Idolator

Pervy, Ponzi-scheming boy band svengali Lou Pearlman had enough to worry about with that pesky trial for fraud before Vanity Fair implicated him as "a habitual sexual predator — harassing, abusing or worse — the teenage boys in his charge." One of the most well-known among Pearlman's alleged victims was the Backstreet Boys' Nick Carter, and in an interview with MTV, Carter and the BSB's freely admit that Pearlman is a giant knob when it comes to managing bands, while continuing to dance arond the most serious allegations leveled at him.

Needless to say, none of this is anything that now-27-year-old Nick Carter is keen to talk about, especially in what ought to be an interview heralding the release of a new record, but he did have a comment for those people speaking out.

"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," Carter said. "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."

When I suggested that if anyone is being "attacked" it's Pearlman and not Backstreet, Nick would only offer, "Well, not necessarily an attack, but it does affect the whole entire group. Because we've all gone through stuff together, and it just feels like, it's unfortunate that people have to talk, 'cause they have nothing else to talk about."

However much this is just Carter, music industry pro, trying to deflect an interviewer's attention back to the band's new album, his "I don't wanna talk about it" attitude coupled with a vague persecution complex feels a little too much like what TV doctors always refer to as the "textbook responses" of an abused kid. Man, Lou Pearlman was a lot easier to joke about when his sleaziness only extended to contracts.

Backstreet Boys Open Up To John Norris About Lou Pearlman [MTV]