Back when they were just starting out, 98 Degrees singer Nick Lachey says that someone from the group’s label handed the band a book that laid out the age of consent in every single state. The shocking revelation comes in the new Investigation Discovery docuseries, Boy Band Confidential, which features stories from members of some of the era’s biggest names dishing on life inside the boy band bubble.

“This is going to sound super shady but when we first went out — I remember in our first tour — someone at the label gave us a book,” Love Is Blind co-host Lachey says in the series that debuts on Investigation Discovery on Monday (April 13) and Tuesday (April 14) at 9 p.m. ET before later streaming on HBO Max. “It was the age of consent in every state in the country,” he added, according to Us magazine.

“We kept that book on the tour bus. Unfortunately, there were people out there looking to tear you down,” he adds in the show of the manual that was seemingly meant to make sure the singers, then in their early-to-mid-20s, did not break the law on the road when interacting with fans. Lachey fronted the band that also featured his younger brother, Drew Lachey, as well as Jeff Timmons and Justin Jeffre, and he says that the safeguards in place today were not there when he and his bandmates were touring.

“You see [Justin] Bieber cancel a tour. You’ll see Shawn Mendes cancel a tour because [their] mental health needs to come first,” he said, noting that no matter what was going on off stage for the group known for such hits as their Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 collaboration on Mariah Carey’s 1999 smash “Thank God I Found You” (also featuring Joe) and 2000s No. 2 hit “Give Me Just One Night (Una Noche),” they were encouraged to carry on.

“That was not an option when we were out there. You went out there and you did the show. Then you came back after the show and you broke down and you cried and you kicked a hole in the wall. Or you did whatever you had to do. But you didn’t bow out. You work so hard to get there, you can’t let your foot off the gas,” he said of expectations for the band, who were all between 25-27 years old during their peak 1998-2000 years (Drew was between 22-24).

98 Degrees released their first non-Christmas album in more than a decade, Full Circle, last May. The collection featured six updated versions of their biggest hits. Boy Band Confidential, executive produced by *NSYNC’s Joey Fatone, features Fatone, Lachey, O-Town’s Ashley Parker Angel, *NSYNC’s Lance Bass, Backstreet Boys’ AJ McLean, Boyz II Men’s Wanya Morris and Shawn Stockman and LFO’s Brad Fischetti.

Hilary Duff just revisited one of her most beloved tracks ahead of the Laguna Beach reunion special, re-recording “Come Clean” and surprise releasing it Friday (April 10).

Approaching the track with a mature sound that still evokes the charm of her teenage self, the Lizzie McGuire star sings, “Let the rain fall down/ And wake my dreams/ Let it wash away my sanity/ ‘Cause I want to feel the thunder/ I wanna scream/ Let the rain fall down/ I’m coming clean.”

The track will appear on Hilary Duff – (Mine), the star’s upcoming collection of re-recorded versions of her greatest hits. The project will arrive Friday (April 18) on a silver vinyl exclusively for this year’s Record Store Day. Only 10,000 copies will be available to purchase, meaning only a small number of fans will get their hands on Duff’s updated renditions of “What Dreams Are Made Of” and other nostalgic favorites.

“Come Clean (Mine)” will also be featured on The Reunion: Laguna Beach, which premieres Friday on The Roku Channel. The original track by Duff — which reached No. 35 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 2004 — served as the theme song for the reality show back in the day. That’s not to say Duff herself was a fan of the show; she hilariously confessed on Watch What Happens Live in 2023 that she’d never seen it.

The How I Met Your Father alum is currently in the midst of a major musical comeback, dropping her first album in 10 years in February and reaching No. 3 on the Billboard 200 with Luck … or Something. Her seven-month Lucky Me Tour kicks off in June.

Listen to Duff’s new-old song “Come Clean” below.

The blockbuster Live Nation antitrust trial is finally coming to an end, and a federal jury will soon decide whether the company has used its size to wield unlawful monopoly power in the live music industry.

The New York jury heard closing arguments on Thursday (April 9), more than a month after the trial first kicked off in the case brought by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and dozens of state attorneys general. The DOJ settled with Live Nation just a few days into the trial, leaving 33 states and the District of Columbia to pursue the company’s divestiture of Ticketmaster on their own.

According to the Associated Press, the states’ lawyer, Jeffrey Kessler, told the jury in his final pitch on Thursday that Live Nation is a “monopolistic bully.” Kessler said the company controls 86% of major concert venues in addition to the artist promotion and ticketing business — a level of control he equated to “digging the moat around the monopoly castle.”

Live Nation attorney David Marriott countered in his own closing statement that while the company is indeed big, it is a “fierce competitor” that plays fair in the live entertainment industry. He said the states do not have any tangible evidence of monopolistic conduct, and that Kessler’s 86% figure is a misleading number calculated by excluding key venues, such as stadiums, from the pool of “major concert venues.”

“This is a gerrymandered market made up for purposes of this litigation,” Marriott told the jury, per the New York Times.

The lengthy trial featured testimony from venue bosses including former Barclays Center CEO John Abbamondi, who said Live Nation CEO Michael Rapino threatened to divert concerts if he switched to rival ticketer SeatGeek. Rapino denied making such threats when he later took the stand himself, saying the company has achieved its success through top-notch work, not anticompetitive conduct.

Other key witnesses included AEG Presents CEO Jay Marciano, Live Nation president of touring Omar Al-joulani and Drake’s manager, Adel Nur (aka Future the Prince). A slew of economics and other expert witnesses also testified.

The jury will begin deliberating in private on Friday morning (April 10). On a technical level, the verdict form asks whether Live Nation violated federal and state antitrust laws via two key practices: requiring artists to use its promotion services in order to play its amphitheaters, and threatening to withhold Live Nation-promoted concerts from venues that don’t sign exclusive primary ticketing contracts with Ticketmaster.

Financial damages could be on the table if the jury’s answer is “yes” to any of these questions. It would then be up to Judge Arun Subramanian to decide what kind of structural relief is required. The states want to break up Live Nation and Ticketmaster, but the judge could find that limits on the company’s business practices are sufficient.

Live Nation has already agreed to some such limits as part of its settlement with the DOJ, including opening up its back-end technology to rival ticketers, allowing rival promoters to book its amphitheaters and offering a non-exclusive primary ticketing option to venues. The deal also created a $280 million fund to be distributed to any states that chose to sign on, though just a handful of states took that route.