Dream Street may have hit a dead end, but freshman Matt Ballinger's dream lives on

The phone rings and a squeaky female voice is on the other end. "I love you, Matt!" she screeches. "This isn't Matt, it's his roommate, Ken," an agitated male voice responds.

Before freshman Matt Ballinger unlisted his dorm room number out of necessity, this exchange was the norm for him and his roommate, freshman Ken Kitchin. Ballinger, a former member of the boy band Dream Street, and Kitchin got a kick out of the numerous calls from teenage girl fans. "It was really funny to mess with the girls that called," Kitchin said. "At the same time, it got really annoying"

Ballinger laughs at his teenage stardom. "I was flattered, but it was weird," Ballinger said. "I just thought everything was funny."

Ballinger grew up in Westchester, New York and was always passionate about music. In fifth grade, he became involved in the Broadway music world. He was in "A Christmas Carol" at Madison Square Garden for two years, and later had a part in Broadway's "The King and I" and "The Sound of Music" in seventh grade.

After all the extensive singing and acting, Ballinger decided to take a break. During eighth grade, he went from Broadway to lacrosse and soccer. "I wanted to be a normal kid," Ballinger said.

The following year, however, Ballinger returned to his musical inclinations. His agent called to inform him that there was a casting call for a new pop group. Since it was at the time when boy bands were just beginning to gain popularity, Ballinger thought the idea sounded appealing. He went back to Manhattan to audition with 500 other aspiring teenagers.

After the group was cut down to eight boys, Ballinger rehearsed for about a month during the summer of 2000. The producers made their final decision and included Ballinger in Dream Street's five members. During the rest of the summer, the two producers, who independently funded the Dream Street project, taught the boys how to sing and dance. "Matty B was always very serious about his work," said former Dream Street member Greg Raposo. "He never played games."

As the boys perfected their songs, record label heads began to scope out the band in their Manhattan studio. Dream Street eventually got picked up by Atlantic Records, home to artists including Kid Rock, Brandy and Jewel. The boys recorded their first album and the release date was set, but there were problems between the producers and the record label. "Our producers were really crazy people," Ballinger said.

Atlantic dropped Dream Street, but the group was quickly picked up by independent record label Edel. Edel marketed the band through promo commercials a month before the first album dropped into stores. Dream Street's music video could be seen on channels from Disney to Nickelodeon, and fans spread their names on the internet prior to their album release. "It was the time that boy bands were the thing," Ballinger said. "All these little girls were getting all crazy and into it."

The album, released in July of 2002, was a success, selling 30,000 records its first week, and eventually almost one million. "We were shocked," Ballinger said.

Dream Street continued its success and opened for Aaron Carter while on tour the winter of 2002, which was an exciting experience for the group. Ballinger missed three months of school and got tutored while on the road. "It was a big deal," Ballinger said. "Aaron Carter is the man for little girls."

After the tour, however, there were problems between Dream Street and its producers. The producers wanted the boys to quit school and focus solely on their boy band occupation. "My parents supported my career," Ballinger, then a junior in high school, said. "But they wanted me to stay in school and get an education. You never know what's going to happen, especially in the music industry with its ups and downs."

Problems escalated, resulting in a lawsuit aimed to remove the band from its producers in the summer of 2002. The band also learned that one of the producers was heavy involved in teenage porn, which didn't go over well with the boys' families. "It's not a good image when you have a teenage girl following," Ballinger said.

Dream Street won its lawsuit, but the decision had an unanticipated result: as per the settlement, the boys were never allowed to perform as a group together again.

Not wanting to get into another messy legal battle, the boys went their separate ways, and Ballinger returned to everyday high school life. "Senior year, I was a totally normal kid," he said.

Currently continuing his normal academic career at Tufts, Ballinger is working on a new project called The Juice, a band he and his freshmen friends recently started. Their debut show was March 13 at Harvard's Battle of the Bands. He has moved away from his previous pop style into more alternative music. "It [The Juice] is kind of Dispatch-Sublimey stuff," Ballinger said, referring to his favorite alternative bands.

The Juice, which practices two to three times a week in Haskell Hall, consists of two singers, a bongo player, and a base and guitar player. "It's cool to work with Matt," said freshman Leon Mandler, a vocalist for The Juice. "He adds experience to our band that is absolutely crucial, and he knows what needs to be done."

Roommate and bandmate Ken Kitchin agrees, adding that fame hasn't negatively affected Ballinger. "Matt never gloats," Kitchin said. "But he's always willing to tell us about his experiences when the other dudes in our suite and in the band want to hear about it."

The Juice is going to Miami over spring break to record its first album. "I just wanna play as much as we can, and hopefully people will like us," Ballinger said. "We'll just go from there."

Although Ballinger is thinking of majoring in economics and going to business school after college, music remains his passion. "I'd really like [The Juice] to get big," Ballinger said. "That would be cool."

With a steady following of teenage girls across the country and a promising new band in the works, Ballinger's dream might just return to the street.