Ok so I haven't bothered to listen to our newest wunderkind until very recently. Like, today. And what I have found is that this kid takes the loose definition of the title "artist" to an entirely new level. I am done with the music industry at this point. I may never buy music from Def Jam again. Really, Universal, signing this young man and promoting him to his current level is shameful, and an insult to the true artists who deserve attention. I love all types of music, from the trashy and catchy tunes of Jesse Mccartney to the soulful renderings of Cat Power to the vintage sounds of original recordings of the Mamas and the Papas. I have no business condemning those who love popular pop, for I am one of that crowd, but this...this is out of control.
1. Being able to repeat between one and three words in time to a beat is not representative of talent. And I quote, "Like baby baby ohh/like baby baby no/like baby baby ohh." Truly a poetic set. At least Britney Spear's songwriters attempt to tell some sort of story, albeit one about her clubbing. Are we really that afraid to say something, anything, that our songs must sound like THIS?
2. He sounds so young. Like, very, very young. 12 year old boy's choir young. In reality, he is actually only 16 years old, yet his lyrics are hyper sexualized. At 16, his demographic of middle class American teens are still trying to fit in while standing in, trying to figure out who they are while still being very sheltered. It's completely inappropriate for him to talk about dating and sex in the way that he does, and to do it with artists such as Ludacris (he wrote the charming and poetically titled "Move Bitch") and Usher (Love in the Club. Need I say more?) We want our next generation to be leaders, to save us from the mess we are in, and yet we let the music industry guide their minds with a 16 year old who talks about girls, his world.
3. His grammar sucks. U Smile? How many sales would you lose by saying "You Smile"?
4. He represents a culture of obsession, a dangerous trend of corporations exploiting us when we are both our most dramatic and our most vulnerable-the teenage years. Now, more than ever, we live in a culture of free information and readily available instant communication. As young women and men tweet and facebook constantly about this one artist, I wonder how much of their other socialization is going out the window. How many real connections do we forsake, because we spend so much time cyber-communicating on social media? I wonder if there will be a statistic, in 100 years or so, of how much time in our lives is given to the computer and to the media, just like we have a statistic now for how much time is given to sleeping in our lives? Though this is a larger discussion to examine, Mr. Bieber is an indicator of this.
5. This young man is Canadian. No wonder our economy sucks, the Canadians keep taking our money. On that note, stop buying Olympic memorabilia. The warm feelings have faded. Okay, this point was a joke...but had to be included.
6. His lyrics are disgustingly sexist. "I'll be your only guy/You'll be my number one girl". Oh, so I can only have you as my guy, but you can have a lot of girls? This is supposed to be romantic because I'm your highest priority? This is furthering girls' tendencies to have low expectations, and boys' expectations to expect the world and a half from girls. To lower girls' self esteem like this...it's just wrong.
7. "If you listen to the crap we all listened to, it's a surprise we didn't end up as whores." Ok so...let's stop now?
I get it. I get that people listen to anything with a beat, and catchiness is not a bad thing. I just would hope that sometimes, we would allow ourselves to stop and think about the words that we allow to enter our precious minds.
2 comments:
i think you missed a few 'baby's in that rendition.
and thank you thank you thank you for point 6. i said the same exact thing the first time i heard it.
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