What are the differences between your debut album and No Strings Attached?

Chris: No Strings Attached takes our music to the next level. We had a lot more creative control on this album.
Justin: Everyone should know that No Strings Attached was created solely by *NSYNC with no external opinions.
Lance: It feels like our real first album because we wrote and produced half of it.
Joey: It’s a step above the first one. We added different beats here and there, different sounds just to make it a little more edgy. But it still has *NSYNC harmonies and sound.

You had a lot more to do with this recording creatively. How much have you all grown as musicians?

Lance: We are Executive Producers of this one and had to independently do this whole album.

Do you each have a favorite song on your new album?

JC: We worked so hard on this album that it’s impossible to just pick one.
Lance: I have three. “Bye, Bye, Bye,” “Promise,” and “Digital Get Down.”

Individually, what have been your greatest accomplishments – personally or professionally?

Joey: I bought a new house.
Chris: I built a new house.
JC: Gritting my teeth and making it through this album.
Lance: Personally, I would say gaining so many great friends. Professionally, No Strings Attached.

What is the one thing, as a group, you have yet to accomplish?

Lance: Win a Grammy.

If you couldn’t perform, what would you do?

JC: If I couldn’t sing and dance, I’d write music.
Joey: I would act.
Chris: I’d manage new artists and continue working on my clothing line.
Justin: I’d write music, especially R&B.
Lance: I’d be an astronaut.

What is the downside to being in *NSYNC?

JC: No sleep.
Joey: No free time or sleep.
Lance: No private life.

Is it hard remaining level-headed?

Lance: It could be, but we have great families and friends to keep us all down to earth.

If you could change one thing about hte business , what would it be?

Lance: The egos.
Justin: The crooks.

If you each had to describe yourselves in one word, what would it be?

JC: Analytical.
Joey: Optimistic.
Chris: Sarcastic.
Justin: Visionary.
Lance: Laid back. Wait, is that two words?

What can we expect from your upcoming concert tour?

Chris: The tour will be packed with high energy and lots of dancing.
Lance: Huge special effects and tons of energy.
Justin: The ideas we have are still being put together, but it’s gonna be big and bad and better than the last tour.

Do you remember where you were, 13 years ago today? Were you dead tired after staying up late to listen to the album stream on your local radio station? Were you standing in line outside of a music store, waiting to pick up your copy of *NSYNC’s No Strings Attached? Do you remember the feeling of holding it in your hands, breaking the seal, unwrapping the cellophane, putting it in the CD player? Did you wait until you got home or were you lucky enough to have a CD player in your car (totally not standard, even in 2000) to blast the sultry strains of It Makes Me Ill, That’s When I’ll Stop Loving You and It’s Gonna Be Me?

Happy NSA DAY, Superfans! IT’S HERE!

It’s not only NSA Day, but it is the 13th anniversary of the release of No Strings Attached, the record breaking smash of the decade!  13 years ago, *NSYNC would make history as the first band to break 1.1 million units sold in one day, and more than 2.4million units sold in ONE WEEK! Trivia: Did you know that the only release to come close to breaking this record is………Celebrity??? Yep! *NSYNC holds the #1 and #2 spot. When they dominate, they like to do it right!

Join us for a day of looking back and celebrating a time when Pop was king and *NSYNC ruled. We’re listening to the album (if you pledged to pick it up at iTunes, please comment and let us know that you did! We want to know!), watching videos, chatting about the hits and one of the best days in *NSYNCfandom.

Feel like a little trip down memory lane? Check out our NSA!Sync page! It’s chock full of photos, video and memorable moments from the most awesome era in *NHistory. Also, we’ve uploaded *NSYNC‘s appearance at MTV studios on March 21, 2000! Ahhh, memories!

Now, I don’t know about any other Superfans, but I am ready to get into some dirty pop! Happy NSA DAY!

