New Kids on the Block.

Although my mother bought me a Joey McIntyre Ken doll, my heart was always with Jon. He was the oldest one of the group, didn't get into the spotlight as much as the others, and was one of my first celebrity crushes.

Although I did sort of go all gooey whenever li'l Joey sang "Please Don't Go Girl". But that's neither here nor there.

I also had a bitchin' pink NKOTB sweater and a pink NKOTB mug. There were also tons of NKOTB trading cards strewn everywhere, each with a photo on the front of one of the guys or a group shot, and a little trivia bit on the back. I asked for the bed linen set every Christmas, but Santa never saw fit to hook a homegirl up.

Anyway. All this was going on when I was about six or seven. I desperately wanted to go to a concert, but for some reason my mom was not interested in sitting through a New Kids' concert in order to fulfill her eldest child's most fervent dreams. Go figure.

But by the time Free Willy came out in 1993, I was too old for all the NKOTB fuss, as I had reached the august age of 11. They had a song on the soundtrack, and I remember laughing at them trying to have a comeback. And at any rate, the Michael Jackson song from that movie was waaaaaaaaay more entertaining to make fun of.

After that, I got into just about every other type of music. I kept up with boy bands too, but this time in secret as I was already in high school by the time *NSYNC showed up. Then, sometime around turning 21, I decided to go on ebay to re-capture my late-80s childhood and bought some old CDs. Including the NKOTB albums Hanging Tough and Step by Step. And a bitchin' fringed suede coat. But that didn't really have anything to do with my childhood. Just another ebay misstep.

I transferred the New Kids to my iPod once I got one, and a couple of the songs still got the odd bit of airplay here and there, but mostly just when I needed a laugh. But they were always there.

And then, towards the end of the summer last year, whilst watching late night music videos at the Brockley house, my world was upended.

NEW KIDS ON THE BLOCK HAD A NEW SINGLE OUT?!?!?!?!

I shushed everyone in the room (who had no idea how I could possibly be so excited about what appeared to be an aging boy band), and watched the terrible video for "Summertime" with wide eyes and a big grin. Because where there's a single, there's a reunion, and where there's a reunion, there's a tour.

Maybe now I'd get my chance to see them.

Oh but wait! Would the guys be touring outside the US?

Sure enough, they were scheduled to play at the O2 Arena in London, but try as I might, I couldn't talk a single one of my London friends into going with me. Plus...I was broke and homeless.

It looked like I was going to miss yet another chance to see NKOTB perform live.

And then I came home for the summer. And my mom happened to see that she could get tickets to their concert at the local Verizon Wireless Amphitheater for ten bucks.

So tonight, Shelby and I prepared ourselves for a night of nostalgia.

First and foremost, I have to say how much I like going to see concerts at Verizon. It's a decent size with 16,000 seats (about 5,000 of which are in the lawn section), but it seems like it's much smaller. To put it in perspective, the Hollywood Bowl only has about a thousand more seats, but the folks on stage look positively tiny from the cheap seats, versus at Verizon where you can still sort of make out the footwork for the dance routines. Plus, Verizon is a twenty-minute drive on surface streets from my parents' house, so getting home is never an ordeal. The parking lot is pretty good for tailgating too.

Jesse McCartney was the opening act, which wasn't really all that exciting for me since I don't know any of his music and only know of him at all because A) he's the younger brother of that guy from Backstreet Boys, and B) he used to be on this silly show called Summerland that happened to be a guilty pleasure of mine. Shelby has decided he's hot, or will be once he gets a little bit older. Side bit of trivia about Mr. McCartney: he co-wrote that ubiquitous song of Leona Lewis's, "Bleeding Love". Gross.

After sneaking into a lightly-populated mens room (the lines for the womens bathroom were horrendous as always), Shibbs and I waited for NKOTB to come on. Thankfully, the group of six-year-olds who were next to us (and dancing a little too provocatively to Jesse McCartney) moved seats when they opened up the Loge area to everyone, so Shelby and I felt ready to dance out all of our excitement once they started playing the old jams.

And they played 'em all. From "Right Stuff" to "Cover Girl" and "Step by Step", they ticked all the boxes. Their new stuff just sounds like all the other stuff that's on the radio, but seeing slightly-raunchy choreographed routines done by a bunch of guys who were all born in either 1968 or 1969 (with the exception of young 'un Joey who was born in '72) made up for it.

But.

We felt robbed. Twice.

First: Jordan Knight came out after Donnie Wahlberg did "Cover Girl" all by himself (which made me fall a little bit in love with him, especially when he brought this little girl up on stage to dance with him...but more on why I now kinda love Donnie in a little bit). Jordan Knight proceeded to tease the audience with a slow-tempo version of "Give It To You". Shelby and I both waited for him to drop the beat and pick the tempo up, but it never happened. We were both struck down by what equates to dancing blue balls for the next couple of songs. Which wound up working out since they were both just solos by Joey McIntyre. Although I will say that while he no longer does the falsetto that I loved so much the first time around (probably because he's no longer pre-pubescent), I do sorta like his voice now.

Second: "Hanging Tough" was, predictably, their last song. I'd been waiting all night to hear it, and, MORE IMPORTANTLY, see them "get on the floor and do the New Kids Dance". But when the moment came...THEY DIDN'T DO THE NEW KIDS DANCE! Now, you need to understand that they'd been doing the old choreography for most of the old songs. And that made me even more upset when they bypassed doing the Dance for "Hanging Tough". And I was all ready to do it right along with them. But no. For whatever reason they opted out. Jerks.

But overall...I was sufficiently rocked. And Shelby and I had a good time boogie-ing up in the cheap seats.

Now. Back to my new crush on Donnie Wahlberg. He, Jordan Knight, and Joey McIntyre are the only ones that have stayed recognizable in show business. Danny Woods is still in the business, but more behind-the-scenes, and Jon Knight left it completely (due to an onset of crippling panic attacks which he's since gotten a handle on). But even if you didn't know any of that, you would've been able to tell just by watching them on stage. Especially Donnie. All of them have stage presence, to be sure, but Jordan, Joey, and Donnie, especially Donnie, have it in spades. And the three of them also seemed genuinely happy to be up there.

Which just makes me feel better about the whole thing. It's nice to go to a show and see that the performer/s are getting just a big a kick out of it as you are. Yes, they've rehearsed it all a million times and performed it a million more, but the concerts I've really enjoyed have been the ones where the folks up on stage look like they're having a blast. Although oddly, right now off the top of my head, the only concert I've been to where the performers looked like they were just going through the motions for the paycheck were KC and the Sunshine Band. Consider the source on that one, I suppose.

Anyway, I'm further amused by my newfound crush on Donnie because I hated him back when I was a kid. Wasn't a fan of bad boys back then. Plus, I seem to recall him having gross long hair back then. Wasn't a fan of long hair back then either.

And now I have a puppy giving me looks that seem to imply it's past both our bedtimes, so I'm going to have to end here. If I think of anything else, I'll post it tomorrow. But for now, I'm going to curl up in my new NKOTB concert t-shirt and have wonderful nostalgic dreams.

OH!

Before I forget: Joey totally wore that hat-without-a-top he used to wear. Giggles.