Backstreet's not back -- they were never gone, but they're going.

[Photo courtesy of MSN]
MSN Music is currently featuring a pre-taped screening of the Backstreet Boys in concert. Anyone who knows me well enough knows that I am a huge Backstreet Boys fan, but there’s something very wrong with seeing four grown men dressed in boxing robes doing nine-year-old choreography to “Larger Than Life.”

What is up with the boxing gimmick? I’m pretty sure the Backstreet Boys concert was taped before the American Idol finale script was even an embryo of a thought, but what is the appeal of introducing male more-or-less pop singers to the audience through a WWF-esque medium? I’d be more interested in seeing Syesha Mercado duke it out with David Cook or Nick Carter, but seeing as female pop singers just don’t look sexy in boxing robes, I don’t think that’ll ever happen. I’m also pretty sure everyone who is willing to shell out the price of a Backstreet Boys ticket either already knows where their favorite “boxers” hail from or does not want to watch them humiliate themselves as such. I mean, what happened to marketing them as sexy? What happened to letting AJ McLean hump the stage in 1997?

To catch everyone up on Backstreet Boys news, apparently they released a second single from their 2007 album “Unbreakable”. It’s a lot of the same ole same ole: Boys placed against a natural backdrop, with an unattainable model-cum-porn star sulkingly representing the one true love of all four of their lives.

At some point, Howie Dorough, the one we all assumed was gay, got married to a woman. And then just recently, his father died. Former BSB member Kevin Richardson and wife Kristin had a child. I think. I hope I’m not making that up. Nick is now, apparently, sober. I didn’t realize he was, at some point, not sober. In the rock star sense of the word, of course.

Everything else remains constant in the backstreet. Brian Littrell is still injecting Backstreet Boys lyrics with the random “Hello” while still managing to keep up with the dance moves, which are more advanced than ever -- surprising, as none of us are getting any younger. I didn’t realize Nick was that flexible.

And as big of a fan I was and am of his, no mention of Nickolas Gene Carter should go without this brilliant clip:
[Courtesy of YouTube user “maahcarter”]
This may be the final tour for the Backstreet Boys – their American wing of the tour is sorely lacking in stops. The closest show to New York City is in Atlantic City, at a House of Blues. But watching this London taping of the concert, I’m kind of glad.