Putting An End To Big Time Rush’s Minnesota Myth.
Unbeknownst to most outsiders, there are many Minnesota-made musical greats. Is it because the angsty cold that looms 7 months of the year and the sunny euphoria that consumes the other 5 result in both seasonal depression and lake-life summer euphoria that give birth to emotional extremes that make great art? I am not sure what voodoo magic is in the 10,000 lakes, but Minnesota definitely has something in the water.
The list is lengthy and I won’t cover them all, but many big names once called Minnesota home including the Replacements, Gear Daddies, Jayhawks, Owl City, Soul Asylum, Bob Mould, Hüsker Dü, Trampled By Turtles, Mod Sun, Hippocampus, Motion City Soundtrack, Atmosphere, and the rapper you don’t want around your mom: Yung Gravy. And of course, the Boardwalk and Park Place of Minnesota’s Musical Monopoly: Prince and Bob Dylan. Even Lizzo, who grew up in Hoston, considers Minnesota her musical home, attributing her success to time spent in the state.
Notice that nowhere in my list did I mention the breakout boy band Big Time Rush. Big Time Rush (BTR) not only toured the country and had countless tween girl Stans, they also had a hit TV show on Nickelodeon that ran from 2009 to 2014.
Their fictional TV show followed four high school aged hockey players from Minnesota in their rise to fame. That said, BTR’s time in the Land of 10,000 Lakes isn’t long, as in the first episode the guys audition in a talent show and an agent snatches them up and ships them off to Los Angeles.
Aster the TV show ended, BTR lost relevance for over a decade, but are exeperiencing a recent resurgence having just dropped some new singles and announced their “Forever” comeback tour. My friend and I, who were in late middle school to early high school when the show ran, heard this and laughed at how cheesy the show was. However, we held strong to the fact that BTR would always have a place in our hearts because they were from Minnesota. When we went to see if they had a hometown stop on their tour, it came to our attention that they weren’t really from Minnesota at all. The four—Logan, Kendall, James, and Carlos—hailed from Texas, Kansas, New York, and Missouri respectively. NOT ONE OF THEM HAILED FROM THE NORTH STAR STATE. Now, this is false advertising!
But when I reflected on this misleading information (and even re-watched an episode from a completely different perspective, now in my mid-20s) there were several warning signs that members of the group were Minnesota imposters from the start:
Their hair game is weak and they too easily gave up hockey. Anyone who lives in the State of Hockey knows that you don’t half-play hockey in high school like the BTR boys did. You either are obsessed with the sport and play, or you don’t (but secretly wish you did). There’s no inbetweeners - here in Minnesota it’s always hockey season, and there’s no dimmer switch for the passion. If the members of Big Time Rush were really “hockey players from Minnesota,” they would never have dropped everything to leave mid-season. Plus, they would have known it would be much harder to go D1 in Los Angeles, where they were spending more time singing than skating.
If that red flag wasn’t enough, the boys flow was also flying at half mast as their hair was much more young-Bieber than Barry Melrose anytime, ever. And even though Bieber played youth hockey in Canada and is friends with Auston Matthews, even his hair isn’t up to par with Minnesota lettuce. Besides, we all know the Biebs took the BTR path by half-assing hockey and regrets it. Let’s be honest, he definitely wasn't that good if he didn’t even play Varsity in high school.
2. They didn’t write any songs about Minnesota. If Big Time Rush were indeed the hit makers from Minnesota that they claim to be, it certainly would have shown up in their lyrics somewhere. Even rockstars from Minnesota have a “one of us” complex that’s so strong that they can’t help but pen songs about their home state.
Consider a few examples of Minnesota as musical muse: Martin Zellar and the Gear Daddies are so Minnesota that they have a song called “I Wanna Drive a Zamboni.” In her breakout song “Truth Hurts,” Lizzo namechecks a “new man on the Minnesota Vikings.” Even Prince loved the Vikings and wrote a song about them called “Purple and Gold.” Now that I think about it, maybe the Vikings were also the reason for “Purple Rain” too. It’s not so far-fetched that the team could be the namesake for the song given the Vikings dreary streaks and tears caused over the years.
3. The rebooted Big Time Rush isn’t even making a stop in their fake hometown of Duluth. Despite their “Forever” tour taking them through Minneapolis on July 28th, Big Time Rush isn’t doing a midsummer tour pit stop in Duluth—the city their characters claimed to be from. Duluth is awesome in the summer, and if they actually hailed from there, they’d know that. By comparison, Trampled By Turtles, a band ACTUALLY from Duluth (who have had three albums reach #1 on the Billboard bluegrass chart) partner with several local music festivals and have two hit songs about their beloved hometown. Unlike Big Time Rush, Trampled by Turtles’ Duluth love is raw and real, and all over their lyrics:
“Still I like the quiet
Of Duluth in the winter
In the sacred bond
There's no place like home”
—Trampled By Turtles, “Duluth”
“And down the street beside the red neon light
That's where I met my baby on one hot summer night
I'm leaving tomorrow, but I don't wanna go
I love you, my town, you'll always live in my soul”
—Trampled By Turtles, “Our Town”
Then again, maybe we should have seen that coming. Of course, a band named after turtles would be the ones to stick their heads out of the shell long enough to tip their caps to their home states because they’re, literally, in no hurry to leave. While the manufactured Nickelodeon boy-band actually named Big Time Rush would be the ones who couldn’t wait to get out of Minnesota. Or maybe, as our research suggests, they were never here at all. Maybe, they were never “one of us” at all.
So, unless proven otherwise please consider this article the official end of Big Time Rush’s Minnesota Myth. To celebrate, please enjoy Semisonic’s iconic song “Closing Time.” Oh, did we mention they’re from Minnesota too?
