 (31:55):
That aesthetic to me where like all of these sort
of like it was like the this is of Jodasy,
which is like, you don't want these guys coming near
your daughters, but boys to men will take you to prom.
Speaker 7 (32:08):
And there was the whole Waanyi and Brandy of it.
Speaker 4 (32:11):
All these white guys don't offense, These white guys.
Speaker 7 (32:15):
But they're in that two second moment.
Speaker 4 (32:18):
While I remember it, it didn't create a sudden impact
and it was never going to. They just didn't have
the esthetics, no offense to them.
Speaker 1 (32:28):
The missing piece of the puzzle is what Michael Bivens
was thinking signing them at this moment, as new kids
on the Block were huge? Was there a moment of
new kids on the block was coming for us? Now
I'm coming for them?
Speaker 7 (32:40):
Of course.
Speaker 4 (32:41):
I mean in nineteen ninety they were the big new
kids on the block, was the biggest group in town,
in the world.
Speaker 1 (32:48):
They were huge.
Speaker 7 (32:49):
I mean, you couldn't get bigger than that.
Speaker 4 (32:51):
So seeing an opportunity for competition, and also from Michael
Bibbins's perspective, I don't know him, I'm not speaking on
his behalf, but considering that Bobby was on his way
to you know by now what he was almost married
to Whitney. He was a fantastic solo artist. At this point,
they didn't know what their legacy was.
Speaker 1 (33:10):
Going to be.
Speaker 4 (33:11):
He was taking a chance on anything, and I think
he was trying to capture wherever.
Speaker 7 (33:17):
It was going to be.
Speaker 4 (33:17):
So like young boys that are like street boys who
can harmonize these you know good like college going, you
know young adult men who can harmonize. Like he was
just trying to capture whatever it is on top of
what was he was creating with BBD.
Speaker 1 (33:34):
While I was working on this show, Waiting for Impact,
a Dave Holmes passion project, a docu series called This
Is Pop came out on Netflix, a bunch of one
hour episodes, each one featuring a different pop act. There's
a Boys to Men episode that I watched, and something
that really jumps out at me is how much work
Boys to Men had to do to get ready for
their big break. They didn't even meet Michael Bivens. They
(33:55):
didn't even try to sing for him until they knew
they were the best. We don't know whether Sudden Impact
had to do the same amount of work, or whether
they got a leg up because they were handsome white
guys who looked a little like new kids on the block.
We can't know for sure what Michael Bivens was thinking
or to what degree race factored into his decision to
work with them, But in twenty twenty one, we have
(34:15):
to ask the question, mostly because we haven't heard them.
Speaker 7 (34:19):
The problem with this all is that I have no
idea if they're good or not. I'm not Michael.
Speaker 4 (34:24):
Bivens, So I can't say from a industry perspective, as
an industry like you know, taste maker, decision maker, if they.
Speaker 7 (34:37):
Would have gone on.
Speaker 4 (34:39):
To great success, you know what I mean, Like, there's
no there's just no way to predict without really knowing.
Speaker 7 (34:46):
Second thing is, I feel really bad because.
Speaker 4 (34:49):
All America got was like two seconds of them, which
is completely amazing marketing.
Speaker 7 (34:58):
By the way, like Michael Bivens, you know, he knew
I have this, this group is going all the way.
I gotta shove in all this other stuff that I got.
Speaker 3 (35:09):
I get it.
Speaker 4 (35:10):
It's like a total like Benny Medina puff Daddy, Like
I get that sort of like ability to sort of
like make it happen, make it work.
Speaker 1 (35:20):
But yeah, we've been calling it the the Michael Bivens
extended cinematical.
Speaker 4 (35:24):
Exactly exactly, and so I get the whole point of it.
Speaker 7 (35:29):
But these guys have even had a chance. They didn't
even have a chance, and that feels really shitty. I
feel shitty for them.
Speaker 4 (35:39):
But I also, having worked in the industry this long now,
I also them.
Speaker 7 (35:44):
The breaks dims, the breaks.
