Songoftheday 4/3/21 - Oh my God we're back again, brothers sisters everybody sing...

 

 

"Everybody (Backstreet's Back)" - Backstreet Boys

from the albums Backstreet Boys (US) and Backstreet's Back (UK) (both 1997)

Billboard Hot 100 peak: #4 (two weeks)

Weeks in the Top-40: 20

 

Today's song of the day comes from the Backstreet Boys, who had already scored a top ten hit on the Billboard Hot 100 chart with "Quit Playing Games With My Heart", along with a top ten radio hit in the US with "As Long As You Love Me". The fivesome's next commercial single release would be "Everybody (Backstreet's Back)", the title to their second international album which was included on their first American release. Written and produced by the Swedish team of Denniz Pop and Max Martin, the song sports normally cheesy lyrics about how desirable they (as a group of young, hot guys) are, but somehow they sell it without seeming like total creeps or like it's a joke. But what really made this a smash was the music video, which is honestly one of the most goofily entertaining clips of the decade. Having the boys inexplicably turn into various monsters while cavorting around a haunted mansion, and ending up in the best horror-dance sequence since Thriller, the video gave real personality to each of them, while giving a reason to party that didn't focus on the lyrics nor a premise to the plot...

(Extra points for an open-shirted and newly shorn Kevin. Rock your body, alright.)

"Everybody" became the Backstreet Boys' second official top ten pop hit on the Hot 100 in May of 1998. Internationally, the single was also a big hit, topping the charts in Spain, Hungary, and Romania, while reaching the top ten in Germany (#2), Austria (#2), Switzerland (#2), Denmark (#2), the UK (#3), Canada (#3), Australia (#3), Sweden (#4), Norway (#4), Finland (#4), the Netherlands (#5), Belgium (#5F/#5W), New Zealand (#6), Italy (#9), and Ireland (#10). 

(9/10)

(Click below to see the rest of the post)

Here's the Boys performing for a horde of screaming girls at the British Smash Hits awards show in 1997...

And again at the MTV Music Video Awards, where they won for "Best Group Video", with apparently a live band and all...

Next up, in concert in 2000 in Indiana, with this song, their first minor hit "We've Got It Goin' On", and album nugget "That's The Way I Like It"...

I had to include the end to the This Is The End movie, if only for Seth Rogan doing the Backstreet's Back dance...

Back to the boys in concert in 2016...

Up tomorrow: Nawlins rap mogul gets his own movie hit.