By CRAIG SEYMOUR News Pop Music Critic 6/11/01
*NSYNC super-sized its zippy brand of boy pop with exciting results Sunday in Ralph Wilson Stadium. The band's mix of new and old tunes combined with splashy showmanship and a dynamic eye-candy stage set contributed to making its "Pop Odyssey" tour one of the most entertaining large-scale pop spectacles ever produced.
The stage was a mammoth silver colossus that stretched the width of the Bills' home turf. Its mix of light bulbs, aluminum panels and hooded heat lamplike fixtures brought to mind both a B-movie spaceship and some 22nd century device for reheating leftovers.
This gargantuan construction was as much a part of the performance as the group's five members, providing an awesome and ever-changing backing for the music.
*NSYNC started "Space Cowboy" while suspended from wires high above the stadium floor. And they rose up in the air on thin columns for the power ballad "God Must Have Spent a Little More Time on You."
Sometimes the show's backdrops and props echoed the group's videos. The clip for "It's Gonna Be Me" is set in a toy store, so the gang rode bicycles, played with Silly String and shot the crowd with a giant water gun while performing this song.
Many of the most elaborate setups were reserved for the nine cuts that the band previewed from its forthcoming album, "Celebrity." The center of the large overhead video monitor split for the bouncy "Just the Two of Us," as the group descended to the stage on a platform from behind the screen. On the jumpy club track, "Up Against the Wall," they stuck to giant fake speakers via strips of Velcro on the backs on their jackets.
They cruised along fast-moving conveyors for the funky "Look Into My Eyes." And they became padded video-game characters warring against a faction of cyber-babes for "You Played Me."
The new songs showed continued artistic growth, pushing the band further into R&B territory. And the best of the songs, the slinky ballad "Gone," which is written and sung by member Justin Timberlake, sounds winningly like something by hip-hop soul superstar R. Kelly. In addition to thoroughly entertaining the crowd with these numbers, *NSYNC once again proved why boy bands are so important for the psyches of teenage girls. The sentiments groups such as *NSYNC spew help salve wounds inflicted by emotionally cagey teenage boys. Boy bands don't go squirrelly when girls say, "I love you." As the guys sang, while performing the title track from "No Strings Attached": "Baby, you're not the only one/You don't have to be afraid to fall in love."
Three acts opened for the group. Tonya Mitchell, who is managed by Timberlake's mom, bore an eerie sonic and visual similarity to Timberlake's gal pal Britney Spears.
Also on the bill were the four young women of Dream, which performed at the recent KISS the Summer Hello festival and will play Buffalo again at August's TRL tour. Fortunately, it's always fun to see them. The gals put on a high-energy set and seemed to be enjoying its tunes as much of the audience.
BBMak - the boy band that, in name, sounds most like a sandwich - performed its drippy meandering guitar-driven tunes, which made *NSYNC's brash attacks of beats and harmonies seem all the more exciting.
The bland songs of the BBMak guys proved that writing your own material and playing your own instruments isn't necessarily a virtue. And though the group's basic jeans and T-shirt look was supposed to make them seem less style than substance, the lead singer's hair looked like it took as long to construct as *NSYNC's set.
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