FUN FACT: This week is the 20th anniversary of the release of the Backstreet Boys‘ self-titled debut album in the United States – one year after the rest of the world found out the boys have apparently “got it goin’ on“.
It’s okay though, because this week internationally everybody – “yeahhhhh” – else can celebrate 20 years of their second, and arguably better, record ‘Backstreet’s Back‘.
And as fans tried to mark the auspicious occasion, Billboard talked to the-other-one-who-sometimes-had-a-goatee AJ McLean who revealed that producer Max Martin managed to turn a fart from BSB cherub Howie Dorough into a bass sound on single The Call from 2000’s ‘Black & Blue‘.
HE WHAT?
As McLean tells it:
So when we were in the studio with Max making the song ‘The Call’, Howie was in the booth and we were doing that vocal break down, [sings] “dun dun dun, dun dun dun dun”. Max gave Howie his harmony, and I think he was just putting so much air into the vocal that as he was singing, he went “dun, dun” and he farted — but he farted not only on the beat, but in key. So Max tweaked it and made it sound like one of his patented bass sounds, and it stayed on the record.
He managed to fart “not only on the beat, but in key”. That’s… actually super impressive.
Dorough responded to the allegation:
I’m sure there were a lot of beverages consumed back in the day. It’s one of those kind of things… Everybody at that age – especially Nick [Carter] – was constantly passing gas, just being young 20-year-old guys doing guy locker room kind of stuff. And coincidentally, I got in the booth, was breathing in really heavily singing my part, and I guess some extra air kind of came out. It made everybody laugh, and Max decided to take that and sample it to turn it into the “dun dun dun, dun dun dun dun”.
As entirely expected, the internet is completely bowled over by this development in the BSB oeuvre:
https://twitter.com/pcrowl/status/896110003597094913
.@howied farted during the recording of “The Call” & @backstreetboys #MaxMartin kept it…thanks for this gem @skulleeroz 😂🎶 reasons I 💖 BSB
— Push Past Paralysis (@MarissaMeleske) August 12, 2017
Me listening to The Call trying to find where the fart is pic.twitter.com/oXqDrQbcw2
— n*t (@gyuhwans) August 11, 2017
I couldn’t be laughing harder
— Shelby Waddell (@ShelbyWaddell) August 12, 2017
https://twitter.com/MikeSettele/status/896274163597430785
P.s. Am I the only one completely fascinated that a @backstreetboys song all started with a fart noise?
— 𝙺𝚊𝚝𝚒𝚎 (@rawrritskatie) August 12, 2017
Well… the truth had to come out sometime… https://t.co/N7IJ7KmLtb
— AJ McLean (@aj_mclean) August 11, 2017
