Backstreet Boys Were ‘Blindsided’ By Lou Pearlman’s Scams—Everything They Said About Their Former Manager

Nick Carter

Nick Carter hasn’t spoken about the scam in its entirety. In 2007, Vanity Fair talked to Denise McLean Nick’s mom Jane about Lou Pearlman’s strange behavior. “My son did say something about the fact that Nick had been uncomfortable staying [at Pearlman’s house],” Denise told the outlet at the time. “For a while Nick loved going over to Lou’s house. All of a sudden it appeared there was a flip at some point. Then we heard from the Carter camp that there was some kind of inappropriate behavior. It was just odd. I can just say there were odd events that took place.”

“Certain things happened,” Jane said. “and it almost destroyed our family. I tried to warn everyone. I tried to warn all the mothers.”

In response, Nick told MTV News at the time, “There’s a lot of people who maybe were involved in our stuff in the past who want to take an opportunity maybe because they are a little bitter, you know, maybe because of where they are right now. And they tend to, like, throw us under the bus, you know what I mean? Because of where we are right now. I mean, I’m not naming anybody but … any attack on any one of us in this group is an attack on the whole entire group.”

AJ McLean

AJ McLean has been very outspoken against Lou Pearlman. “We were blindsided to Lou being the sixth member of the group,” he said in Dirty Pop. “You’re going to make your management commission, but you’re also going to make exactly how much the five of us make, and you’re not out there doing what we’re doing.”

“This was this man that took us under his wing,” he recalled. “There [were] years of learning one another and experiencing things together.”

Howie Dorough

Howie Dorough took part in Dirty Pop: The Boy Band Scam. “I didn’t think Lou was the guy was the guy who put the band together,” he said in the doc. “I thought he was the casting director.”

He remembered his time fondly with Lou despite all the scams. “There were some great bonding moments with Lou, and there’s a part of me, for sure, that’ll always hold a place in my heart of gratefulness to him,” he said.

Kevin Richardson

In an interview with Rolling Stone, Kevin Richardson likened Lou Pearlman to “a second father.” He told the publication, “He totally deceived me. I just wish Johnny and Lou could have been honest about everything. We just really learned it’s about money. It’s, ‘We’re a family, we’re a family, we’re a family,’ then you find out, ‘It’s about the money, it’s about the money, it’s about the money.’ Everybody thinks we’re loaded.

Brian Littrell

Brian Littrell was the Backstreet Boys member who initiated suing Lou Pearlman. Littrell hired attorneys who calculated that the five singers had received barely $300,000, about $12,000 per member each year for extensive touring, while Pearlman was raking in millions.