We “want you back,” JC.
Chris Kirkpatrick’s heart is tearing up over his good friend and *NSYNC bandmate JC Chasez’s reluctance to release new music.
“I don’t know what the hesitation is,” Kirkpatrick, 50, tells Page Six exclusively.
“I don’t know if there was a bad taste in his mouth from his first record or what, but I know that there’s a bad taste in his mouth from something, and he just won’t put it out no matter what.”
After the boy band went on an indefinite hiatus in 2002, Chasez released his first and only solo album, “Schizophrenic,” in 2004.
The record reached No. 17 on the Billboard 200 in its first week on the chart but then dropped 65 positions to No. 82 in its second week.
Chasez, now 46, never put out a second solo album, and nearly two decades later, social media users are still clamoring for his comeback.
“i just want to live in a world where jc chasez is the worldwide icon he should be,” one fan tweeted in September.
Podcaster Danny Pellegrino, meanwhile, wrote on Twitter earlier this year, “❤️ I need a 👑JC comeback or at least a line of turtlenecks for Macy’s.”
Kirkpatrick tells us Chasez “is aware” of the social media campaign pushing for him to put out new music again and adds that he, too, tries to encourage his former bandmate.
“I beg him, like, I would love to hear a record from him,” he says. “I’d love to be [on it] … just put me on a background or two in your record, you know? But, he’ll do it when he’s ready.”
Kirkpatrick notes, however, that he doesn’t have any plans to put out solo music either.
“I think my time has passed,” the father of one admits, adding that he now prefers to write for other artists. “We had a run in the band, and if the band goes back out again, sure, you know, we’ll all sit down and talk about things that way.”
Kirkpatrick did make a return to the limelight just last week, though, when he appeared on Season 8 of “The Masked Singer.”
When asked which member of *NSYNC he would nominate next to be on the singing competition show, Kirkpatrick tells Page Six it’d be an “easy” decision.
“That’s easy. JC Chasez,” he says. “JC needs to be on this show, and I’m probably going to get a text message later saying, ‘Dude, stop putting my name out there.'”
Kirkpatrick adds, “When I get asked this question, it’s an easy answer. I would love to hear him on it. I’m still, you know, 30 years of friendship, closer than a brother to him, and I still consider myself a fan of his.”