‘This is a lot’: Nick Carter enjoying ‘surreal’ BSB Sphere experience

At Sphere, it happened for U2. Same for the Eagles, Dead & Company and Kenny Chesney. All of those headliners added dates or, in Chesney’s case, have announced such plans.

Entering its third weekend, the Backstreet Boys’ “Into the Millennium” show has already sparked expectations it will expand beyond its Aug. 25 closing. The show’s run was extended four times even before opening July 11, growing to 21 dates.

They are selling out, and when you sell out Sphere, you’re a candidate to add dates. BSB co-founder Nick Carter, a Las Vegas resident for nearly a decade, neither confirms nor denies these plans.

“There have been rumors and whispers of us doing more stuff,” Carter says in a Sunday chat a couple of hours before a performance. “Nothing has been confirmed yet. So just live in the moment, and enjoy it.”

Torrid, I tell you!

It can be argued that the original BSB roster of Carter, Kevin Richardson, AJ McLean, Brian Littrell and Howie Dorough is hotter than ever. “Into the Millennium” at Sphere is a conversation-starter around the city and internationally, with “Have you seen it?” leading those chats.

The BSB Terminal pre-show fan experience and post-show hangs at Voltaire are at The Venetian. The combined Sphere-Palazzo-Venetian presence has turned the corner of the Strip and Sands Avenue into the Backstreet Boys’ fortress.

Carter says the band was in rehearsals for months, working on choreography and core stage skills. The basic BSB show has remained intact, the dance styles familiar to fans who caught the band at Planet Hollywood’s Zappos Theater from 2017 to 2019.

“It got to the point where, toward the end of our rehearsals, we were fatigued, we were tired, we were like, ‘Gosh, this is a lot,’ ” Carter says. “And then the last four days of the rehearsals, they could only get us in there from 10 p.m. to 4 a.m., and it was just like, ‘Wow.’ We were not just gassed, but it was almost like we were really focusing on living up to what Sphere is going to deliver.”

Sphere headliners have become aware, quickly, that they are not always the main focus of their crowd.

The Bulbous Wonder bursts with an opening of a rocket ship blasting out of the venue and becoming a spacecraft. The “Siberia” winterscape, with the guys’ singing faces embedded in snow is an instant classic. During “I Want It That Way,’ the stage that ascends 70 feet above the crowd, supported by four thin cables, is as suspenseful as any moment in a Cirque show.

“Getting up there, it shakes a little bit, it sways a little bit, and there are times you have to adjust our choreography,” Carter says. “When it comes back down and we land, it has to lock back in. We can’t move as much as we would want to up there. But the gag itself is pretty extraordinary. It really elevates ‘I Want It That Way,’ and kind of puts us on the top of the mountain, so to speak.”

The back-to-BSB segment

The quintet performs a few rarities in the show’s middle section. “Spanish Eyes” is dusted off for the first time since 2016. “The Perfect Fan” is performed for the first time in 25 years, as photos of the guys with their mothers fill the rounded video screens. This stretch has become Carter’s favorite.

“In rehearsals I was like, ‘Oh, my god, I don’t know how this is going to come off,’” Carter says. “We had not done those songs in so long, and they are songs that only core fans would really know. We didn’t know what to expect, but when we got the big reaction, we almost feel like it’s the best part of the show. It brings everything back to a simpler time, the foundation of what we’ve always been.”

As the Sphere shows have taken off, Carter is stepping out of his BSB costume with his latest album, “Love Life Tragedy,” issued in May. This is his state-of-self statement, full of retrospective originals.

“Hey Kid” is a conversation between Carter and his younger self: “Hey kid, I know you didn’t ask for this, but if you hold on tight, you might get your wish.”

“It’s basically me saying, ‘No matter what you’re going through right now, everything is going to be OK,’” Carter says. The track “Hurts to Love You” was also difficult to compose, as an ode to Carter’s late brother, Aaron, who died from a drug-related, accidental drowning in Lancaster, California, in November 2022.

“It’s about my brother and our relationship, and everything we had gone through in this industry, in our lives,” Carter says. “That one is definitely hard for me to do.”

The Vegas lifestyle

Carter and his wife, Lauren Kitt, have been married for 11 years and are nine-year Las Vegas residents. He coaches his son, Odin’s, baseball team. His daughters, Saoirse and Pearl, were born in Las Vegas. He lives 15 minutes from Sphere, and can remember watching it being built from street level and imagining what it would be like to play there.

“It’s surreal to me. When I drive by, I’m still in shock, like, ‘Are you kidding me?’ ” Carter says. “I think people have got to understand, no matter how big or small things have been throughout our 34 years of being in this industry, nothing is a given.”

Carter says this level of fame is often fleeting, and he is enjoying every moment of the Sphere experience.

“I think about if it all was taken away or it wasn’t here anymore,” Carter says. “As long as I still have my friends and family, be there for my children, and still be a part of this community, I’d be fine.”