Am I the Only One?
Justin Bieber and Surviving an Unsurvivable World
“In a country where we are asked by family, by community, by broader institutions to resist vulnerability, to resist breaking ourselves open, to resist appearing as if we need help or rescue, to resist saying that we are scared, how is loneliness not a feature of our experiences?”
— Darnell Moore, Playboy
I put down my paper scraps and stood to my feet. We were having a crafting party at the house. The living room was split into two zones. One had a table and chairs where we sat around making valentines and vision boards and getting up for the occasional cupcake or pretzel stick. Funfetti cupcakes and Dot’s buffalo pretzels, of course. Meanwhile, we had the Grammys on a couple steps away. Every now and then, someone would try to hear who won over the laughter at the craft table, but it was ultimately in vain because any sort of quiet didn’t last long. There were a few moments we all stopped for. Sabrina Carpenter. Olivia Dean. Addison Rae. But I had a personal mission not to miss Justin Bieber’s performance.
Since last year, I’ve had Bieber’s latest albums, SWAG and SWAG II, in heavy rotation. Both albums were surprise drops, released within a couple months of each other. The first of the bunch, SWAG, came out the same day as Clipse’s Let God Sort Em Out, which was my most anticipated album of the year at that point. That is, until I saw Bieber was dropping. Since 2010, I’ve shown up for nearly every Bieber release. His Christmas album, Under the Mistletoe, solidified my fandom. You will catch me singing “Mistletoe” every holiday season for the rest of time. There’s also a wild Busta Rhymes feature on “Drummer Boy” where the rapper wishes their Twitter followers a “Merry Christmas, Kwanzaa, Happy Hanukkah.” The album is a star-studded event with additional appearances from Usher, Mariah Carey, and Boyz II Men. There’s a one-off country collaboration with The Band Perry, which is something Bieber tries to dip his toe in at times. He did an acoustic duet with Rascal Flatts for “That Should Be Me.” Then, he won a Grammy, along with Dan + Shay, for their song “10,000 Hours.”
Despite the country nods, Bieber has never committed himself as fully to a genre than he has R&B. His brand of pop sits most firmly within the Black music tradition, drawing inspiration from his idol, Michael Jackson, and childhood mentor, Usher. Both men, as child stars turned mega stars, loom large over Bieber’s life and career. From an early age, Justin knew that, if he wanted to be like Mike, his life wouldn’t be normal. Bieber’s former manager, Scooter Braun, would tell him as much: “We can do the teenage-pop-star thing with no long-term career plan, and we can ride this thing for a few years, and your career will be done—and I mean over—or we can stick to our current plan, which is following in the creative footsteps of Michael Jackson.” But if you want Jackson’s career, Braun continued, “you have to grasp that you’re never going to be normal again.”
This came after a concert in Orlando where, afterward, a tearful Bieber told Braun he didn’t like being famous. It’s no wonder he hates it. Despite his immense success and the riches he’s attained, Bieber has contended with the consequences of fame—and navigating it at such a young age—throughout his career. It’s not a stretch to say that Bieber has potentially had more eyes on him than anyone else in the history of the world. Two years after the official launch of YouTube, a 12-year-old Bieber and his mother uploaded their first video to the platform. It was Justin singing Ne-Yo’s 2006 hit, “So Sick.” Bieber’s popularity exploded as he continued posting YouTube videos. Eventually, it’s these uploads that caught the attention of Braun, who later teamed up with Usher to sign the young artist. With the duo moving him and his mom from Ontario to Atlanta, the Bieber fever was set in motion.
Within the first 14 months of his career, Bieber sold over 10 million albums worldwide. Earning an estimated $100 million in 2010, he inspired more than 100 products that were holiday must-haves, secured a Paramount-backed movie listing with his Never Say Never concert film, and sold out Madison Square Garden. L.A. Reid, whose Island Def Jam Music Group housed Braun and Usher’s label, told The Hollywood Reporter, “I’ve seen an artist ascend this fast before but never this big.” In other words, Bieber was everywhere, as were the moths his light attracted. From the constant barrage of paparazzi to intrusive adults who had no issues sexualizing a teenager, Bieber became an object of capitalism’s evils. Horrors that likely resemble redacted emails in the Epstein Files or speculations of time spent with Diddy. Braun’s words, a heartbreaking premonition: “You’re never going to be normal again.”
At 18 years old, Bieber told GQ, “I keep my guard up a lot, because you know, you can’t trust anyone in this business.” He added, “That’s what’s sad. You can’t trust anybody. I learned the hard way.” Remnants of old interviews show how these anxieties have followed Bieber into adulthood. A rather creepy Rolling Stone profile from the year before finds Bieber expressing his ire at the paparazzi and money, repercussions of fame that he also faces on SWAG. “I hate paparazzi,” he says. “They’re stalkers with a camera. If someone’s following you, that’s automatically a crime, but if they have a camera, it’s OK? I don’t agree with that at all.” Later, Bieber adds, “I don’t love money, because once you start loving money, you’ve got a big house and nice cars and just an empty heart, and that’s the truth, I’m not just saying that.”
