Patricia Cárdenas

Erasure gears up for the strangest album cycle of its career.

The star-studded night of pop spread festive cheer throughout an all-ages audience at the BB&T Center. Throughout the evening, boy bands of all sorts stole the show.

This season is more than just for best-of roundups and seemingly endless plays of Wham’s “Last Christmas”: It’s also time for Jingle Ball.

The Liverpool band’s dulcet lyrics explored everything from the wonders of telegraphs and atomic bombs to a tragic romance with Joan of Arc.

All the great boy bands have delivered polished love songs, cute guys, and lots of posters for tweens to tack to their bedroom walls. For young girls coming of age at the end of the 2000s, the Jonas Brothers expertly filled that role.

Though he’s often bunched up with the rest of the adult contemporary gang of the late ’90s to mid-aughts, Thomas’ signature poppy songwriting alone proves he’s in a league of his own.