Backstreet Mom: A Mother's Tale of Backstreet Boy AJ McLean's Rise to Fame, Struggle With Addiction, and Ultimate Triumph (32 page)

Food became a bit of an issue on that tour, since not all of the boys
were really into Asian cuisine. Alex was always on the lookout for a
Mickey D's and Nick was right behind him. Brian was also pretty picky
when it came to his eating, especially if it was green. Stir-fry was not
high on his list. Kevin and Howie, on the other hand, were in their
glory. They both loved Asian cuisine and ordered up whatever was new
and different. I enjoyed eating out with the two of them since I, too, was
always up for trying new things.

A few of the groups from England and Germany had tried to get a
foothold in that market, but they had had no success. It stood to reason
that everyone probably thought that our boys would meet the same
fate. The main difference was the boys' talent and their ability to sing
live. In every country that the boys' album had been released, it had
entered the charts at the second-highest possible level. In some smaller
countries, it did not take many sales to achieve that, but it was still
impressive and better than all of the other pop bands at the time.

As we continued on our travels, we went to Malaysia, then to the
Philippines. The fans gave us a great reception wherever we went. Word
spread fast. It was an amazing phenomenon to be a part of. Fortunately,
it was one of those times when Alex and I seemed to be able to put our
mom-and-son differences aside for a while. We focused on our surroundings and tried to have some fun.

My job, which at this point only focused on wardrobe and makeup,
was not as stressful, since the boys only needed to dress in wardrobe for
performances and photo shoots. They wore their own clothes for everything else, so that limited the amount of baggage I had to haul around.
When they did press interviews, they would just bring me what they wanted to wear that day. They had gotten to the point where, even if they were
just going from one room in the hotel to another for interviews, it was
still necessary for them to maintain a sense of Backstreet style.

By then, they had each developed their own style. That was something I had to be acutely aware of when I helped them dress for the
shows. Since I had been traveling with those five young men for so long
I could dress them in my sleep. The only difficult one, of course, was
my own son, who changed his style from day to day right along with his hair color, accessories and facial hair. I left him on his own and just
made sure that he was clean and pressed.

Dressing the boys, organizing the media interviews with Nina and
setting up the meet-and-greets meant my schedule was full. Nina was
great to work with. She was really organized and handled any rough
spots with a great deal of professionalism. We also got along great as
friends and had many things in common.

Our spiritual beliefs and family values were right on target with each
other. Nina came from a typical Italian household of loving parents and
siblings. Her sister, Polsia, was a long-time veteran of the music industry. The two of them were very close, both on a professional and personal level.

We were all excited about our next stop on the tour, Australia. Nina
was especially thrilled since she had spent most of her childhood there.
She had dreamed of returning someday to live. We all soon discovered
why she was so fond of that vast continent. It was amazingly beautiful
and exotic. The locals were some of the kindest and warmest people we
had ever met. The record company there welcomed us like family and
made us all feel as though we were on holiday.

All the shows went well, except for one night in Sydney. The venue
was a youth center and it was in a part of town that was not too cool and
there were too many guys in the audience. Some of the guys near the
stage threw water bottles at the boys and Kevin got really mad. He walked
up very close to the group of guys and got in their faces as he was singing. Then he flicked off one of the guys' baseball caps.

I could see in Kevin's face that he really wanted to get into a fight,
but the performance was cut short when a small riot broke out in the
parking lot. Apparently, this was a very nasty part of town and the kids
outside beat up one of the security guards and that was when the trouble began. When they broke down the glass doors at the entrance, that
was our cue to leave. Our bodyguards gathered us up and hustled us out
the back in an instant. It was a little scary, but it all ended well.

All of the remaining in-store sessions and shows in Sydney went fine.
I think the incident in the youth club was just a bad booking on the part
of the record company. The people who turned out were not our target
audience. We sadly bid farewell to Australia and moved on to Tokyo. It
was the end of October and we were all beginning to show signs of
exhaustion.

WHEN WE RETURNED NOME, we found out that another group that Johnny
and Lou had been working with, *NSYNC, had released their first single in England. It did not do very well and I cannot lie and say I was
unhappy. I had seen the look of grave disappointment in the boys' eyes
when they talked about the other boy band. It was very hard for all of us
to understand why it was necessary for them to have another boy band.

Did Lou and Johnny think that the Backstreet Boys had gone as far as
they could go? Were they ready to move on to the next project? Alex
confided to me on several occasions how angry he was with Johnny for
managing the other group. He and Johnny and Brian used to go golfing
together quite often. Now that would undoubtedly change. The closeness they once shared seemed at risk.

The only explanation I could see was that Lou and Johnny wanted to
duplicate the success of the Backstreet Boys. Why else would they want
that group when they already had our five boys? The five boys in *NSYNC
were very similar. Alex was afraid that his group was going to be cast
aside.

When confronted with that, Lou and Johnny insisted that they were
moving ahead very slowly with the other group and that it would not
affect the Backstreet Boys. I knew that could not be true. Both men
would have to split their time between the two groups, and Johnny had already become less of a presence for the Backstreet Boys. All of this was
bound to have an impact on the boys' feelings.

Alex and me fooling around in Japan

As 1997 wore on, we forged ahead. Another single was released in
England and it did very well in the charts. At the last minute, a trip was
put together so that the boys could do a television show there. Johnny
could not make it, so Donna went to oversee things. What a mistake
that was! She seemed to have a chip on her shoulder.

On a personal level, Donna and Johnny were on the outs. Most of her
time was spent on the phone with him, embroiled in nasty screaming
matches. She flew off the handle into a jealous rage over some girl from
Germany who had spread rumors that she had slept with Johnny. It
resulted in an ugly scene in the lobby bar of our hotel. Everyone just left
her standing there alone and went to their rooms.

Shortly after that incident, there was a welcome new addition to our
team, Nina. She quit her job at Jive and took a position as the boys' tour
manager. I was very happy
about that since she shared
everyone's opinion of Donna
and did everything she could
to keep her off the road. It felt
like our group was complete.

Me backstage with Steven Tyler

As time went by, I became
more involved with press and
fan club events than with
clothing issues. That made
me happy. I was not really cut
out for the wardrobe slot after all. I enjoyed being out
there on the front lines,
where I was able to keep an
eye on Alex. Having Nina
there eased my stress, since
she watched over all of the
boys and really grew to love
them as I did. Even the crew
looked out for them.

It had become standard procedure that someone always needed to "speak" to the boys
for one reason or another
right before they went on
stage. They had made it very
clear that they wanted to become more involved in every
aspect of their careers. In a
way that was a good thing,
but when it came to scheduling it was a nightmare. The
boys wanted approval over
merchandise and touring, but
it quickly became clear that
they really did not have the
business sense to deal with it.
Lou and Johnny had always
made the business decisions
for them.

Me with John Norris, MN News