Like most young girls in the late 1980s and early 1990s, I was a huge New Kids on the Block (NKOTB) fan. I had all the cassettes, trading cards, pillowcases, and even a Jordan and Joey doll (which, in hindsight, is kinda creepy). All of that is now gone, of course, but I still have a VHS somewhere called Step By Step, which ends with this song:
Ah, yes, “Tonight.” It’s the classic “thank you fans” song that every boy band records when they become too popular to spend a lot of time in the studio. Perhaps that’s why the melody is so blatantly copied from The Beatles’ songbook from its hook right down to its “la la la” refrain. Even the lyrics are lazy, with half of them referencing the group’s previous hits.
The video is heavy on dance moves straight out of the era. Jordan Knight, the band’s unofficial lead singer, busts out the best worst moves in the bunch – inadvertently starting the “I’m just a boy bander, singing and dancing in the rain” trend that would later copied by Take That and the Backstreet Boys.
The best part, of course, is Donnie Wahlberg – who seemed so anti-boy band that you often wondered what he was doing there with his motorcycle and scowl. He even wears a shirt that gets blurred out, which I remember as being really edgy at the time. It's clear that none of today's boy banders could hang quite as tough as him.
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