Need some cover photos for your Facebook and Twitter profiles? We’ve got you covered with the photos from the liner notes on No Strings Attached:

Editor’s Note: Because the Larry King interview took place over the course of an hour the transcript is quite lengthy. For the next few Friday’s we’ll be posting the interview in sections.

KING: We’re back with ‘N Sync. Why are you called a band since you don’t play instruments?

KIRKPATRICK: It’s all about the special effects.

KING: You mean I imagine the instrument?

BASS: We’re definitely a vocal group first.

KING: Yes, but you’re called a band: band of the year, band of the hour.

TIMBERLAKE: I don’t know. We called ourselves — we call ourselves a vocal group.

KING: A vocal group. And the dancing? Were all of you good dancers?

(LAUGHTER)

Lance, you had to learn?

BASS: No. I had to learn.

KING: Was it hard?

BASS: It was. I mean, but we — we would dance every day…

CHASEZ: Hours.

BASS: Yes, hours a day we had this warehouse that was like a 110 degrees in Orlando, and the year before we had a record deal, we would just, you know, work every day, you know, just sweating and…

TIMBERLAKE: I think the whole dancing thing came into play when we decided to do a video demo to send out to record companies. We said, well, we just can’t stand on the stage, and saying we should give them a show. So, that’s where the choreography came in, and we got some choreographers that JC and I had worked with on the Mickey Mouse Club.

KING: So you are choreographed, right?

KIRKPATRICK: Well, we play instruments, too, though. I mean, you know, when we do a lot of the writing for the album, we do it, you know, on the keyboards, on the guitar. I actually have worked on turntables and (UNINTELLIGIBLE) and a lot of different things that we all incorporate, we have incorporated into our shows. And it’s just that in the show, we don’t pick up…

KING: But when we think band, we think…

OK, Joey, you’re huge hits overseas, you come home and nobody knows you. How did they finally know you here?

FATONE: Wow. Well, when we — after we were with RCA for a while — we were in Germany — and then we went over to RCA in the States, because in Germany we were with Munich BMG. So when we did that, put out a video, and we actually had a redo “I Want You Back” because it was so old and we were so, you know, doing stuff in Germany (TIMBERLAKE: It’s so different.) over there.

And it was like slowly people started to just be like, “Oh, OK, that’s ‘N Sync, it’s great,” and it slowly started building up…

KING: There was no boom?

FATONE: Well, the Disney Channel. We did a show on a Disney special.

TIMBERLAKE: We also got a big a boost from radio, too. We got some good radio…

KING: They played a lot…

TIMBERLAKE: … airtime for the first single.

KING: What was the biggest hit initially at the start?

FATONE: The first thing was…

KIRKPATRICK: “Tearin’ Up My Heart” was — it hit big. But like we said, it was definitely the Disney special.

KING: And what was it like for you, frankly — let’s go around. What was it like for you, Lance, to be suddenly phenomenal?

BASS: I don’t know. I mean, we — to us, it’s been the same, you know, from day one. I mean, things have changed as it’s gotten bigger, but I think, you know, since we’ve stayed the same and we surround ourselves with such great people, and you know, such great — we come from such great families that…

KING: You’re all close to mothers and everything…

BASS: Yes, you know, we’re very…

KING: But how about, JC…

KIRKPATRICK: My mom’s here.

KING: JC — your mom is here. How about adoration, dealing with that? I mean, all these girls?

CHASEZ: Well, I mean, we appreciate it, I mean, because we know what it’s like to not have it, and we’re thankful for it, that’s for sure.

KING: Look at this. Look at this

CHASEZ: Holy-moley.

KING: Why do you think you bring this out?

CHASEZ: Well, I think the one thing that’s great that we bring is we bring a good time with us. It’s like when people want to go somewhere, forget about everything that they’re doing in their every day lives or whatever, when they come to a concert, we give them a solid two hours of take your mind off of everything. Don’t worry about whatever problems you had earlier that day, come to the show, scream your head off, get rid of every piece of energy that you have in your body, go home and sleep great.

KING: And why, Justin, girls?

TIMBERLAKE: Why?

