The Backstreet Boys welcomed Drake as their honorary sixth member during the band’s concert stop at the Budweiser Stage in Toronto Saturday evening.
Just as the boy band was closing their set, the quintet introduced Drake as the crowd launched into rapturous applause. Before the band jumped into its 1999 hit “I Want It That Way,” Drake went to explain what the song meant to him as a 13-year-old kid.
“At my bar mitzvah, for the first time in my life, this girl I was in love with came up to me while one of the greatest songs in the world was playing, and she asked me if I would dance with her,” the rapper told the sea of Toronto fans. “It was the first time I ever felt acknowledged and it was the first time I ever felt like I had a shot at being cool.”
What’s better than I Want It That Way?
I Want It That Way…. f/ @Drake #BSBTO #DNAWORLDTOUR pic.twitter/pKVQK2XtDN
— Backstreet Boys (@backstreetboys) July 3, 2022
“And by the way, if she could see me now!” he shouted, going on to say the song was “one of the greatest songs in music history,” as the beginning notes of the track started up. With his eyes closed, Drake joyfully bopped along to the classic tune before joining the band for the rendition. Members of the boy band also honored Drake by adding parts of “Hold On, We’re Going Home” to their performance.
Although neither party has officially confirmed how the surprise performance came to be, a source close to the collaboration told PvNew that Kevin Richardson ran into Drake at dinner in Toronto and the rest was history.
After the show, the rapper posted a snippet of him singing the final lines of “I Want It That Way” on his Instagram with the caption “When she says she’s over men in this generation and asks why I live alone…”
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