98 Degrees was up next, ready to contribute their part of the package (tour). The choice for this lineup confused me from the day it was announced; I can understand wanting to resurrect the NKOTB nostalgia thing (I think), and I really do like Boyz II Men well enough, but the amalgam of the three was slightly confusing.
98 Degrees wasn't ever as huge as NKOTB, and Boyz II Men is in a completely different genre, being far more r&b than anything, although they are technically a boy band, I suppose. To be fair, though, I admittedly never jumped on the 98 Degrees bandwagon; they came on the scene well after my boy band infatuation days were over.
Fortunately for them, it seems I may have been the only one in the crowd who escaped their grasp back in the day, because the rest of the women in attendance -- and yes, it was all freakin' women filling the Toyota center -- were fangirling it up for the Lachey brothers and company once they took the stage.
The tears of fangirldom were much less during the 98 Degrees set, despite them touching on all of those sappy ballads they released. They busted out the big guns, too, opening with "Invisible Man" and running through heavy hitters like "The Hardest Thing" and "I Do (Cherish You)" with relative ease.
These guys were never the strongest singers to take the stage, even back at the height of their popularity, but they definitely held their own, and they still can. The vocal chops were pretty decent, honestly. I'd expected way more of a choppy performance vocally, but they surprised me.
Where things got slightly muddled, however, was when they tried to keep the whole boy band appearance going. It's been so many years, and I suppose that their fans -- probably rightfully -- expect to see choreography and ass shaking and hip swiveling, but it's so damn weird to see a bunch of guys in their mid-forties dancing around to "Give Me Just One Night (Una Noche)." All I could think of was how embarrassing it must be to see your dad up on stage, dancing around like a '90s boy band member, and it totally threw me off.
There's gonna come a day when the fool in 98 Degrees rips off his tank top, which he's stripped down to from his regular shirt to get "more comfortable," and there's going to be an audible groan from his daughter in the crowd. Perhaps it's time to focus just on the vocals, and leave the sexpot moves to the new generation, no? I'd dare to say that it's okay if boy bands evolve just a bit as the years go, as long as they're still giving the superfans the music they want.
