We Need To Talk with Paul C. Brunson - What Happens When You Get Famous Young

Episode Date: May 7, 2026

AJ McLean and Cody Simpson open up about the darker side of the music industry, from exploitation and manipulation behind the scenes to the personal fallout of becoming famous too young. AJ reflects on Lou Pearlman, the betrayal at the heart of the Backstreet Boys’ rise, and what it cost the band to break free, while Cody shares how early fame, unlimited access and pressure on a young brain pushed him into a period of partying, substance abuse and psychosis. Together, their stories reveal the real cost of fame when success comes before you’re ready for it. We're Talking The Cost of Fame This conversation includes discussion of addiction and mental health. We've included support charities below: MIND: https://g2ul0.app.link/gbuRaxjM3Nb Campaign Against Living Miserably (CALM): https://g2ul0.app.link/npaQKXUV4Wb (00:00) Intro (00:37) Lou Perlman’s Hold on the Backstreet Boys (02:50) The Real Dynamic Between the Backstreet Boys and *NSYNC (04:45) What Is Lou Perlman’s Legacy? (09:14) Cody Reflects on the Dark Side of Fame at a Young Age (16:42) Cody Opens Up About the Darkest Period of His Pop Career Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I saw my friend on the other side of the street. I was heading to school with the kids. I let go of Mom's hand to wave. I had already forgotten their lunches. I ran over to hug her. She came out of nowhere. And then... It stopped.

Sometimes the moments that never happen matter most. Volvo's automatic emergency braking helps ensure a safe ending for everyone. Learn more at VolvoCars.a.com. Welcome to We're Talking. In this episode, A.J. McLean and Cody Simpson pull back the curtain on the darker side of the music industry where fame comes fast, but the consequences can last a lifetime. Hey there, I just want to share a content warning. This episode includes discussion of addiction. If you or someone you know need support, we've included resources in the show notes. Please take care while watching.

So the group, though, was found, was it Lou Pearlman? Lou was the entrepreneur that put this whole thing together. There was a thing that went around Orlando back in the day called the Blue Sheet, which was essentially the classifieds for entertainment. And I was perusing through the Blue Sheet one day, and I saw this banner that said local entrepreneur looking to put together a vocal harmony group, all a boys to men meets new kids on the block. And I asked my mom, and she's like, if you want to audition, sure.

A couple days later, I met Lou auditioned at his house with my mom, signed on the spot. On the spot? On the spot? And then that was the beginning of now 33 years for me. So just on the business side, though, I mean, you are, so you're 15, you said? I was 14. You're 14. So you're 14.

Your mother hasn't been in the business. It's just you and your mom. Do you read what you're signing? Is there any... So then there was no, it was more like a handshake then. Okay. It wasn't until the group, the final group was formed that then it was, you know, signing a contract, making it official, then we signed a record deal and all these things.

But it took us three years to get a record deal. Wow. But we didn't. Our parents and us as all young kids, Kevin was the oldest at the time. 21. Nick was 12. So we were just excited to be doing something like this. No, we didn't read the fine print.

We didn't realize that Lou was one-sixth of the band, plus 25% commission as manager, plus getting a kickback under the table from promoters. So he was triple dipping. Wow. As well as hiding the biggest Ponzi pyramid scheme in record history that we didn't find out about until after we parted, ways.

But, yeah, it was, it was insane. And, you know, we were the guinea pigs, really, because then they, then he started in sync and then Oetown and this and that. So they all kind of saw our track record and saw kind of what not to do. By doing that. We were the guinea pigs. We were the ones that had to go through hell or back. Was it?

So I don't know if this was rumor, but I've always wanted to know the answer to this is that when, so Lou, not leaves. Well, yeah, he leaves. You guys kind of kick him out. We part ways. He then becomes the founding or founder of Insync. Does he found Insync specifically to compete with you all, with Backstreet Boys? I don't know if that's really at the epicenter of why Insync and him became something.

But we were told from, because we had the same management, we had the same label, same producer. was Max Martin, Jive Records. We were told that they wanted to manage in sync so that they could basically manipulate the situation where okay, we're going to, if we have control of Insync, we can keep them out of your way.

But in turn, anything we turn down, they got. They got it. And essentially, because we turned down a performance on Disney in sync took it and that was the kick off of their career JC and Justin had already come from the Mickey Mouse Club

so they already had a relationship with Disney and they were on the Mouse Club with Christina Aguilera and Britney Spears so they all came out of that world but that had we done that show I don't know if things would have happened for Insync the way they did maybe eventually but that was the catalyst for them And then it just was like

this constant icky feeling for us like you're really shitting where you eat kind of thing like this is our own backyard now like we're all from Orlando same this same that and it became really frustrating and that's when we parted ways with everybody. With everyone.

Now Lou Pearlman was later sentenced to 27 years in prison for money laundering and fraud and then he dies in 2016. What do you think his legacy is? I mean, look, at the end of the day, we will always be grateful because without Lou, we would never be anything. Nobody would have known who we were.