KING: Why so many girls, do you think?

TIMBERLAKE: Why not?

(LAUGHTER)

KING: Good way to look at it, Justin. I mean, why does — it is a kind of a phenomena, isn’t it?

TIMBERLAKE: Yes, I don’t think — that’s something I really wouldn’t know how to analyze.

KING: Do you enjoy it?

TIMBERLAKE: Of course. You wouldn’t enjoy like millions of girls screaming “Larry, Larry, Larry”?

(LAUGHTER)

You’re onto something there.

KING: Yes, the nursing home!

(LAUGHTER)

What do you enjoy most about it, Joey?

FATONE: Traveling, I think, for me. I mean…

KING: You like traveling?

FATONE: I like traveling, love traveling. I think, for all of us, I think it’s everything, from the creative of recording to the creative of bringing the videos, things doing on stage, touring, choreography, doing the promotion, you know, everything.

KING: Are you really all good friends?

KIRKPATRICK: We’re like best friends.

KING: You hang out together?

KIRKPATRICK: We started out as best friends, and you know, I think it shows — it shows in everything we do. From when we’re on stage, when we’re clowning around, we do like so many shows that each show is so different because of the interaction amongst each other. And we’ll goof around with each other. We do little things to each other on stage that a lot of people that come to a lot of the different shows go, oh, that’s funny, or I know he’s messing with him there. And it’s just, I think, when we start as friends and we’ve grown as a group…

KING: Because some groups, you know, historically haven’t liked each other.

TIMBERLAKE: Well, the chemistry we have is unreal. I can’t tell you, you know even with this tour last summer, I could just look at Chris and it could say 10 things at the same time, and he would know exactly what I meant just by looking at him, because we’ve been together, you know, even before everything took off, we were together, some of us working 9:00 to 5:00. But every day, singing, and you know, trying to get our act together. So…

KING: This ties with the family. JC, did you always have your mother’s approval?

CHASEZ: Actually, my mom — my family’s been an amazing support for me. Really, my mom brought it to my attention the whole show business thing in the first place.

KING: She did — she wanted you to do it.

CHASEZ: I was doing — yes, I was doing like talent shows and stuff like that for fun with friends back home, but she was the one who said, you know…

KING: Did you do like “Star Search” or something?

CHASEZ: … if you really want to try it…

KIRKPATRICK: No, he did “Star Search.”

TIMBERLAKE: I did “Star Search,” yes.

KING: Did you win?

TIMBERLAKE: No. Lost the first round.

KIRKPATRICK: We saw Ed McMahon last night, too. We were going to get him.

KING: First round?

TIMBERLAKE: He owes me $10 million. If you’re out there…

KING: You’ll never make it…

TIMBERLAKE: … it never showed up.

KING: If you lose on “Star Search,” you’ll never make it.

TIMBERLAKE: Yes, of course, there you go.

KING: Your mother very — well, your mother’s here with you, right?

TIMBERLAKE: Yes, she’s always been very supportive. She always — she always did. And I think with all of our parents, they always said, you know, if it’s not fun, don’t do it.

KING: Lance?

BASS: My family’s been there, you know, throughout the whole thing. It was hard for me, because I had to leave, you know, my high school, going from Mississippi, and I had to leave them for a few months just to, you know, go do this group. So it was very hard on them and…

KING: They didn’t say to you what are you doing here with some pop group? What are you doing with your hair?

BASS: Well, you know, they — they were just nice support. You know, we would talk about it, and you know, it was a very hard thing.

I mean, I could imagine if, you know, if my kids, you know, would do that, I don’t know what I sound like. Are you crazy? But they were very supportive.

TIMBERLAKE: Yes, me and Lance came from some small towns. I think Chris did, too.

KING: I’ll get to Chris in a minute. Joey, you’re from Bensonhurst.

FATONE: Yes.

KING: In fact, Joey grew up — I grew up at 2136 83rd Street. Joey grew up at 2140 84th Street, one block away.

FATONE: That’s right.

