Whether you're a wannabe Survivor, Big Brother houseguest or Popstar, you're supposed to be happy when you reach the goal.

 Right?

 "I was like, why did you choose me?" former Making the Band cast member Ikaika Kahoano says.

 Kahoano beat out hundreds of auditioners for a spot in the new musical group O-Town.

 Tonight at 9 p.m. on W, Kahoano interrupts O-Town's publicity tour to announce he is returning to his family in Hawaii.

 (Making the Band also airs on F at 12:30 a.m. tonight.)

 "Obviously, they had seen I wasn't getting along with anyone, yet they chose me. I didn't know if I was there because I could sing, because I had a certain look or because they were trying to make a TV show and I added a lot of drama," he tells the Sun.

 "If the latter was the case, I didn't want to waste my life doing that."

 ABC's docu-soap set out to chronicle the formation of a new boy band by manager Lou Pearlman -- the man credited with discovering 'N Sync, Backstreet Boys and LFO.

 One of the eight finalists, Paul Martin, returned to Mississippi before the final cut was made.

 Kahoano, Ashley Parker Angel, Erik-Michael Estrada, Trevor Penick and Jacob Underwood were in. Bryan Chan and Mike Miller were given a handshake and a plane ticket.

 "The cut was very abrupt. The day after, we all had to go home," says runner-up Chan. "I think the hardest part was not so much getting cut, but to leave those guys so abruptly. When you go through challenges with people, there's an automatic bond."

 Without his friends Mike and Bryan riding shotgun on the road to stardom, Kahoano opted to return to undergraduate medical studies at the University of Hawaii, his family and his girlfriend, Malia.

 Ah, yes. Malia. You see, part of being in a boy band like O-Town or 'N Sync is telling teen magazines you're still looking for that special someone.

 "Lou'd always tell me you have to live two lives. I'm not going to pretend I don't have a girlfriend," Kahoano says.

 Dan Miller, one of the 25 finalists, took Kahoano's place after the February departure.

 "People might look at it like it was the biggest opportunity and I'm a dingaling for not doing it -- but I'm not about to compromise what I believe in to do what other people tell me to do," says Kahoano.

 While O-Town follows the patented Pearlman recipe for success -- record in Germany, appear at malls in Canada, storm MTV -- Chan, Kahoano and Miller have formed a new group and are recording a demo in New York.

 "When MTV (the show's producer) and ABC came up with the idea, I don't think a single thought was put into, 'OK, what about the guys that don't make it?' " Chan says.

 "The benefit of the show and the exposure is there are already labels who are interested in us without even hearing our demo."

 Paul Martin is now playing in a country band, but the other three O-Town outsiders have been teamed with Matt Morrison, fresh off a national tour with the stage production of Footloose. The band is yet to be named.

 The guys are writing and choosing material which they hope differs from O-Town's style, thanks to the baritone of Miller, four-part harmonies and an R&B flavour.

 "If I had to describe a style and label it, -- which I don't, really -- we'd be more like Boyz II Men with an edge," offers Kahoano.

 If nothing else, things will certainly be different offstage now that the group has swum with the sharks and lived to tell the tale.

 "The deal we have now is completely on our terms. We don't want anything like what we had with Making the Band -- it completely prepared me for working on this new deal," Chan says.

 It also was instrumental in attracting Kahoano back to the mainland. He has come the realization school will always be there, this opportunity won't.

 "I wasn't ready for the situation that was happening in O-Town. I didn't trust anybody out there. I didn't know what the project was about," he says.

 "I'm gonna fight it out with this group."