Love ’em or hate ’em, boy bands are a part of the fabric of mainstream pop thanks to groups like Boyz II Men, who perform tomorrow night at the Taipei World Trade Center.
The R ’n’ B trio of vocalists, whose members range in age from to 37 to 39, began as a quintet during their high school years in Philadelphia. In the 1990s, they produced a line of hits that became staples on the radio, not to mention at high school dances.
Other boy bands such as New Edition, New Kids on the Block and ’N Sync have come and gone, spawning successful solo careers for pop artists like Bobby Brown and Justin Timberlake.
But Boyz II Men have managed to stick together since forming in the early 1990s, which the members — Wanya Morris, Shawn Stockman and Nathan Morris — say has much to do with their “common denominator,” music.
“Before we were friends, we were music partners,” said singer Wanya Morris in an e-mail to the Taipei Times forwarded by the group’s promoter in Taipei.
That partnership produced instantly recognizable Top 40 hits such as their cover of the Motown song It’s So Hard to Say Goodbye to Yesterday and the Babyface-penned I’ll Make Love to You.
The group is also credited for helping to bring hip-hop into the mainstream with its 1991 radio single Motown Philly. The music video for the song even featured appearances by Black Thought and Questlove of the Roots, who went to the same high school as Boyz II Men’s members.
Like many teen idols, Boyz II Men fell out of the spotlight as they grew older, but the group has made a recent comeback. Their 2007 studio release Motown: Hitsville USA, a collection of mostly Motown classics, was nominated for a Grammy. On their latest album, Love (2009), the trio covers everyone from Sam Cooke and the Beatles to Cyndi Lauper and the Goo Goo Dolls.
As the group’s promoter is eager to point out, Boyz II Men’s show in Taipei tomorrow coincides with Chihsi (七夕), or Chinese Valentine’s Day, which falls on Monday this year. The group says its concert program will oblige the lovebirds in the audience.
“We will be doing the old to the new. We will sing our classic hits, Motown tributes and material from the Love album. It will be full of love songs,” said Morris.
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