Sinatra held the world on a string for our grandparents’ generation, our parents would twist and shout for The Beatles, and what did we get? The BIEBS! We were a bit young to recognize The Backstreet Boys, and The Jo-Bros are way too commercial to really be the figure-head of our generation’s musical definition, but Justin Bieber fits the bill. If the trend continues, I’m sure our children will be worshipping the pop-star who has the best remix of “Row Row Row Your Boat (Baby, yeah yeah yeah!)”
Who couldn’t fall in love with the Biebs? There’s no arguing that if Bach was a sixteen year old ‘gangsta’ from the Canadian suburbs, he’d be Justin Bieber. I always think of Peter Brady when I think of Justin Bieber. I remember the episode of the Brady Bunch where the kids get a record deal just as Peter’s voice is deciding to become a man. Everyone becomes really upset with Peter, and Peter becomes really embarrassed about the whole thing. By the end of the episode, of course, the Bradies realize they can rearrange their hit tune to include Peter’s new falsetto style and bring the song to perfection. Similarly, if someone were to sing with Bieber they’d be rather perturbed to find he still has the voice of a twelve year old and the sass of a moody teen, yet somehow he’s selling records with Usher.
In all seriousness, what are we basing Bieber’s talent on? Any 16 year old guy could woo a class of 6th grade girls with that haircut. If I wore my stupid purple hat backwards and hacked on an acoustic guitar, would someone love me? The Monty Python group pretended to sound like women all the time, and I don’t believe they ever received such attention.
Of course, it’s not all hair whooshing, love swooning sweethearts in the Biebs’ paradise. While his music video “Baby” has been honored as one of the most viewed videos on YouTube, it’s also the most disliked. Bottles have been pitched at him on stage and slander is posted all across the web.
But I truly fear for Bieber’s future. It’s not hard to realize that after he’s reproduced the same album three times under the names “My World”, “My World 2.0” and “My World Acoustic”, he’s out of ideas. As he nears his seventeenth birthday, though, it would seem the timing is just right. As Justin approaches the era of “Big Boy Biebs”, we’re sure to see an abundance of change in his sound that the world might not be ready for. Growing up is hard, but Bieber better figure out Peter Pan’s secret fast if he’s going to stay afloat. One can only guess what the seas of squealing girls will think of Bieber when he comes out on the other end with a super-puberty voice like Louis Armstrong.
