The night began with the end of the world, as a meteor storm set the earth ablaze on the video screens, echoed by a barrage of real fireworks pelting the stage.

        It was a fitting start for the Backstreet Boys concert, since the group's career came close to flaming out just as spectacularly.

        Saturday's show at Firstar Center was only the second since A.J. McLean, the group's designated “bad boy,” got out of rehab.

        He was very upfront about it, as we've come to expect in these Behind the Music times. He told the young, near-sellout crowd — predominantly girls from 9-16 — that he'd been “52 days sober.”

        Confessions aside, it was boy-band business as usual for the quintet. They've long since lost the bubblegum wars to 'NSync, the top-selling, stadium-filling boy band, but the Backstreet Boys have held on to a sizable audience and they know what their arena-size crowd wants.

        Many of their fans were at their first concert, and the Backstreet Boys gave their parents their money's worth.

        Their massive silver stage spanned the arena floor, reaching up eight rows into the side eats. They had 10 dancers helping them fill that stage, while their seven-man band labored in the shadows at the rear. Later in the show, they sang a couple songs from a tiny round stage at the rear of the arena floor, making their way back to the main stage on a walkway above the crowd.

        The “Black & Blue” tour featured songs that that CD, including the obligatory opener, “Everyone,” with its lines, “Let's get on with the show.”

        For most of their 110 minutes onstage, the Backstreet Boys portrayed idealized boyfriends, almost every song a pledge of undying love and fidelity.

        Mr. McLean broke that pattern with his finale, “The Call.” A cheating song co-starring a cell phone. But the encore, “Shape of My Heart” brought things back to the more familiar puppy love.

        They touched on older material, including the predecessor of “Everyone,” “Everybody (Backstreet's Back).”

        They also sang their biggest hit, “I Want It That Way.” Their harmonies rang sweetly as ever, but coming early in the evening, it pointed up the real danger to the Backstreet Boys' future.

        Like Hanson's “MMMBop” or Spice Girls' “Wannabe,” no other song in the Backstreet Boys' repertoire approaches such pure pop pleasure. The group still has its moments, as in the pretty “Time,” or Howie Dorough's feature, “How Did I Fall in Love With You,” but it seems the guys may have peaked artistically as well as commercially. Backstreet's back, but what now?

        Sisqo, who's done more for the thong than Monica Lewinsky, kicked things off with a disjointed 25 minutes upstaged by his costume changes.

        Alternating lame rap with mediocre soul, all backed by recorded tracks, he proved his awful show at the 2000 Coors Light Festival was no fluke. He needs to reunite Dru Hill. Now.

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