The year was 1967. Mom was parking the car in front of my Aunt Lois’ apartment when I realized, for the very first time, that I was hearing music from our car radio. I was almost 8.  (I told you that I didn’t think much when I was younger. Evidently, I didn’t pay attention much either.) The song was What’s New Pussycat? by Tom Jones. And so, my realization of music began. When a few years went by, I started noticing that some of the songs on the radio were sung by good looking guys, and I really liked them! Thus began my own  fascination with what we now know as ‘boy bands’.

Though I don’t think they were ever referred to as a boy band, the original boy band would have to have been The Beatles. Oddly enough, I don’t really remember listening to them. Again, I was probably not paying attention. I have heard that girls would get so hysterical at their concerts that the concert halls often smelled like urine and that generation didn’t have Depends!

My boy band of choice was The Osmond Brothers. They were good looking! I remember sleeping all night with my ear on the radio just waiting for one of their songs to come on. This may or may not be one of the reasons I sport a lovely pair of hearing aids today.

I read about them in Tiger Beat magazine, put their posters on my walls, and toyed with the idea of becoming a Mormon. Yup, I had it bad. My parents brought me to one of their concerts at the Garden State Arts Center for my birthday. It was loud and we were fairly hysterical, but I’m happy to say I never smelled anything offensive. The dream all ended when one-by-one the Osmond Brothers started getting married. I removed them from my walls, stopped reading Tiger Beat, which had become an expensive habit anyway, and no longer felt the call to Mormonism; but the boy bands played on!

By the time our girls were growing up, boy bands had exploded. They were all over the place! They were the New Kids on the Block, and the Boys who lived on Back Streets. They all went in One Direction and were, in fact, N’Sync. (See how I did that? Sometimes I’m very clever!)

Our oldest daughter’s boy band of choice was Hanson. Honestly, I think our whole family liked them. They seemed like very nice guys and they “Mmmbop, ba-duba-dopped” their way into our Rachel’s heart and our home. We didn’t mind. The words were weird, but the tune was catchy. And, the best thing about these boys…they were home schooled! What more could a mother ask for? They were a nice, clean, boy band, and though they made up words, so did Dr. Seuss, and that was just fine by me!

The idea of this blog was birthed in my kitchen as I listened to our 13 year old granddaughter breathlessly tell me about the boy band she likes. They are called BTS. No, I did not forget the vowels…that is what they call themselves. I don’t know why, but I did try to guess what BTS stands for. My first guess was not very nice…Big Tub of S–t (you can fill in the blanks). Realizing there was no “O” in the initials, BTS, my husband and I had fun with it. We came up with Bite The Straw, Burn The Soup, and Boys That Smell. It could also stand for the thing we’ve noticed our granddaughter doing, Buy The Store. The ‘Store’ being anything that has to do with BTS or any of their albums. By the way, albums can now be purchased and played on your phone. We could play albums on our phones, but only if the cord was long enough to reach our record player. Anyway…here they are.

They’re from South Korea and most of the words to their songs are in Korean. Since our granddaughter doesn’t speak Korean, and the fact that a few of them look like little girls, I don’t really see the attraction. But, I am obviously not 13. Those extra forty-five years can do a lot to a person.

Oh, in case you’re wondering, BTS actually stands for Burn The Stage or Beyond The Scene. I guess they can’t make up their minds. They are also known as the Bangtan Boys. (Maybe Bangtan means Backstreet in Korean?) Mady’s favorite is Jung Kook. Let’s just hope she doesn’t find this guy and marry him. I’d hate to have to think of her as a “Kook.”

But, then again, it’s really not that big a deal!