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Backstreet Boys Biography

Courtesy of Jive/Zomba

Courtesy of Jive/Zomba

Backstreet Boys Members:

AJ Maclean
Kevin Richardson
Brian Littrell
Howie Dorough
Nick Carter

The Backstreet Boys Get Their Start

So where did the ride to stardom begin for the Back Street Boys? It started in high school when AJ Maclean, Nick Carter and Howie Dorough decided to start singing together after running into each other at auditions. A little later on Kevin Richardson and his cousin Brian Littrell joined the group after they moved to Florida from Kentucky. Even though all these guys were new to the boyband thing, they weren't new to performing. By age 12 Nick had already been the lead in The Phantom of the Opera, Howie and AJ had done Nickelodeon TV stuff and Brian had sung in his church choir.

The Backstreet Boys Make Their Mark

The Back Street Boy's success came quickly in Europe and by late 1996, with the release of Backstreet and the single Quit Playing Games (with my Heart), they had broken the charts in Canada and the US. The Backstreet Boys have never looked back, setting and breaking records left right and center. Backstreet Boys was seven times platinum and Millennium sold over 1.3 million copies in its first week. In 2000, Black and Blue debuted at number one on Billboard's 200 albums chart, selling 1.6 million copies in its first week out. That may be less than *NSYNC's 2.4 million, but the Backstreet Boys have nothing to prove - they are already pop icons.

Backstreet Boys - Did U Know?

Kevin Richardson used to sing into a broom handle while standing on top of a hill so he could pretend the valley below was a stadium full of cheering fans.
AJ Maclean has 10 tattoos.
Howie Dorough's sister died of Lupus.