Backstreet Boys: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 11:16, 4 February 2006

Revision as of 11:17, 4 February 2006

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1996 marked a big change for the Backstreet Boys as European popularity grew. They kicked off 1996 by being voted No.1 International Group by TV viewers in Germany - "I'll Never Break Your Heart" went gold there and hit No.1 in Austria. The group earned their first Platinum record in Germany (500,000 CDs sold) and toured Asia and Canada.[[Image:Backstreetboysbsb_lp01.jpg |left|100px|thumb| "[[Backstreet Boys (album)|Backstreet Boys]]", 1997.]]By [[1997]] when bands like the [[Spice Girls]], [[Hanson (band)|Hanson]], and [[Savage Garden]] began to succeed in bringing back dance/pop music to the forefront in United States, Jive and Pearlman decided to bring the boys back to the United States after 8.5 million discs had been sold worldwide. They began to record a new album for the American market and released "Quit Playing Games (With My Heart)" as their new single; the single quickly went platinum and climbed to #2 on the [[Billboard Hot 100]]. In August, the boys hit big on the U.S. charts with the release of their self titled debut album ''[[Backstreet Boys (album)|Backstreet Boys]]''. The album debuted at #1 in Germany, Norway, Switzerland, Finland and Austria, and sold over 14 million copies in the U.S. setting a record for the most successful debut album in U.S. history. In October, a free concert in Spain was cancelled after too many fans attended, and so in December 1997, the band embarked on a 60-city, 20-country tour.

In 1998, Littrell underwent open heart surgery at the insistance of his then girlfriend Leighanne Wallace in the middle of their sold-out US 39-city tour; he had twice postponed the surgery in the past. He had been struggling with thisa diseaseheart murmur since he was born, almost dying at the age of 5 due to a bacterial infection. Littrell needed about 8 weeks to recover from the surgery, but shortly after this time, the Backstreet Boys cancelled an appearance in Minnesota after learning that Howie Dorough's sister had died of [[Lupus erythematosus|Lupus]]. Four of the Backstreet Boys went ahead with a lawsuit against Lou Pearlman, in which they claimed that the Backstreet Boys was owed more of the $200 million they had generated to that date. In [[October]] 1998, the band received the [[Freedom of the City|keys to the city]] from the mayor of [[Orlando, Florida|Orlando]] in honor of the tornado relief concert the group headlined in March.

===Millennium===