Article courtesy of user charlie.r of r/popheads.
NSYNC was the biggest band on the planet at one point in time. From Britney to Ari, everyone either was a fan or knew someone who was a fan. In Britney’s case it was more so because she was their opening act but still, they were the hottest new pop phenomenon.
To my knowledge they were, at least. I was just under 2 years old when this song was released so I can’t fully grasp the situation but I’ll try my damndest to put it into perspective.
The band had essentially been touring nonstop following the release of their chart-topping self-titled debut album in 1997, right up until the end of 1999; that’s roughly a 30 month promotion cycle, and that’s not even counting when they first released “I Want You Back” in fall of 1996. Justin was 15 here when they performed it! This was a music era that spanned for over three years; albeit with the heavy lifting being done in Europe first, before RCA got NSYNC to establish a foothold in North America when the album was released stateside in 1998. It paid off handsomely for the group however, because the album would become a Diamond certified album, clocking in over 10,000,000 copies sold in the U.S. (Article restricted to Billboard Pro)
With all the money rolling in from the album sales, tour dates, and other assets like merchandising, the members of NSYNC were absolutely earning their living as recording artists. Well, in theory that was the case. What really happened was Lou Pearlman and his fraudulent TransContinental company were hoarding all the wealth NSYNC should’ve had, which led to the band filing a lawsuit citing breach of contract on BMG’s part. Sadly, this is far from an isolated incident in pop; you get impressionable teens who are promised everything before ultimately, being taken advantage of by these bigwig record execs who think they’re too stupid to realize they’re being swindled right under their noses. It’s very common in k-pop, and allegedly plagued Fifth Harmony when they were still a band. In fact, it wasn’t even just NSYNC; Pearlman’s own Backstreet Boys, primary rivals to NSYNC and label mates on Jive Records, faced similar issues with the business mogul, the likes of which can be best appreciated in the Backstreet Boys’ Show ‘Em What You’re Made Of 2015 documentary.
That was 1999. This is 2000. More specifically, January 11, 2000. The day the boy band would forever be changed. Little did Jake Schulze and Kristian Lundin know as they produced this song, co-writing it with Andreas Carlsson, that they would cement themselves in the annals of pop.
“Bye Bye Bye” starts off rather innocuously, with a violin playing a G#minor, as it plays for 3 bars before Justin interrupts it with a terse “Hey, Hey”, prompting the music to stop entirely. What brings it back? One word. One word to rule them all. The word in question?
Bye, bye, bye (Bye bye!)
Okay, so it’s technically one word repeated five times, but it’s all that’s needed to properly kick this song off. And when it starts, it does not stop. It only really stops for the bridge, before kicking it back into high gear for the final chorus, which JC Chasez launches into with an iconic B4 note. Speaking of which, JC Chasez and Justin Timberlake, typical for NSYNC, go blow for blow on vocal solos on the song, with Lance, Joey and Chris only really being present on the chorus, interlude, and second half of the bridge. Now that we’ve established who sings on the song and when they sing, we come to the big question:
What’s the song actually about?
Lyrically, the song details a relationship ending between a man and a woman, in which the man is completely fed up with the woman treating her man’s love for her as a toy, manipulating and toying her lover along in exchange for unreciprocated love and empty promises.
Does that remind you of anyone? It certainly reminded listeners of the toxic dynamic between Pearlman and the members, which is heightened by lyrics such as
I loved you endlessly
And you weren’t there for me
Just hit me with the truth
Don’t really wanna make it tough, I just wanna tell you that I’ve had enough.
The narrative certainly fits the song’s lyrics. As far as the song goes, this is pretty much where it ends. But it doesn’t end there.
A couple of weeks later, on January 24th, the music video for “Bye Bye Bye” premiered on MTV’s Making the Video, elevating the single to new heights.
Directed by Wayne Isham, The video starts with NSYNC being suspended from puppet strings, being puppeteered by the actress Kim Smith, who cuts each of the members off their strings at various points, chasing them through various settings. By the way, I haven’t mentioned this yet, but this song serves as the lead single and opening track for the band’s sophomore album, No Strings Attached. The video strongly plays into this motif. For Joey and Chris, they fall on top of a moving train which they run across in an attempt to flee from Smith, only being able to do so once they hide in the seats of one of the cars. Justin gets dropped into a warehouse which he must escape from, his task made harder with Smith sending attack dogs to stop him, which he just manages to evade as he sprints into a downpour. JC and Lance are dropped into a sports car, as they race to escape Smith in the car behind on a canyonside highway, barely escaping in time. All the while, the video is inter-cut with scenes of the members in a blue anti-gravity box as they struggle to find their footing, however, when they are stood upright, they perform what is widely considered to be the gold standard for boy band choreography even to this day. It’s a choreography I pride myself on hopefully learning from start to finish, it’s that legendary.
The evidence for this case comes in the form of the Best Choreography Video Music Award which was awarded to Darrin Henson for his work on the band’s signature dance routine, “Bye Bye Bye” claiming two other Moonmen for Best Pop Video and Viewer’s Choice. It disgruntles me that Oops!…I Did It Again had to lose for this to win, not to mention it wasn’t even fucking nominated for Best Choreo, but I digress.
As a result of the one-two punch of the great song and video, “Bye Bye Bye” barnstormed the charts. It entered the Hot 100 at #42 at the end of January, vaulted into #20 the week after and peaked at #4 in April of that year. Elsewhere, it peaked at #3 on the UK Singles Chart, it topped the Canadian Singles chart the week of March 20th, and similar to the Hot 100, charted at #4 in Germany where it all started for them. Elsewhere, the song topped the charts in Australia and New Zealand, only to reappear on the New Zealand charts at #14 in 2014 for some unknown reason. If someone can explain that to me it’d be much appreciated.
The song’s legacy hasn’t faded over time either; in 2013 when Justin Timberlake performed a medley of his hits at the 2013 VMAs, he reunited NSYNC, including “Bye Bye Bye” in the set. The song even popped up in Anne Marie’s 2018 hit, “2002”, and its music video has been referenced by both The Wanted and Big Time Rush.
As for Pearlman… after he was exposed as a money-laundering fraud he would eventually die of heart failure while serving a prison sentence.
No musician should ever have to experience what NSYNC went through at Pearlman’s hands, but if not for him, NSYNC almost certainly wouldn’t have had the universal recognition they have today, most of which was bolstered by this song.
On that note, I have a few discussion questions.
- Just how ubiquitous was this song with pop culture in the year 2000? I want to know firsthand from someone who experienced it who is now in their 30s-40s who could truly appreciate it as it was happening before them.
- Were you an NSYNC fan prior to “Bye Bye Bye”? If so, did you love it when you first heard it? Did you watch the video every chance you got? I spoke to a friend about this and she told me a family friend’s daughter babysat her once and she spent the entire night with her sister and the babysitter watching the video over and over again trying to recreate the choreography, while also playing No Strings Attached on repeat.
- Do you think we’ll ever see another song from a boy band on the scale of Bye Bye Bye in our lifetimes?
- Did you ever see NSYNC perform the song live? Just how electric was the venue when they performed it?
Thanks for reading, I hope I did the song justice.
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