We wouldn't have even met. Like, he is truly at the epicenter of our creation. But everything we've done since we parted away from him has been all us. continuing to grind, changing management companies multiple times, literally going through it. Yes. Both in the industry and in our personal lives. Deaths in the family, rehabs, you name it. Open heart surgery.

Brian had when he's 23. Like, we've been through shit. Yes. And have overcome every single adversity, every time, different lengths of time to get through it. But we've gotten through it. but we did a documentary back in, God, I feel like it's five, six years ago now, show them what you're made of. I don't know when that came out now. I can't remember.

But one of the things in that doc that we were so close to coming into fruition was the production company reached out to the prison that Lou was at. And at first they got the green light for the five of us to visit him. Oh, my goodness. But we wanted to go simply to ask one word, one question. Why? Some of us had already made peace with the whole thing and kind of, you know, wrote it off, closure. I was one of them. Okay.

You know, again, beyond grateful for the opportunity that was given, made my peace as soon as we parted ways. I was like, okay, you're a piece of shit. And I want nothing to do with you. And that's in the past. That's fine. Yeah. But some of the guys, even to, I would say some of them to this day, still, somewhere in here have still a little bit of a chip. And that's okay.

That's their choice, you know, to have that. It was nasty, man. And I think, I think fully understanding what happened gives us even more appreciation for where you are today. Yeah. Once everything transpired, we were an open book about it. Like, we were, you know, we were. I think we were in Sweden, about to go back in the studio, and Brian was the one that basically really started doing some digging and finding out, like, this isn't adding up.

We're out here busting our ass, leaving our families, you know, touring, traveling. And he's making the same shit we're making. And he's not lifting a finger plus this, this, this, and this. So he was the one that was like, okay, I'm putting together a lawsuit. You guys can hop on board with me or not. Wow. So Brian. Brian was the catalyst for that.

And the minute we did it, Lou's instant reaction was to shut down shop. All of our gear. He locked it up in storage. Like everything was like shut down for a minute. He still owned the name. So he was threatening to keep the name. So we would put basically money aside in escrow,

which was his one sixth bullshit. And essentially, we just said, you know what, let's just cut him the check. And for all intents and purposes, I won't disclose the amount. But we cut him to check, done. And that was it. And that was it.

We basically paid for our name and got our gear and got our stuff. And we were done. Wow. And, you know, thank God. Because I don't know what would have happened with the name. We would have had to come up with some other

something. boys. I don't know. The bone boys. Yeah. Yeah. There's one stat that I want to throw out here and I want to get your opinion on is that so this is a 2019 study. It found that 80% of 18 to 25 year old musicians said they had a negative mental health issue with anxiety and depression being the most common. Right. So now there is not one person I've ever talked to who has a negative mental health issue with anxiety and depression being the most common. Right. So now, there is not one person I've ever talked to who has experienced extreme fame at a young age and there's not been a negative consequence to it yeah yeah it's um I absolutely went through my my valley you know after the the hot you know the mountains yeah um there was this there was this

doctor, this neurologist or neuroscientist, I don't want to title him incorrectly, but I met him through Miley when we were together because she would do these brain scans on her brain that would kind of show all kinds of activity. and I met with him a couple times into these brain scans and it would show certain, you know, where different parts of your brain are activated at different times and there was sometimes an issue with frontal lobe activity and dopamine or something because of, I guess, as he would explain it,

he did a lot of research on fame on the brain and he's worked with like B, but he worked all these other guys, especially at a young age, pre your brain being fully developed, your frontal lobe being fully developed as an adult. And having that amount of dopamine, it's like dopamine flooding as a child. Fame is a form of dopamine flooding in a way, and going up on stage and having this amount of admiration. It's not a natural, right.

It's not something that you're really supposed to experience, particularly as a teenager. And so you do a lot of work on how to kind of reset that and kind of come back to this healthy baseline because it's so easy to kind of get caught in this immense, you know, immense high and immense low cycle, especially as somebody who as a young person has experienced these really, really immense highs. It's hard for your brain to then kind of re-regulate to a place in which like normal life is enough. Yes. And I think that's something that a lot of people who have experienced that kind of fame young have struggled with. And that's why you see a lot of people go on and fall into addiction and substance abuse and stuff just to like make, to try

and maintain that what they felt what you know dopamine hit yeah like what you felt out on stage doing that thing to then come back and like normal life is is not enough no you know it's going to sound crazy but i i moved out around 16 17 i bought my own place and i moved in i ended up moving in with my like I had a young a younger day-to-day manager to a manager at the time who was also my best friend and we spent every day together work or not and he moved in with me because I bought a place here in I bought a place in West Hollywood when I was 17 and I that's when things started to slip for me and I think it's because I rebelled a little bit of against my family and my parents, which is, I think, a natural thing to do at that age.

