Backstreet Boys honored with the 2,495th star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame

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They've been labelled competitors for more than two decades, but members of the Backstreet Boys and *NSYNC recently hit the stage together in the ultimate show of unity, making their debut as "Back-Sync" at The Grove in Los Angeles, California.

Before performing each other's biggest hits, Nick Carter and AJ McLean of the Backstreet Boys and Joey Fatone and Lance Bass of *NSYNC shared how the seeds of their friendship and new professional endeavors – including newly-announced Las Vegas engagement The After Party, featuring Carter, McLean, Fatone and Boyz II Men's Wanya Morris – were planted behind-the-scenes of their groups' perceived feuds.

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Music Lists

8 Forgotten R&B Groups

As the popularity of R&B faded, these groups were lost to history.

During the '90s and 2000s, R&B groups were among of the most popular and profitable acts in music.

Iconic groups like Boyz II Men, Jodeci, and TLC reshaped the landscape of Black music. Their powerful vocal arrangements, distinct personalities, and chart-topping singles not only earned them millions of fans across the globe but respect and recognition from their peers, as well.

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MUSIC

Olivia Castriota Shoots New Video 'What Do You Stand For' on the US-Mexico Border

The R&B-soul diva has been a contender in the past, but her latest video reveals she has political edge.

In the political climate we find ourselves in at the end of 2019, it feels like we spend every day being asked the same question: What do you stand for?

With various media reporting every day about all the new excruciating facets of the various humanitarian crises both at our doorsteps and further afield, we either other ourselves from atrocity or retreat into a virtual world where we can ignore it. Olivia Castriota brings this to light in her latest music video, taking her usual output of pop music almost to a place of performance art, directly and loudly asking us: "What Do You Stand For"?

The song, an anthemic piece that at first appears to be about self-empowerment, takes on a satirical bite when contrasted with the visuals of the video. Collaborating with AZURxVIBES Productions, Castriota and her team headed south and shot some remarkable footage along the US-Mexico border in Arizona. The music video shows guerilla-documentary style visuals of illegal circle-fights, the border wall, and actual undocumented immigrants crossing into the US spliced with more commercial angles of Castriota performing and appearing in glamorous locales, producing a distressing juxtaposition. Recontextualized, her lyrics now alternate between self-reflective criticism and downright self-parody; the chorus' call-and-response becomes a conflict rather than an affirmation. The joyously anarchic result: "What do you stand for? / I stand up for me":

"Our goal as directors was to bring out an emotion of uncomfortable self-reflection from the viewer. We wanted the viewer to feel the dry parched desert from the comfort of their sofa, while watching children in cages on their smartphone. Not guilt... but a slap" - AZURxVIBES

An unconventional video project needs an unconventional debut. To that end, Castriota premiered the video by projecting it onto a giant empty wall on New York's Houston street, adding to the video's punk-rock street cred. Passers-by were charged with the task of looking up and taking notice of what was going on around them. Both literally and figuratively.

Olivia Castriota has already shown herself to be a talented singer and songwriter, producing pieces like " Weekend Lover" and "Kills Me," but "What Do You Stand For" takes things to another level. Her willingness to position herself in the video as a fatuous figure, taking selfies whilst surrounded by humanitarian neglect shows an uncommon degree of self-awareness. In the face of the sheer human agony of the border crisis, answering "What do you stand for?" with "I stand up for me" is blatant satire on the petty, selfish short-sightedness of Instagram-based empowerment. Castriota once again stands out from her contemporaries by challenging the status quo, telling us loud and proud what she stands for.



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MUSIC

Stephen Puth Talks New Single and Working Alongside His Brother

"I mean music, in general, is in a weird but great place."

24-year-old Stephen Puth has dedicated his musical career to navigating the minute intricacies of romantic relationships.

From "Half Gone" to "Sexual Vibe," each of his breakout singles so far has attempted to unravel and understand a different nuanced phase of romance. His latest release, "Look Away," expands further on this theme. "It's not necessarily the first time we fight or fall in love, it's that weird awkward in-between phase leading up to some sort of breakdown," Puth told Popdust. The track, which he co-wrote alongside his brother Charlie Puth, was a complicated endeavor for Stephen to put into words. "We wanted to talk about something universal that everybody goes through," Puth said of the track's creative process. "It's hard to open up about emotion and make a great song out of it." Stephen spoke further with Popdust about the new single and what else we can expect from the up-and-coming pop sensation.

Tell me more about the new song!

People's eyes can tell the whole story in a break-up, and we wanted to take more about that specific moment, that moment right before the breakdown of a relationship.

Does this stem from personal experience?

Everyone always thinks, "This experience must have just happened to the artist, so that's why they're talking about it." But this is really just an accumulation of having both good and bad relationships, and even in the good moments having those times when you look away from each other. I just think everyone can draw from that.

Is this part of a larger body of work?

I'm working on an EP. The music is ready; we're just ironing out all the wrinkles. I want it to come out as soon as possible. I'm excited to grow the fanbase and start touring more. I'm looking forward to all that.

How did you get into music?

My mom was my piano teacher, and I pretty much learned to hate the piano. I went to a very academically rigorous school. So it all culminated in a massive burnout. I taught myself guitar instead, and it became a real big stress reliever for me.

Did you know that you wanted to pursue music professionally?

At the end of college, I was working in finance and had a job set up with that, and then I took some time off from school, and then one day just didn't go back. I couldn't do that for the rest of my life. So I downloaded Pro Tools on my computer, moved to California, and started interning as an assistant at a record label.


When did things start to change for you?

I started working with an Australian artist named Connor Sewell, and next thing I knew I was in Scott Storch's house. It was a very weird process, but I'm glad it all worked out.

Where do you see pop music heading, and what can you bring to the table?

I mean music, in general, is in a weird but great place. I saw some crazy statistic that 100,000 songs of any sort are globally released on a weekly basis or something like that, and that's crazy. But that's also great, because that means anyone can create a stylistic wave. Personally, I wasn't the big pophead growing up; I used to listen to classic rock. So for me, my influences are going to come from there.

Follow Stephen on Instagram and Twitter.