*NSYNC's Sound Fails To Match Its Splashy Looks Michael D. Clark Houston Chronicle
It took longer than expected, but *NSYNC has finally gotten too big for its boy-band britches. On its new 2001 Pop Odyssey tour, a live preview of its soon-to-stores album, Celebrity, America's favorite singing-and-dancing Ken dolls have made a deadly career mistake.
They bought into the hype.
The five shy boys beloved for their aw-shucks wholesomeness and defined by personality traits -- i.e., JC "the cute one" Chasez and Justin "the talent" Timberlake -- have finally realized they are power-wielding mega stars.
It's hard to imagine that selling a record 2.4 million copies of last album No Strings Attached in one week wouldn't swell their collective head, but who do these boys -- Chasez, Timberlake, Joey Fatone, Lance Bass and Chris Kirkpatrick -- think they are? U2?
Actually, yeah. They do.
On Friday *NSYNC's Pop Odyssey stage of lights and high-tech toys was the biggest musical event to play the Reliant Astrodome since U2 set up its Pop Mart extravaganza there more than three years ago.
*NSYNC's five-story-high, football-field-wide main stage of conveyor belts, flying cables and mechanical bulls was enough to make the Irishmen jealous. Unfortunately for *NSYNC, eye candy, which extended to the boys-to-men themselves for the screaming teens making up the majority of the 40,000-plus crowd, was all Pop Odyssey had to offer.
Musically they didn't offer much, and what they did could only be heard in echoey feedback ricocheting off Dome walls. Perhaps this is why Pop Odyssey was such a carnival of props for the retinas: Keep the eyes happy, and the ears won't notice the deprivation.
Those of us not swooning, however, realized halfway into the hour-and-45-minute set that this was Sesame Street Live on a Titanic budget. There was lip-syncing, there were corny prepackaged video fluff and rehearsed sight gags. Even though nearly half of the set's 18 songs were new (a bad sign), what *NSYNC didn't provide in Pop Odyssey was anything original. *NSYNC does deserve applause for knowing how to work its audience. The halo of blinking glow wands waving in unison created a crazy, multicolored cosmos against the Dome roof. That accompanied a rocket-launch countdown to the main event. By showtime the shrieking sounded like a Girl Scout jamboree staging a hair-pulling contest against a cheerleading camp.
It has been rumored that Pop Odyssey would mark the ascension of Timberlake, clearly the most distinct vocalist in *NSYNC, as group leader. On new single and set opener "Pop", that was partially true as he led his boys, clad in graffiti-painted jeans and T-shirts, down a runway to the main stage. The real leader on "Pop" and several other songs, however, was the sound person piping in the prerecorded vocals.
Either *NSYNC has revolutionized a headset microphone that grabs the voice but mutes the sound of breathing, or there was some lip-syncing taking place on this odyssey. That's how it seemed during the show's more athletic moments. Chasez would run down a catwalk splitting the audience, yelling to fans in a pant, and then hit a perfect powerful bellow on "God Must Have Spent a Little More Time on You."
In a show like this, a little melody-boosting might be acceptable. Using the bulk of the night as a commercial for upcoming works at the expense of favorites is not. *NSYNC paid only lip service (no pun intended) to songs from its 1998 debut, combining the snippet of "God Must Have Spent a Little More Time on You" with "Tearin' Up My Heart" and "I Want You Back".
Only five songs from No Strings Attached, which, with 11 million albums sold, is heading toward album nirvana, were played. Too bad, considering these were the show's highlights. The snarling, red-eyed silver mechanical bulls *NSYNC rode during "Space Cowboy" made the finest combination of sight-'n'-sound all night.
Timberlake's chorus-halting stammer on "It's Gonna Be Me" was learned straight from Pop King Michael Jackson himself. His and Chasez's shared vocals drifting into a five-part chorus on "This I Promise You" demonstrated why these guys won the boy band wars. No one else in the genre is more disciplined vocally.
The disappointment for fans is that little of the new Celebrity material could match these lyrical smooches. *NSYNC appears to know it, too. The band dressed up these bits more than others, as if to de-emphasize the music with lots of movement.
"See Right Through You" is an effort to recapture the "Bye Bye Bye" mystique. It was hard to grab hold while watching Fatone and Kirkpatrick zip by on people movers. "The Game Is Over" had a video-game theme with a futuristic Phantom of the Opera lording over the proceedings. With the massive stage exploding around the band, the song was just background.
Ballads like "Gone" and "The Two of Us" were the new standouts, and it was on these songs that Timberlake seemed to be leading the rest of *NSYNC into the future. From the arrogant lyrics of "Pop" to red-carpet-paparazzi art for the new album, Celebrity is a huge risk for *NSYNC. It's due July 24.
As visualized at Pop Odyssey, they are confirming what naysayers have always whispered: These guys have good looks and average talent boosted by huge marketing dollars and strategic hype. Fans who say the *NSYNC boys are misunderstood artists will now have more trouble making a convincing argument.
This pop mart was clearly more about the mart than the pop.
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