The New Kids on the Block officially announced that they’ve reunited yesterday morning on the Today show. I wasn’t planning on covering this, but my nine-year-old self got incredibly cranky and threatened to climb into her NKOTB sleeping bag and refuse to come out until I did. My current-age-withheld self was also pretty damn impressed – those guys aged WELL. Despite the painfully obvious abundance of “Old Men on the Block” jokes, there was no denying that even the ugly one is decent looking now. And I’m pretty sure it’s worth it to write all about them for that reason alone. Back in the day, the New Kids sold over 70 million albums, paving the way for such illustrious boybands as the Backstreet Boys, Nsync, and the ultra-prestigious LFO. Now they’re ready to reclaim their rightful place at the top of the charts.

The undeniably aged entertainers, reunited 22 years after first forming and 20 years after the release of their debut album, Hanging Tough, are apparently more than willing to embrace their status as the elder statesmen of teenybop pop. (Jonathan Knight’s the eldest, at 39; [Donny] Wahlberg and [Danny] Wood are both 38; Jordan Knight is 37; and [Joey] McIntyre is the baby, at 35.) Asked what they had in store for long-suffering fans on their new album, McIntyre teased, “Three things: the economy, health care and job security.”

“We’ve got some new material,” Wahlberg said. “We’re going to dance, we’re going to sing, we’re going to do it all.” Once the man band was unveiled—with a drumroll and from behind a red-velvet curtain set up outdoors—Wahlberg wasted no time in getting down to the business of the announcement. “We started recording in August,” he said. “Really, it was music that brought us back.”

Wahlberg also noted that the reunion announcement, which has been in the ether for months, was something the group wasn’t planning on confirming so early on, but felt they needed to after word began to leak out in January. “We really weren’t going to announce this yet,” he said, adding that the boys-no-more band ultimately decided to confirm the rumors for their fans’ sake. “The fans got a little excited, but they got a little unsure, so we thought we better come out and let them know it’s official. We hope to tour in the fall—we’re already setting up limited dates.”

[From E! News]

I’m embarrassed to say I probably started that rumor. I’ve been working on it for the last six or seven years. I figure if you tell enough people, it’s bound to come true eventually. The New Kids will launch their tour by performing on the Today Show’s Summer Concert series on May 16th. Which I’m pretty sure I’m going to be getting up at 4 in the morning to attend. I’m only doing it for nine-year-old me. Not because I’ve had a mad crush on Donny Wahlberg since he starred in “Boomtown.” And certainly not because I want to get any of them to autograph my neon orange NKOTB water bottle. Because that would just be lame.