New Kids on the Block / YMMV

Audience-Alienating Era: Face the Music, the final album from the original run, featuring "Dirty Dawg", a Darker and Edgier out-of-nowhere Genre Shift. Recorded after they parted with Maurice Starr, the album's hip hop stylings were more reflective of the music they grew up on, but it didn't go over nearly as well as their previous material.
Broken Aesop: "Remix (I Like The)" is meant to be about being wowed by a formerly unremarkable woman who transforms herself and becomes empowered and self-confident, but it's not at all a stretch to interpret it as "we only like you now that you're pretty."
Covered Up: "Didn't I (Blow Your Mind This Time)" was originally recorded by the Delfonics in 1969 and has had several cover versions, but the NKOTB version is likely the only one people remember.
Epic Riff: Five "oh"s, to two different rhythms^note, were two of the most iconic vocal riffs in pop music in the 80s and 90s.
Growing the Beard: The group's evolution from their debut through Step By Step (coupled with some literal beard-growing), as well as their more modern sound on The Block and the following albums.
Harsher in Hindsight: Jon leaving the group was the final straw that led to their breakup. Years later, Jon revealed on Oprah that he suffered from panic attacks pretty much the entire time he was in the group, and that by the time he quit, they had gotten so bad that he could barely function in everyday life, much less on stage. Jordan was in the same episode with Jon, and revealed that he also suffers panic attacks, but to a much lesser extent. While he's largely been able to keep them in check since they reunited, Jon still struggles with panic issues. During a live, televised performance for iHeartRadio in 2013, Jon couldn't sing his solo part in "Survive You", left the stage, and didn't return for the rest of the show.
Hilarious in Hindsight:
- When the press said that Jon was dating Tiffany, the fangirls screeched. Several years later Jon and Tiffany said yet again that they only were friends... but why is this different, huh? Because Tiffany added "I and Jon never dated... because Jon is Straight Gay, you know". Guess the fangirls were screwed either way, huh.
- In the early-to-mid 2000s, VH1 aired a series called Bands Reunited. The premise is simple enough; they find bands that split up under less than amicable circumstances, hunt down the members, and ask if they would be willing to perform a short concert for charity. They tried this with New Kids, and it ended up being one of the most tense episodes of the series: a couple of the guys said they'd only do it if everybody else agreed to do it, and at least one flat-out refused to even be seen on camera (needless to say, the concert didn't happen and the show was essentially Killed Mid-Episode). Fast forward a few years, and they did reunite, not just for a one-off, but producing new material, and doing very well at it, to boot.
Poor Man's Substitute: The cartoon had a lot of bad Boston accents. After a few episodes, they just stopped trying. Mercifully. (But see Totally Radical on the cartoon's page.)
Replacement Scrappy: Joey when he first replaced Mark Wahlberg, who had left the group after only a few gigs.
Retroactive Recognition: From the cartoon we have Dave Fennoy and Josh Keaton making their debuts as Dick Jackson and Albert.
So Bad, It's Good
- The first album in general and the song "Popsicle" specifically (it's the second in this medley; just the chorus but that should be enough).
- During the last leg of the reunion tour, as part of his solo routine, Joey performed "Popsicle" in the same outfit he originally wore in the group's heyday: multi-zippered pants, a Members Only jacket, and a fedora with the top of the crown cut out and his fluffy hair spilling out. Surprisingly, it worked.
- One possible interpretation of the cartoon.
Tear Jerker:
- Their intervention in the Unsolved Mysteries show turned out to be this. A Missing Person case featured a missing girl who was supposedly caught on tape in one of their videos, so both Jon and Jordan showed up on the show asking for info about her whereabouts. According to an update, however, the girl on tape was an Identical Stranger... and the actual one had been murdered the same day she disappeared. The only good thing is that the poor girl's killer was found and brought to justice.
- During a 2019 performance in Boston, the first there since his father's death, Joe broke down and briefly left the stage just after his performance of "Please Don't Go, Girl".
They Changed It, Now It Sucks!: Fans had this reaction when the New Kids On The Block entered their mid-20's, shortened their name to NKOTB and changed their "clean-cut sound" around the early 90's starting with "Games". When the "Games" remix album came out, their popularity had waned by the time of the album's release, as the pre-teens who had liked them at their peak were the same audience who would become part of "Generation X", embracing the forthcoming grunge and gangsta rap sounds that ended the dominance of late 80s/early 90s dance/pop.
What Do You Mean, It's Not for Kids?: Jordan Knight's One-Hit Wonder "Give it To You" was performed by him at a 1999 Nickelodeon fan concert, in spite of it having allusions to sexual innuendo in it. As such, when it was performed, some of the lyrics were blanked out.
The Woobie: Jon, due to the stress of keeping his sexuality under wraps during the group's original run and his struggles with panic attacks both then and now.

YMMV / New Kids on the Block

Edit Locked