KING: So we know the neighborhood.

FATONE: Yes.

KING: Do your parents…

FATONE: Oh, yes. My dad used to sing in a group, old ’50s group kind of — ’50s and ’60s — called the Orions. So, that’s how we got influenced by listening to ’50s duop. And he was always supportive, always trying to do something creative.

KING: So they encouraged you?

FATONE: Oh, yes.

KING: And Chris, your mom?

KIRKPATRICK: My mom’s been real supportive. She’s been — you know, we grew up kind of very underprivileged, so…

KING: She was very young when you were born?

KIRKPATRICK: She was 16, yes. She had me when I was 16.

KING: Did you know your father?

KIRKPATRICK: Yes, I know him.

KING: But they’re not together?

KIRKPATRICK: No, they’re not together now. But yes, she’s always been — I mean, she’s basically been the backbone in the family. You know, she had to raise me and my four sisters younger than me. So you know, growing up, she was always like just do — do what makes you happy, like Justin said.

KING: Do all your parents go watch you work?

BASS: Oh, yes.

TIMBERLAKE: Yes.

KING: A lot?

TIMBERLAKE: They enjoy it.

KING: They enjoy it?

BASS: Whenever we want to bring them out on the road. They get tired a lot. I know — like when we bring our friends and family on the road, they’re like “How do you do this?” You know, they spend like three days and they have to go take a week off.

KING: Over the weekend, they won the People’s Choice Award for favorite group or band. They are ‘N Sync. They’re our guests for the full hour. We’ll be including your phone calls. More after this.

Editor’s Note: Because the Larry King interview took place over the course of an hour the transcript is quite lengthy. For the next few Friday’s we’ll be posting the interview in sections.

LARRY KING: Tonight, they are huge! And they are here! Who is going to be talking to these guys? It’s going to be me! And who is going to be phoning in questions? It is going to be you! ‘N Sync for the hour — next on LARRY KING LIVE!

Only program in the world that will give you President Carter one night and ‘N Sync the next. But they’re here, all five of them: ‘N Sync, the hottest group in the world. Let’s meet them individually. We’re going to have a lot of fun tonight — include phone calls.

They are Justin Timberlake. He is the youngest member at age 20, and was member of the Mickey Mouse Club.

J.C. Chasez, 24 years old, from Bowie, Maryland was also a member of the Mickey Mouse Club.

My man, Joey Fatone, born in Brooklyn one block from where I was born: He will be 24 on January 28. And he wants to be Superman.

Chris Kirkpatrick is the oldest member of the group. At 29, Chris was born in Clarion, Pennsylvania.

And the last member of the group is Lance Bass, who is only 21. Lance was born in Clinton, Mississippi, once wanted to be a space engineer, wanted to work for NASA. And look where he wound up.

How did this — how did this — we will start, I guess with — you are the oldest, Chris, so I’ll start with you. How did this group come together?

CHRIS KIRKPATRICK: Well, you know, it is a lot of hard work. We started about six years ago. We used to do a lot of acappella singing together. We were friends. I worked with him (Joey) at Universal Studios in Florida. And those two worked together, like you said, on the Mickey Mouse Club (JC and Justin). And…

KING: Lance?

KIRKPATRICK: We don’t know Lance.

LANCE BASS: I don’t know where I fit in.

JUSTIN TIMBERLAKE: He just keeps following us everywhere.

KIRKPATRICK: Lance is our best fan!

KING: You worked together, like doing what?

KIRKPATRICK: We actually — I sang at a ’50s doo-wop thing. And he dressed up as a monster.

JOEY FATONE: It was called the Beetlejuice Graveyard Review Show…

(LAUGHTER)

KING: So, how, J.C, did the five of you come together to be a group?

JC CHASEZ: Well, it’s a weird story. But, basically, how it runs is, each person knew somebody else in the band, you know, whether they were working or just friends. Chris was the one who initially came up with the idea to start a group. And he approached Justin because they were friends and they had met in different places, you know, passing each other, whether it be in auditions for commercials or whatever in Florida.

