The Washington PostDemocracy Dies in Darkness
Arts and Entertainment

The Backstreet Boys stole the show at the ACM Awards, and here’s why that’s good and bad news

Analysis by
Reporter
April 3, 2017 at 2:01 a.m. EDT
Florida Georgia Line and Backstreet Boys perform onstage during the 52nd Academy Of Country Music Awards in Las Vegas. (Ethan Miller/Getty Images)
Placeholder while article actions load

In a twist that few could have predicted, the Backstreet Boys managed to steal the show at the 2017 Academy of Country Music Awards on Sunday night.

The 1990s boy band is featured on duo Florida Georgia Line’s current single, “God, Your Mama, and Me,” and the groups performed it together during the CBS telecast. Then, at the end of the song, the two acts suddenly segued into “Everybody (Backstreet’s Back),” the pop-dance track that helped launch the Backstreet Boys to superstardom in 1997. Members of the ACM Awards audience, to put it mildly, lost their minds.

Get the full experience.Choose your plan

ACM Awards 2017: Complete list of winners, best and worst moments

Disclaimer: The author of this post is in a demographic that feels deeply nostalgic for 90s boy bands. But as social media suggests, for many other viewers, the BSB cameo was a much-needed shot of adrenaline to a relatively flat three-hour show with only a few standout performances. The audience appeared to truly come alive with “Everybody,” as cameras panned to stars such as Tim McGraw, Faith Hill, Keith Urban, Nicole Kidman, Carrie Underwood and Maren Morris having a blast, dancing and mouthing every lyric. Even the normally-stoic Jason Aldean laughed and clapped along.

So what does it mean that the most energetic moment of the broadcast centered around a non-country act that hit its peak about two decades ago?

For traditional country fans, that’s bad news — especially because it adds fuel to the ongoing debate about the role of crossover genre performances on country award shows. While some feel that these ceremonies don’t “need” stars like Beyoncé or Justin Timberlake to show up, producers rely heavily on these celebrity appearances to boost viewership outside the country realm. And when ACMs producers scour Twitter and Facebook and see comments about how the Backstreet Boys “saved” the show, or were the best part of the broadcast, that will only inspire execs to book similar acts in the future.

After all, country award ceremonies serve to spotlight the genre, but ratings are the true goal. “Our job is to grow the audience as big as we possibly can,” CBS executive Jack Sussman said before the ACMs, adding that producers are focused on “maintaining the integrity of the brand and staying true to the core value of the show.”

Plus, although the goal is for the pop act to bring attention to the country singer (see: Chris Stapleton’s career-making night when he sang with Timberlake at the 2015 CMAs) there’s always the chance that the country artist will be overshadowed. Case in point: Florida Georgia Line’s “God, Your Mama, and Me” got a nice boost on iTunes, though that wasn’t the song that caused Nashville’s superstars to dance like nobody was watching. And while Miranda Lambert, Chris Stapleton and Reba McEntire had stellar performances, guess which clip probably be circulating the most on Monday morning?

A year after Chris Stapleton’s CMAs shocker, country music is still wondering how much it mattered

The good news? Though a group like BSB is primed for mockery (hey, not everyone enjoyed the boy band era), regardless, it’s a treat for the audience to see country stars act like regular people: Turns out they rock out to cheesy 90s anthems just like everyone else. During award shows, TV viewers bank on those type of celebrity snapshots, especially when proceedings start to drag.

So even if some people can’t stand the pop acts brought in to make country music more “accessible” to the everyday viewer, at the end of the day, they serve to create more human moments — and that’s something any award show could use.

Read more:

Toby Keith was a loud political voice in the Bush years. What about the Trump era?

Should country singers speak up about country singers and Trump? We asked them.

Why do these country singers seem embarrassed about their new music?

Loading...