Speaker 4 (35:46):
I mean, there's a lot of people we look at,
we look back on, and we, you.
Speaker 7 (35:51):
Know, wonder what happened to them?
Speaker 4 (35:52):
Remember the brew haha over Gretchen Mall that was such
a big deal and all.
Speaker 1 (35:59):
Cover of sanity fair out of nowhere.
Speaker 4 (36:02):
This is the one, This is the one. And I
couldn't pick her out of a lineup now.
Speaker 1 (36:07):
Oh yeah, you know, yeah, twenty plus years of Sienna Miller,
I still don't know which one.
Speaker 7 (36:13):
She doesn't know she is. But there is there any
way possible to redeem.
Speaker 4 (36:21):
These these these gentlemen, because I would love them to
have some redemption.
Speaker 7 (36:25):
They should, They deserve a redemptive arc.
Speaker 1 (36:27):
You know by now that I agree with Winter. It's
never too late for redemption or even just to meet
sudden impact once and for all. And it is never
the wrong time to reboot the Alex Vanderpoole era. So
let's return to the block where Joey McIntyre wants a
new kid, and one of those kinds of famous where
you can't just go next door and not be famous,
(36:48):
is now sitting in a parked car zooming with me
on his smartphone. After initially just trying to stay super
famous in the wake of New Kids on the Blocks breakup,
he took some time off, took a step back, and
regrouped breath. He returned in nineteen ninety nine with a
solo album called Stay the Same. That album got a
couple hit singles, couple videos on the TRL charts. That's
(37:09):
where we met.
Speaker 2 (37:10):
Now.
Speaker 1 (37:11):
We definitely did episodes of Total Request live together, but
I cannot find any of them. What I could find
on YouTube was this. I found a clip from a
celebrity episode of Say What Karaoke, which I am co
hosting with Jerry Springer and Joey McIntyre duets with Jamie
Lynn Sigler, Medo from the Sopranos on Aerosmith, and run
(37:32):
DMC's Walk This Way. Okay, Yeah, I typed those words.
I said them out loud. I am now looking at
them and they still don't make any sense to me.
Joey got back into theater, playing the lead in Jonathan
Larson's Tick Tick Boom off Broadway, which I went to
see and his performance made me cry so hard. People
turned and looked. That is not a joke. He started
touring again theaters, this time instead of arenas, different more
(37:55):
intimate experiences. He got back on track, back to doing
the things he loved, except this time with a feeling
of gratitude for them. Did you have a sense for
what twenty twenty one would look like for you in
nineteen ninety Nah?
Speaker 3 (38:08):
No, No, I mean you know I love live performance, man.
I mean I love to make records too.
Speaker 2 (38:15):
I mean I do love to sing in a studio
and write music and that that electricity that you get
about songwriting, and oh man, this is good, you know
what I mean. And let me keep trying, and let
me keep swinging at it and let me get the
vocal and make some magic. But like if I'm doing
(38:36):
Shakespeare in New Jersey, I mean, it's a beautiful theater.
But like if I'm if I'm doing Shakespeare and it's
paying seven hundred bucks a week, then I'm good, you
know what I mean.
Speaker 3 (38:45):
That's that's my journey. Like I've earned that. That's what
i want to.
Speaker 2 (38:49):
Do, you know, and I'll always have it, Like I
love an intimate setting and I and I'm lucky enough
to play arenas too.
Speaker 1 (38:56):
So yeah, and two thousand and eight, New Kids on
the Block got back together, and in the last few
years they've played big summer package tours with Nelly and
TLC or Tiffany, Debbie Gibson and Salt and Peppa. I
have been to these summer shows and they are insane.
Those five year old girls who rushed the Super Bowl
stage in nineteen ninety one, they're thirty five now. They
(39:18):
got a babysitter at home and a plastic tumbler of
Pinogregio in their hands. They are ready to throw down.
And I mean this from the bottom of my heart.
