Facing the Music And Living To Talk About It (12 page)

Still, for better or worse, Paris saw me as a celebrity and therefore as her “type.” I’ll admit that I was curious about her and her lavish lifestyle. Who wouldn’t be? But I quickly realized that I didn’t belong in her jet-set crowd.

I’ll never forget going with her to Puffy’s (Sean ‘P. Diddy’ Combs) Fourth of July White Party in the Hamptons in 2004. We flew in on this helicopter. I had never arrived at a party that way before. I hate helicopters. When I first performed with BSB in Germany, we were supposed to ride in one with some kids for a charity event. We missed the take-off time and the helicopter went down, killing almost everybody onboard. For a long time, I was so petrified at the thought of that happening again. But I put that thought out of my mind on the evening of the party and we safely landed on the property of a 12,500 square foot mansion owned by Sony. The mansion was situated on six acres in Bridgehampton and was called the PlayStation 2 Estate. Paris was supposedly co-hosting along with Puffy and Jay-Z. We weren’t getting along that day. I felt like a fish out of water. It was strange for me because I remember sitting down on a couch looking around not knowing anybody while she was socializing with everybody. In many ways I didn’t want to be there. I felt uncomfortable and out of place—like a lost puppy, not knowing what to do, or who to talk to. Maybe that’s because I was abandoned for hours on end while she did her thing.

FAME IS JUST SOMETHING THAT CAME WITH
SUCCESS
AS AN ENTERTAINER.

I might have had a better experience if I hadn’t gone with her. I felt that night as if I was being looked at as her boy toy. I’m sure that if I went back to that place now by myself, with my new healthier lifestyle and mentality, I would probably fit in better. I was there with someone I wasn’t convinced really cared about me. I often felt like she was playing me, but that no one would tell me so. I had tried getting out of the relationship several times because I couldn’t shake the feeling that stuff was going on behind my back.

There were people in those ultra-rich, society circles who seemed fake and soulless to me. After being exposed to that lifestyle for a while, I decided it wasn’t healthy for me to stay there or to continue my relationship with Paris.

Living like that just wasn’t for me. I admit, that hanging around with people who are willing to take you along for that kind of pampered ride can be very seductive at first, but personally, I didn’t want to get too caught up in it for too long.

Paris and I went our separate ways mostly because of our different views on life. This was one instance when I recognized that staying in an unhealthy relationship and environment was a mistake, so I got out. But during this time, I made many other mistakes, and often compounded them.

OPPORTUNITIES LOST

One of my long-time goals has been to move into film and television acting, so when I was cast in the 2004 television movie
The Hollow
, I was happy to be taking a first big step in that direction. But one of the serious mistakes I alluded to above is that I squandered this opportunity by failing to maintain focus. It was the ideal chance to really develop my acting abilities. Instead, I partied way too hard.

One night, another actor in the movie went to Santa Monica Beach with me and we went overboard in a really big way. We sat next to the pier and drank until we nearly passed out. I brought my guitar and was playing, but I couldn’t stop drinking. We had started at my apartment by downing about ten Flaming Dr. Peppers made with 151-proof rum (75 percent alcohol, twice the normal level) and almond-flavored liqueur dropped into a beer.

…THAT I SQUANDERED THIS OPPORTUNITY
BY FAILING
TO MAINTAIN FOCUS.

We were lighting them on fire and drinking one after another even before we headed to the beach. I took the bottle of rum with us to the pier and then we just drank and drank until I blacked out. When I woke up, I was back in my apartment and scared as hell because I didn’t know how I got there or what had happened during the time in between. Blacking out like that was typical when I was drinking heavily.

I think I had alcohol poisoning because I got sick as soon as I woke up. I crawled into the bathroom and just stayed on the floor for three or four hours, thinking I was going to die. Then for some reason I decided I needed to eat. The only thing I could find in the kitchen was a box of Cheerios. I ate the whole box, still thinking I‘d never survive this.

