Millennium

Millennium
Studio album by Backstreet Boys
Released	May 18, 1999
Recorded	London, October 3, 1998; Cheiron Studios, Stockholm, October - November 1998; Orlando, FL, October - December 1998; Lexington, KY, March 1999
Genre	Pop
Label	Jive
Producer	Max Martin Kristian Lundin
Professional reviews
Allmusic link Entertainment Weekly (B-) link Robert Christgau link Rolling Stone link
Backstreet Boys chronology
Backstreet Boys (US) (1997) Millennium (1999) Black & Blue (2000)
Singles from Millennium
"I Want It That Way" Released: April 16, 1999 "Larger Than Life" Released: September 3, 1999 "Show Me the Meaning of Being Lonely" Released: December 10, 1999 "The One" Released: May 30, 2000

Millennium is an album by American pop music group Backstreet Boys. It broke numerous records, and is their biggest success to date. It was a highly anticipated follow-up to both their United States debut album, and their second internationally released CD. It was their first record to be released in both the U.S. and internationally in the same form, at the same time. In the United States, it holds the record for most shipments in one year, with 11 million in 1999. It was nominated for five Grammy Awards and spawned four Top 40 singles, including worldwide smash hit single "I Want It That Way." Millennium set a record for most albums sold in its debut week in the United States, and sold 2.2 million in one week, and was certified at least platinum in 45 countries, and has sold more than 40 million copies worldwide.^[1]

Album success

Preceded by the worldwide hit single "I Want It That Way", anticipation for Millennium was high. On May 18, 1999, the day of the album's release, the Backstreet Boys made a heavily-publicized appearance on MTV's Total Request Live. Over 5,000 fans showed to catch a glimpse of the group, prompting police to shut down Times Square, where TRL was taped.

Millennium entered the Billboard 200 at number one, where it remained for 10 non-consecutive weeks. It sold 1,134,000 copies in its first week of release, shattering the previous Nielsen SoundScan record held by Garth Brooks for single-week record sales. Millennium sold nearly 500,000 copies in the U.S. on its first day alone, setting a record for first-day sales.^[2] This record was subsequently overtaken in 2000 by Britney Spears with Oops!... I Did It Again,^[3] and then again by 'N Sync with No Strings Attached.

Millennium became the best-selling album of 1999, selling 9,445,732 albums^[4]. Millennium remained on the Billboard chart for 93 weeks, eventually selling over 12 million copies in the United States and being certified 13 times platinum.^[5] As of the end of December 2008, the album stands as the fourth best selling album in the US of the SoundScan era with 12,104,000 units sold.^[6] In 2003 it was also reported as being the fourth biggest seller for Music Club sales in the US over the past 14 years with sales of 1.59 million.^[7] In Canada, the album is seventh biggest selling album since 1995 ^[8] in the Canadian Soundscan sales era up to end of December 2007.

Millennium dominated the worldwide charts, landing the number-one spot in Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Germany, Greece, the Netherlands, Hong Kong, Iceland, India, Indonesia, Italy, Korea, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Norway, Philippines, Portugal, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan and Thailand.

Millennium was honored with five 1999 Grammy Award nominations including "Album of the Year." Also "I Want It That Way" was rated number three on VH1's 100 Greatest Songs of the 90's.

Track listing

1. "Larger Than Life" (Max Martin, Kristian Lundin, Brian Littrell) – 3:52 Lead vocals by Brian, Nick and AJ
2. "I Want It That Way" (Max Martin, Andreas Carlsson) – 3:33 Lead vocals by Brian, Nick, AJ, Howie and Kevin
3. "Show Me the Meaning of Being Lonely" (Max Martin, Herbert Crichlow) – 3:54 Lead vocals by Brian, Nick, AJ, Howie and Kevin
4. "It's Gotta Be You" (Max Martin, Robert John "Mutt" Lange) – 2:56
5. "I Need You Tonight" (Andrew Fromm) – 4:23 Lead vocals by Nick
6. "Don't Want You Back" (Max Martin) – 3:25
7. "Don't Wanna Lose You Now" (Max Martin) – 3:54
8. "The One" (Max Martin, Brian Littrell) – 3:46
9. "Back to Your Heart" (Gary Baker, Jason Blume, Kevin Richardson) – 4:21
10. "Spanish Eyes" (Andrew Fromm, Sandy Linzer) – 3:53 Lead vocals by Brian, Nick, AJ and Howie
11. "No One Else Comes Close" (Gary Baker, Wayne Perry, Joe Thomas) – 3:42
12. "The Perfect Fan" (Brian Littrell, Thomas Smith) – 4:13 Lead vocals by Brian, AJ, Howie and Kevin

Other editions

The Asian edition of Millennium contained the bonus track "I'll Be There for You" at the end of the album. The Australian edition added that song as well as "You Wrote the Book on Love", as did the Japanese edition which also included a special Japanese cover booklet. In Taiwan, several limited editions were released in packages with other items. One included a Backstreet Boys mouse-pad, and another came in a plastic "CD Player" package with some collector cards. Another Asian limited edition (with the Asian bonus track) was released containing a bonus CD that contained four remixes each of "Larger Than Life" and "Show Me the Meaning of Being Lonely". Yet another edition, "The Multi-Platinum Edition" was released later (with the Asian bonus track) and contained a VCD of the band's music videos from the album.

Miscellaneous

• "Larger than Life" was played in Napoleon Dynamite, and Joe Somebody.
• "I Want It That Way", "Larger Than Life" and "Show Me the Meaning of Being Lonely" all reached the No. 1 spot in Canada.
• "Larger than Life", was also played in Sabrina, the Teenage Witch.

Charts

Album

Singles

See also

• List of best-selling albums worldwide

References

1. ^ The Daily Record: Taking It Back
2. ^ Yahoo Music: The current record for one-week sales in the U.S
3. ^ 'Oops I Did It Again' passes 1.3m in first week
4. ^ top twenty selling of 1999
5. ^ Millennium certified 13x platinum on 07 February 2001
6. ^ SoundScan's Annual Report - January 2009
7. ^ Music Club sales up to 2003
8. ^ Canadian Soundscan sales - January 2008
9. ^ ^{a b} Swiss Charts.com - Millennium Chart Positions