It's not an uncommon thing for a teenager to want their own space and then to have to go and kind of learn your own lessons in a way. Sure. But that was also around the time that I started to rebel from, 17, 18 was around the time I started to rebel from what I'd built. And I started partying and kind of fell into the time. trappings of kind of having access to like whatever I wanted at an age that was far too young to to be you know allowed that I suppose you know like you can you can get in anywhere and you can

get anything and people just say yes kind of thing it was like that amount of autonomy is unhealthy I think at that age yes because power is also a has effects on the brain as well in that way in the same way that fame does, it's sort of coupled. Yes. And so too much of that too early is also easy to abuse. So I felt like I was at the mercy of that a little bit. Yes. Was there an emancipation attempt?

Yeah, yeah. Early, which I didn't, no, no, this was like. Oh, this was before. At the start almost. Oh, really? Like I, yeah, when I was still, when I was really early on, like a very, a very early management company, pre-prooter and everything that, that were trying to, I think tried to claim, claim my parents were unfit parents and to legally emancipate me so I could work.

Because there were limits on the amount of hours I could, or days I could work and my schooling. And I think under 18, you're considered a. a minor in the, I'm not sure exactly what the entertainment industry laws are, but they were trying to finesse those, you know. Just really so you could work longer. Yeah, really, yeah, yeah, more money, more with it, whatever. Jeez. So I was fortunately sheltered from all that at that age.

My parents didn't tell me what was going on, but they had days in legal offices about it and all that stuff and I had no idea. It was shielded from it. So look at that. They didn't tell me until I was probably 19 or 20. So they were really protecting you, but then by 16, you stepped out yourself. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And now you had to.

So for a couple of years there, I think my mom, like, I just, I just, there was a couple years there where my mom had to put Google that's on her phone because it's the only way she knew where I was. Really? Because I just wouldn't. I was just rebelling. in every sense of the word and I wouldn't talk to her and not because she ever did anything wrong I think it was just my my way of going to find who I was outside of everything I'd been through

and feeling like my identity and my life and my everything was had been imposed on me which is like a really which is ironic because I built it for myself and wanted to build it for myself and In that rebellion, if you will, I've heard you describe 17 to 20 as messy years. Yeah, absolutely. The messiest. Absolutely. When you think about the darkest period for you, so we can understand what you were going through, what was that? What was happening?

To preface it, it wasn't all bad because I was doing a lot of musical and creative soul-searching at the time. I was like discovering all this music I didn't know. I was actually practicing a lot of guitar. Like I was, it was directed in some ways. It was just that it was all very angsty. And I was partying a lot. And I was doing drugs and I was treating people poorly. And it wasn't who I was. It was like this layer on top of who I really was that was just me trying to, me trying to find myself, you know, like I just, I, I, I'd realized that I've felt trapped in what I'd built and I, I was, just felt like I needed to clean the slate or something, you know, um, I felt, um, I felt, um, I felt, A lot of it was a creative and musical angst.

I felt misunderstood musically because I felt like I was growing a lot as an artist and I was trapped in by being a teen pop star. And so there was a lot of that. So I was like, I'm going to do everything I can so that people don't think of me as that anymore. And, you know, there's like a lot of that stuff. And I was like if I have to go and party and do drugs and whatever to like, like that was almost me going, I'm not. The surfer guy.

Yeah, you know what I mean? Yeah. It could have very easily gotten worse had I not, had my parents kind of not stepped in and helped me out. How did your parents know you had slept? They knew that I was partying a lot and I was abusing. I was drinking too much and I was doing drugs and all that stuff. I think I got to the point where it started to affect my brain chemistry. like I was really, I started to get really paranoid and was having some psychoses and things like that.

Like I thought I was, I was, I know, I'd substance abuse my way into just a detachment from reality in some sense. And I remember showing up at their house and just breaking down into tears and told them that I, had a problem and not I wasn't an addict but I was I was I needed to change whatever I was doing you know it wasn't working and thank God they just were ready to take me in and help me you know yeah now how did you know because I you know when I do I've talked to a lot of addicts right there's typically and I can't claim to be one I'm not I never was it was just this period of time where I took it way too far way too far But those, well, the addicts that I've talked to,

there's typically an inflection point where something happens where they realize, okay, this path is to my demise, I need to get on a new path. But what was for you, the inflection point that allowed you to then go to your parents for help? I think I just had like a really big night and I was freaking out.

And I was coming down and, and realizing that I didn't want to live in this cycle anymore and had just slipped too far from who I was and the values that I, you know, claimed to hold dear and went to them and just broke down, you know. My nervous system and my psychology and everything was suffering a lot and I just realized I needed to wanted to, you know, clean up and get back on track and actually keep working towards the

things I said I wanted. And, you know, that when you're in that, like, that kind of state, the partying and the highs from that can be so seductive, like, they become more important than, yes. The real thing? Yes. And if you want to hear the full, unfiltered stories from today's guest, you can check them out on the We Need to Talk page. Drop a like, leave a comment, and hit subscribe.

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