Former New Kid Jordan Knight Sounds Off on His New Album and Old Band

Original Article here.

"It blows in like a hurricane/Till you wonder where you are/And how you got so far," sings Jordan Knight on "Separate Ways." It's a love song, but it could just as easily apply to his experience with pop supergroup New Kids on the Block, who ruled the charts -- and teenage hearts -- in the late '80s. Like fellow Kid Joey McIntyre, Knight, now 29, is back for another taste of the pop pie. Before he set out as elder statesman on the Boys of Summer tour with reigning teen princes 'N Sync and Five, he sat down to chat with barnesandnoble.com's Rebecca Wallwork about his new R&B-tinged self-titled CD -- and laugh about his days as a teen idol.

barnesandnoble.com: I think people will be surprised to learn that you cowrote, coproduced and played keyboards on most of the album. How long have you been playing?

Jordan Knight: I didn't seriously start playing keyboards until I was 17, but before that I used to play the violin, and I had a recorder that I used to learn flute solos on [laughs]. I would play along with Led Zeppelin's "Stairway to Heaven" [hums tune]. I'd be playing a rock guitar solo on a recorder.

bn: What was it like working with Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis?

JK: I was nervous, going into the studio. But they're very down-to-earth, and very go-with-the-flow. They really valued my opinion, which is all you can ask for.

bn: Your first single, "Give It to You," is pretty raunchy. Did you write those lyrics?

JK: [laughs] I was in the studio in Minneapolis with Robin [Thicke, his writing and production partner] and Jimmy Jam, and we couldn't figure out any lyrics for it. So I got back to my hotel room at 2 a.m., still thinking about it, and writing down ideas. Then I called Robin at 3 a.m., and started reading this stuff to him and it sounded like some perverted love letter. He was like, "What the hell is that?" So I went to bed feeling real stupid, but yeah, we ended up using what I had written.

bn: How has the fact that New Kids were so successful affected your plans for this album?

JK: It screwed me up totally [laughs]. Actually, when I first signed my deal, I was like, "Yeah, I want to top the New Kids. I want this record to be huge," but I realized that if you have those high expectations, it makes you too scared to take risks. It really stifles your creativity.

bn: Is it weird going through the fan hysteria again, after so long out of the spotlight?

JK: I try not to think about it too much. I just don't want people to be turned off because they're thinking, "No, only teenage girls listen to his music." I want everyone to give it a chance.

bn: How do you feel now, looking back on the work you did with New Kids?

JK: I think some of it's really good and some of it's really terrible [laughs]. I was listening to some of it not too long ago, and I was like, "Damn, that's terrible!" But we were just starting out. It was a teenage pop band, and it was good for what it was.

bn: Was the criticism hard to take?

JK: Well, if you read four bad articles in a row, you start to feel down on yourself. But I always looked at articles on other people that I respected, and they would get dogged just as much. So I would tell myself, "All right...it's not me."

bn: So, has this solo project been on your mind for a long time?

JK: Yeah, I was thinking about it back when we did the last New Kids album. We all had different ideas of what we should do by the time that album came along -- me especially. I took some time after our last tour, to just relax and be normal, and to get the passion back. Also, the music scene was full of rap, alternative, and grunge, so I felt it would be good for my career if I waited a while.

bn: Right. But in the last few years, pop music has exploded again.

JK: I think people just got bored of the whole "Music is a serious thing. You've got to be real" attitude. People just felt, "Come on, lighten up. It's just music." You're supposed to listen to music and feel good. That's what it's for, to enjoy yourself. You don't have to take it so seriously. Why is being happy not being real?