GIVING HIS ALL
Backstreet Boy Nick Carter opens up to In Touch about balancing a world tour with his daddy duties
For Nick Carter, traveling all over the globe with the Backstreet Boys for their DNA World Tour with his pregnant wife, Lauren Kitt, and 3-yearold son, Odin, in tow has its fair share of challenges. “They’ve been on the road with me for three weeks straight, jumping on planes every other day,” says the 39-year-old. “It’s brutal.” But that’s not to say the boy bander doesn’t, well, want it that way. “It’s also a beautiful thing. I wouldn’t want to be away from them at all, and having Odin here forces us to get out of our hotel room and go do things.” Here, Nick takes some time out of his hectic schedule to talk to In Touch’s Diana Cooper about balancing family life with work, expecting baby No. 2 with Lauren and his gluttonous guilty pleasure.
Sounds like juggling the tour with fatherhood isn’t easy.
NC: I’m definitely working overtime. I have a two-hour show, then I’m reading books to Odin and doing all the things that go into being a dad. But it also makes the experience sweeter in many ways.
Do you get time to hang out with the BSB guys offstage?
NC: When we have time, we spend it with one another. For my wife’s 36th birthday, we went to an Italian restaurant in Sweden. All the guys were there, and our original producer Max Martin came. We had a great time. Congrats on Lauren’s pregnancy! NC: Thank you. On my birthday I said I don’t want anything, just take
a pregnancy test, because we’d been trying. And she did, and she came out and her face looked like she’d seen a ghost, and we both started crying. It was the best present ever.
Are you hoping for another boy or a girl this time?
NC: As everyone knows, we had a miscarriage and it was a girl, which was heartbreaking. We’d love a girl, but I just want a healthy child.
You were 13 when you joined BSB. Think Odin will follow in your showbiz footsteps?
NC: All I care about now is that he can be a kid. I became the provider in my family at a very young age, so I want Odin to feel protected and lifted up by his mom and dad. But can he hold a tune? He can sing pretty well. [Laughs] Speaking of your family, how’s your little brother Aaron doing? NC: He’s fantastic. We speak here and there, but he’s in a great place.
You’re still close with the guys from ’NSync. Do you think they should follow BSB’s lead and tour?
NC: I think it would be good for the world of music for them to make new material or tour. That era was a really happy time. But, of course, it’s their choice.
How cool is it to still be performing with BSB after so many years?
NC: It’s great. I’m very appreciative of having this career for 26 years. But if it all went away, it wouldn’t matter to me as long as I have my family. ◼