Joey Fatone Didn’t Even Tell His Parents About Secret *NSYNC Reunion at Justin Timberlake Show

Fans went wild at Justin Timberlake‘s Los Angeles concert last week when the singer brought out his *NSYNC bandmates for a surprise live reunion, debuting the group’s new song “Paradise” onstage. And in a new interview, Joey Fatone revealed the lengths he went to in order to keep it a secret leading up to the show.

“I didn’t even tell my parents,” the boy bander said on The Jennifer Hudson Show on Tuesday morning (March 19). “My father has a very large mouth. He’s very proud, so he likes to tell people… I didn’t tell my publicist, I didn’t tell nobody. Surprise!”

In addition to “Paradise,” which appears on Timberlake’s new album Everything I Thought It Was, the “Mirrors” singer, Fatone, JC Chasez, Chris Kirkpatrick and Lance Bass performed their smash ’90s hits “Bye Bye Bye” and “It’s Gonna Be Me” at The Wiltern in L.A. The performance came more than 20 years after *NSYNC went on hiatus in 2002, after which they wouldn’t officially reunite until 2023 to collaborate on “Better Place” for Timberlake’s Trolls Band Together animated threequel.

“It was really exciting, it was kind of just fun,” Fatone added of the show. “We have not been around for a long time, obviously… When we came out, it was just like, ‘What?’ Justin asked us to do the show and we were like ‘Yeah, why not.’ People went crazy.”

“When they all walked out … the screams were unbelievable,” chimed in the Backstreet Boys’ AJ McLean, who joined Fatone on the Hudson Show couch. “They didn’t miss a beat.”

McLean and Fatone kicked off their joint A Legendary Night Tour last week. The two stars have plans to play select dates across the United States through the end of March, with the shows promising live music, comedy and storytelling.

While chatting with J-Hud, the guys also reminisced on the time their respective bands faced off against each other for a charity basketball game in Europe back in the day. To spice things up, Bass had switched over to the Backstreet Boys team, while McLean played alongside the guys of *NSYNC.

“I think we won,” McLean said. “Whoops, sorry guys!”

Watch Fatone and McLean on The Jennifer Hudson Show above.