Justin and I, of course, were doing the Mickey Mouse Club. And after that ended, him and I started working on songs together. And then when Chris came up with the idea, he approached Justin. Justin called me up. The three of us were singing together.

TIMBERLAKE: Are you still with us?

KING: I’m with you. Still haven’t found out about Lance.

CHASEZ: Lance is coming in. Don’t worry. I’m going to get there. Now, after the three of us were together, Joey, believe it or not, was one of my first friends when I moved to Florida to do the Mickey Mouse Club. So him and I were friends. And Chris knew him from work. And so we both knew he could sing. And the three of us got together, we were out one night and ran into him, and said: “You know, we’ve started a group. Why don’t you join the group, man?”

KING: And he said yes?

CHASEZ: He said of course.

FATONE: I said: “Sure. How much money you giving me?”

KING: Was it named ‘N Sync then?

CHASEZ: No, not yet.

KIRKPATRICK: No, actually what was it then … *N…SYC

FATONE: Nothing.

CHASEZ: Not entirely done.

KING: Now, how does Lance get in?

CHASEZ: And then, when the four came together, we were singing. And we would try and gig and everything like that. And it just — the sound wasn’t quite right yet.

KING: You needed one more.

CHASEZ: And we needed a bass. Therefore…

TIMBERLAKE: We did not have a true bass voice in all four of us. And we initially wanted to do this group because we wanted to be one of those groups who sings acappella But that’s — we wanted that to be our niche. And so my vocal coach, we got in contact with him. I took from him from when I was about 8 years old until about 11 years old. And we got in touch with him. And he gave us Lance’s name. And he said: “But his mother will never let him do it.” So…

KING: But she did.

TIMBERLAKE: So we had to convince mom.

BASS: Thanks, Mom.

KING: And then you became ‘N Sync. Did someone name you ‘N Sync? Or you named yourself?

TIMBERLAKE: My mother came up with the name. The first time … The first time we sang together, she goes: “Man, you guys sound really in sync.” And we were like ding, ding, ding.

KING: Did you have a hit right away?

CHASEZ: No, no not at all.

BASS: We were rehearsing for about a year straight.

KIRKPATRICK: We had a lot of hard work and a little house that three of us lived in, and actually Lance came down and lived in for a while.

KING: In Orlando?

KIRKPATRICK: In Orlando. And Joey came over and stayed.

KING: That is where you live. You guys live in Orlando.

KIRKPATRICK: And we practiced there. We did everything we possibly could. I mean, we worked so hard just trying to get anything, trying to get somebody to notice us and trying to get a deal somewhere.

KING: What made it for you? Was there a break?

TIMBERLAKE: About a half-a-year after we were together, we hooked up with our manager, Johnny Wright, and he led us to a record company. And, you know, that was the beginning.

KING: And was that record a hit?

CHASEZ: It wasn’t a hit here, we spent little over a year in Europe touring and busting our butts trying to get noticed over there. We signed to a German label because they were the only people that would pay any attention to us, really. And after spending a little over a year there, we came back to the United States, kind of exhausted, and one guy from RCA came to a show that we did in…

FATONE: Budapest.

CHASEZ: Budapest. A guy…

KIRKPATRICK: Vince DiGeorgio…

CHASEZ: Vince DiGeorgio from — an A&R guy from RCA Records came to show in Budapest saw us said these guys have got something.

KING: What was you first hit record?

FATONE: “I Want You Back” in Germany. Yeah, first single. It was ” I Want You Back.” It was weird.

TIMBERLAKE: I want you back in Germany.

FATONE: “I Want You Back In Germany.” It was weird because it was like — it was kind of rushing to it. It was like the minute we got there we didn’t even a song or anything. We went up. We did a couple photo shoots for some magazines we sang a cappella at some open air festival that they had.

BASS: We release released that song, “I Want You Back,” before we even had half the album — our first album.