If you get a chance to see New Kids live, go,
I wouldn't have thought in nineteen ninety one that, in
you know, twenty nineteen, twenty twenty, I'd go to Hollywood
Bowl and see New Kids on the Block. Ye half
the time of my life.
Speaker 2 (39:37):
Yeah, but I did, Yeah, and we do. You know,
I think the quick math is number one. Take fourteen
years off, you know, as a group and as a band,
because you know, so many bands could have to certain
degrees similar experiences, but they don't because bands don't stay
(39:57):
together for a lot of different reasons, you know. And
we were able to move on.
Speaker 8 (40:05):
And have lives and then get back together fifteen years later,
and you know, our fans were ready to, you know,
and now we get to with time and a little maturity,
you know, we get to look back and embrace those
moments with a sense of humor, but with a lot
of love and admiration for what we were able to share.
Speaker 2 (40:29):
And we benefit from this time. And now you know,
we're like family with our fans, you know. And so
you know we're not going anywhere. And you know, now
it's a combination of our work and our intention and
our connection with our fans and the right kind of
management to you know, facilitate that, you know what I mean,
(40:54):
to keep the party going in a healthy way, in
a fun way.
Speaker 1 (40:57):
Joey McIntyre got what he wanted from his life, and
all it took was being grateful for what he already had. Joe,
thank you so much. Thank you Bunny for taking the time.
Speaker 3 (41:07):
I hope you get a nugget or side where it's warm.
Sudden impact.
Speaker 1 (41:12):
Sudden impact. We're finding them. But the whole East Coast
family story is really interesting. Like people would just go
to where Bell Bivdevou was staying when they toured and
just singing Michael Bivens's face, and then sometimes he would
sign them ivette Nicole Brown, actress from Community and various
other things. She was one of them. She was a singer,
(41:34):
she was a solo act as part of the East
Coast Family. Yeah, I'll send you a video.
Speaker 2 (41:41):
Those are fun times, man, I don't think it happens
like it's almost like well Motown Philly, right, I mean
it's that motown, you know, like just get me in
front of her man, you know, and we came from.
Speaker 8 (41:53):
That, and.
Speaker 3 (41:56):
It's sweet. It's sweet.
Speaker 2 (41:58):
I'm glad you're celebrating that and kind of going back
into that world.
Speaker 3 (42:03):
So I look forward to seeing what you'll find.
Speaker 1 (42:06):
So Hayden has put in a good word for me
to Aaron Kin. I have followed up with an email
to the address that is on Aaron's YouTube channel. And
after a few days, I check my email and there
is a message from Aaron Kin. And I hesitate for
a moment before I click on it, because what if
he wants to leave this all behind him? What if
he doesn't want to talk at all? What if I'm
(42:27):
out of story and it's only episode four. It's like
that certified mail notice back when I got kicked out
of college. I know something important is in the post.
I just don't know what it is until I open
that message up. This email contains the future. I click
it open and there they are ten short words and
a lot of exclamation points. Hey Dave, yeah, that would
(42:50):
be awesome. Let me know. Oh my god, we have
made contact with Sudden Impact. We will talk to the
legendary in Kane, the man in the middle, the guy
in the bow tie. On Waiting for Impact, a Dave
Holmes passion project. This has been an exactly Right production.
(43:15):
Written by Me Dave Holmes, produced by Hannah Kyle Crichton, recorded,
mixed and sound designed by Andrew Eapen. Additional engineering and
assembly by Annalise Nelson. Music by Ben Wise, artwork by
Garrett Ross. Executive produced by Karen Kilgarriff, Georgia hart Starr
(43:35):
and Danielle Kramer. Follow the show on Instagram, Facebook, and
Twitter at exactly right and follow me at Dave Holmes.
For more information, go to exactly Rightmedia dot com. Binge
the show add free on stitchr Premium for a free month.
Head to stitcher Premium dot com, slash impact and enter
(43:56):
promo code Impact when you select a monthly plan, send
Subscribe and leave us a review on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher,
or wherever you get your podcasts.
Host
Dave Holmes
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