I had to work on
The Hollow
set that night but because I hadn’t studied my lines or gotten any sleep, I went in unprepared, sick, and looking terrible. I took this opportunity for granted instead of preparing for it and making the most of it. I was still able to do my thing, but my face was so swollen, I can see how unhealthy and tired I was in the final film. Even though I somehow made it through the night, I know I acted very irresponsibly. I could have done a lot better.

Sure, I memorized my lines for the movie. I showed up and did the work, yet I still feel badly that I didn’t maximize the experience. Had I committed myself to doing my best, my performance could have helped me establish the acting career I wanted. Instead, I partied on, as if my goal wasn’t important to me at all. This was another low point for me in many ways. My mind was going places I didn’t want it to go. I’d be driving somewhere and find my thoughts had wandered to very dark scenarios. It was as if my subconscious was searching for ways to create drama and negativity.

MY MIND WAS GOING PLACES I
DIDN’T WANT IT
TO GO.

One night I was doing prescription painkillers on top of drinking alcohol and I remember going back to my condo, getting in bed alone, listening to my heart pound and feeling as if my body was falling apart from the inside out. I was paranoid at times, worrying that if my heart were to stop no one would even care that I died. The thought kept striking me that my death would be chronicled as just another
celebrity
tragedy, one more tale of drug abuse and a waste of life and talent.

But despite those fears, I never seemed to learn from my mistakes.

DRIVING TO DISASTER

Never Gone
, the first Backstreet Boys album since our two-year hiatus, was set for release in the summer of 2005. We were deep into rehearsals for a promotional tour that would include 79 concerts in the U.S., Canada, Europe, Asia and Australia. I needed to be on top of my game. But as you might have guessed by now, I wasn’t. I was overweight and out of shape and badly needed to get my act together.

Instead, I took a nosedive deeper into despair.

On a rare day off from meetings and rehearsals, I went with some friends to the Newport Beach and Huntington Beach area to party all day. I liked getting out of town so I could do my own thing and not get caught. I also loved the beach there.

I TOOK
A NOSEDIVE DEEPER
INTO DESPAIR.

On the way down, my friends and I were listening to heavy metal music in my car. At that point it was a genre I could really relate to. I felt like it was speaking right to me. We were getting so into it, we were head-banging and acting really crazy. Now mind you, I love all music and I’m a big fan of hard rock bands such as System of a Down, Slipknot and Metallica to name a few, so I’m not saying that heavy metal music was the culprit. It was
not
the reason I behaved the way I did that day or any other day. But when you have a lot of hate and anger festering inside you, you find a way to feed it and, sadly, the lyrics to some songs are what hate and anger can sometimes sink their teeth into. Yet, for every person who uses heavy metal or rap music to fuel his or her anger, there’s a person out there who is perfectly capable of listening to that same music and separating entertainment from reality. A healthy mind can do that. Unfortunately, my mind and emotions weren’t healthy at the time. In fact, they were out of control when we pulled up to valet park at a waterfront restaurant near the pier on Huntington Beach. We had been doing this routinely for a couple of weeks during my breaks, meeting with friends and going to a series of bars in the area. We’d play pool and drink away the day, doing shots until we lost track of time. Some of the bar staff seemed to be afraid of us because we were so wild. We finally got kicked out of one place, so we hit another bar and that’s where I started having black outs. The more I drank, the more agitated and upset I became. I felt these waves of rage and resentment toward my parents. The feelings just boiled up from inside me. I couldn’t stop thinking about how I missed out on a lot of fun in my teen years because I had to work so hard to please and support my family. The thought that I had to make up for lost time kept racing obsessively through my brain.

Apparently I decided that the way to recover those years was to binge drink myself blind. I justified my behavior by telling myself these were the equivalent to my college years. Whenever I drank, I became vulnerable to those unresolved feelings about my parents’ drinking and fighting and their lack of nurturing. Then, I’d repeat their behavior by drinking and fighting, too.

We can easily fall into the lifestyle patterns that are most familiar to us, as I’ve said before. My parents drank, so I drank. They fought, so I fought. They had dysfunctional relationships, and so did I.

THE MORE
I DRANK
, THE MORE AGITATED AND UPSET I BECAME.