KIRKPATRICK: It was like 28 days after we signed the record deal so it was like, a record.

KING: What a thing it must have been, huh?

CHASEZ: It was cool.

TIMBERLAKE: It was pretty wild.

KIRKPATRICK: You know what was really strange is the fact that when we release we started to get so big over in Europe so quick, that we would get on a plane in Orlando, and fly over to Europe and get off the plane there would be like thousands of girls just waiting or just, you know, kids just waiting for to us get off the plane. We’d get off it was all this, you know, we were celebrities. We’d get back on plane come home.

KING: Nobody.

KIRKPATRICK: Our parents would be picking us up from the airport.

FATONE: Our parents would be there like “Yay!!” [clapping]

KING: Boy, that’s got to be — that’s a weird feeling. We’ll pick up on career of ‘N Sync as we move ahead on this edition of LARRY KING LIVE. They won the American Music Award Internet Fans Artist of the Year Award last night. They’re with us for the full hour. We’ll include your phone calls. We’re going to have a lot of fun, learn a lot, too. Don’t go away.

But that’s not the most exciting news. In a blink and you’ll  miss it moment, the lyric video announces that Justin’s new album “The 20/20 Experience” is coming on March 19.

Maybe he’s thinking there may be some good karma around a certain date that a certain beloved band dropped a certain album 13 years ago?

Fun fact: I actually bought ‘No Strings Attached’ on March 19 because stores in Michigan jumped the gun and put the album out two days early. I kept the receipt and everything…

Last Thursday, Timberlake teased his return to the music world with a short video titled “I’m Ready,” which came on the heels of another flurry of rumors that he’d been collaborating with Jay Z and Beyonce in the studio. The video led to a countdown on his website which finally clicked to zero last night and transformed into an open letter to his fans which told us that not all of those rumors that JT was back in the studio that were so quickly shot down last year were false:

Back in June of last year, I quietly started working on what is now, my next journey with that thing I love called MUSIC.

The inspiration for this really came out of the blue and to be honest, I didn’t expect anything out of it. I just went into the studio and started playing around with some sounds and songs. It was probably the best time I’ve had in my career… Just creating with no rules and/or end goal in mind and really enjoying the process.

What I came up with is something I couldn’t be more excited about! It is full of inspiration that I grew up listening to and some newfound muses that I’ve discovered along the way.

Public opinion for the single has been all over the place. Many were immediately hooked by the sweet sultriness of his falsetto and beats, while others began tweeting that they hoped the single would grow on them. Perez Hilton is even running a poll on his site where the general sentiment is “meh.”

But one thing is for sure. Justin Timberlake is back and 2013 will be a hell of a ride for all of the fans.

Download “Suit & Tie” on iTunes.

“Someone asked me the other day, ‘so are you just … so, are you just done with music?’ It means more to me than anybody else in the world. Look I’ve only done 2 albums in 10 years, that’s the way I really look at it. What does the next decade mean for me? I’m the one who sits and is obsessive about it before you even get to hear it. As close as I get to it, I don’t know if I could physically torture myself that much year in and year out and expect it to fulfill me the way that it doe sand the way that it is right now. I don’t want to put anything out that I feel like is something that I don’t love. You just don’t get that every day. You have to wait for it … I’m Ready.”

Though we know not all of our fans celebrate Christmas, please forgive us as heading towards a 25 day deadline was the easiest way to plan the countdown.

As one last hurrah on our countdown, we have another video to look back at many of the photos taken of *NSYNC during holiday season’s throughout their lives.

Again, happy holidays and we’ll see you all in 2013!!

What’s left for a holiday party after all the gifts have been unwrapped? Well, Christmas Carols of course! Let’s join in the fun of this footage from *NSYNC singing Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.

It was shot during a break in filming the video for “Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays!”

To celebrate Christmas eve, here’s a video from the 1998 Disney Holiday special (which Day 18′s “Under My Tree” came from as well). *NSYNC, Tatyana Ali and Shawn Colvin sing “This Christmas.”