But because of my success with Backstreet and the fame and money it generated, I attracted lots of people who brought out the worst in me. I knew that I was in bad company, making bad decisions, and headed for a crash and burn, yet I did nothing to prevent that from happening. One mistake led to another and another until this day turned into one of my darkest.

At the last bar, I was so drunk and on the edge of passing out once again that I found myself on the bathroom floor. I was totally fixated on the music we’d been blasting in the car on the way down from Santa Monica. The more we drank, the more satanic the songs seemed. Normally, the battle between good and evil isn’t a major topic of debate in my mind, but on this day my alcohol-and drug-induced mood rapidly brought the music’s blaring negative messages back—its lyrics pounding punches to my head.

The songs were loaded with references to the devil and they were freaking me out. Obliterated out of my mind, with disturbing images and thoughts circling inside my skull like bats, I found myself wondering: What’s so bad about the devil anyway? Why was Satan really thrown out of heaven? Could it all have been just a big misunderstanding?

The mind is a terrible thing to waste and wasted I was. I suddenly realized I was thinking out loud, too. A crowd that included my drunken friends and total strangers had gathered in the bathroom listening to me rant about the devil and the dark side. I felt like I was in a bottomless, black pit. People were looking at me as if snakes were crawling out of my ears.

Why is bad so bad? Why is evil, evil? Why does Satan get such a bum rap?

Now, these aren’t necessarily bad questions for a theology or philosophy class to ponder, but I was just a babbling drunk sprawled next to the urinals. Then to make matters worse, I went mobile. Somehow I rose up, stumbled out of the bathroom and the bar, and made my way to the beachfront restaurant where I had valet-parked my BMW 750 that morning (though it seemed like two weeks earlier).

The valet took one look at me in full meltdown mode and, to his credit, said, “I’m not giving you the car keys.”

THE MIND IS A TERRIBLE THING TO WASTE AND
WASTED
I WAS.

I went off on the guy, even though he was just doing his job and trying to save me from killing myself or someone else, but he was not intimidated. I calmed myself and after a brief flash of coherent thought I promised him that I’d let one of my friends drive.

One member of my posse managed to imitate a sober person long enough to win the car keys. He drove two blocks, stopped the car, handed me the keys, and we switched places.

We thought we were brilliant badasses at that point, but I only drove a few blocks before I had second thoughts and pulled to the side of the road to try and sober up.

We were still parked and listening to music when a convoy of Huntington Beach police cars with screaming sirens surrounded us. I suspected that the parking valet called the cops, and if he did, I am incredibly grateful to him. He may have saved my life or the lives of others.

At least that’s how I feel now. But when those patrol cars came roaring down on us, I wasn’t quite so awash in gratitude. The police officers didn’t mess around. They gave me a sobriety field test, which I failed with flying colors.

It was only about 7:30 at night, but we’d had an early start. We’d set out that morning dedicated to drinking ourselves stupid. Mission accomplished.

This marked my first visit to a jail as a guest of dishonor. They had me in a holding cell by myself. I was right behind the area where the cops were working and walking by with other people they’d arrested. I was on display for everyone to see. I felt like a trapped rat. I just wanted to crawl into a hole and hide.

I FELT LIKE A
TRAPPED RAT
.

They held me for about eight hours before releasing me. No one came to get me. I had to find a cab to take my sorry butt home. This was a new low, though not the lowest point I’d fall to. Looking back, I feel like maybe I was being tested in a way. I was fixated on evil and I got arrested. The devil gave me what I’d asked for. Maybe if I’d been thinking good thoughts, I would have experienced something better.

I’d like to tell you that I learned from this terrible mistake and immediately turned my life around, that I stopped drinking and doing drugs right then and there. Unfortunately, that was not the case. I’d screwed up badly, but I wasn’t yet ready to learn from that awful event, change my lifestyle and move forward.

The judge who heard my case did force me to take one good step in that direction, however, by ordering me to attend Alcoholics Anonymous meetings. Getting to those meetings was a pain in the ass because I was on a crazy schedule preparing for the tour and all of the promotional events surrounding the release of the new album. But the judge didn’t care. He was trying to do for me what I could not do for myself.