I identify with Bieber’s desire to keep his heart, especially in the face of systems that want to steal it away. Of course, I’m tempted to roll my eyes at the wealthy complaining about his wealth. The famous renouncing his fame, while basking in its spoils. But I also see the many manipulations that can lead one to madness. Reminders that our leaders would rather grind us to dust than relinquish an ounce of their power. One of the questions about Bieber I hear come up most often is the rhetorical “is he okay?” Even if we expect an answer, it doesn’t take long to remember that none of us are.
On “THERAPY SESSION,” one of the one-too-many SWAG interludes featuring Druski, Bieber shares how this question weighs on him. “That’s been a tough thing for me recently,” he confesses to the comedian. “It’s feeling like, you know, I have had to go through a lot of my struggles as a human—as all of us do—really publicly.” He concludes, “It starts to make me feel like I’m the one with issues and everyone else is perfect.”
Joy Oladokun has a song called “AM I?” that I’ve been listening to a lot recently where she mirrors this sentiment. In the chorus, Oladokun sings:
“Does anybody feel like everybody’s flying
Even though the sky is falling?
Has anybody noticed someone’s always crying?
We don’t do a thing
Does anybody feel like it’s getting hotter
Down here under the sun?
Am I the only one?
Am I the only one?”
That question “Am I the only one?” has only grown louder in recent years. We have more platforms for connection than ever before where we’re constantly bombarded with information. However, none of this info is universal due to so many niches, feeds, and micro-communities. There’s also a refusal to accept the truth and the histories that made it so. Even when we know what’s real, we deny it to maintain our own convenience; to uphold our illusions. I’ve felt crazy trying to keep my heart in a careless world. I question if we’re all living the same reality when I see industries and fans alike continue to celebrate abusive artists and athletes. This also comes as our government protects pedophiles in plain sight and distracts from these atrocities with nationwide ICE raids and complaints about Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl halftime show not being “white enough.”
As Hanif Abdurraqib acknowledges for The New Yorker, this is “a world that can render a person unable to get out of bed.” Earlier in the essay, he states, “The world at large is seemingly fine with what we are witnessing, and I think that suggests the irreversible unwellness of a people, of a society.” It’s this world that applauded Justin Bieber—and that I stood up from the craft table to join—as he walked onto the Grammys stage in nothing but socks and SKYLRK boxer shorts. A world that sat clouded in darkness, except for camera flashes and a series of table lamps, as Bieber constructed the soundscape for his hit song, “YUKON.” Unable to see anything but his own reflection, which appeared in a floor mirror that waited for him on stage, Bieber felt comfortable closing his eyes and focusing only on singing.
The original song pitches up Bieber’s voice to where it’s nearly unrecognizable, but his Grammys performance leaves no mystery about who he is. Bieber is who he’s always been. A kid who loves singing; who, like me and my friends in high school, went through a phase where he couldn’t stop saying “swag.” Many of us remember and question the allowance of his cringeworthy line on “Boyfriend”: “Swag, swag, swag on you, chillin’ by the fire while we eating fondue.” When informed of the end of his 2014 Vulture interview, Bieber jumped out of his seat and shouted, “We’re done? Swag!” This feels like a precursor for Justin’s current stage in his career.
As depicted in Bieber’s Grammys performance, he has stripped his professional life down to its bare essentials. He parted ways with Braun, who was a life source for Justin and his mom when first starting out. Additionally, Bieber cut ties with the team that had been with him for most of his career. Instead of cover stories and video interviews to promote his SWAG albums, Bieber has opted for Twitch streams where he plays music with his friends and they talk about their faith. Even the albums mark a clear departure from his over-produced, air-tight songs of old. Bieber’s SWAG series leaves room for imperfection. With help from a new band of collaborators, including Carter Lang, Dylan Wiggins, Eddie Benjamin, and the dynamic duo, Dijon and Mk.gee, there’s more texture than previous Bieber records. He taps into the Michael Jackson influence on songs like “ALL I CAN TAKE” and “DON’T WANNA.” These projects also find Justin raising his first child with wife Hailey Bieber.
The pop sensation keeps his heart by embracing his inner child and resting in the ones who let him be. A fulfillment of Bieber’s own prophecy in a 2015 Men’s Health profile: “I want to always remain… to have that sense of purity inside of me where I don’t… I don’t want to lose that sense of purity.” Later, he notes, “You feel like you wanna grow up and you gotta prove yourself. Hey, man, you don’t need to prove yourself. I didn’t know that, though.”
After Bieber’s Grammys performance, I return to the craft table and keep tinkering away at a valentine for Elizabeth. I flip through magazines, scan sticker sheets, and look for the right marker. I tear and cut and paste. In my body, I’ve just finished watching a performance I’ll remember for years. But in my heart, I’m back in art class crafting with my friends. This night—our coming together to celebrate friends’ shared birthdays—is a reminder that we will show up for each other. It’s an invitation, as Hanif notes, to “imagine a heart that feels a connection to the hearts of others, even others you do not know.” As I attempt to survive a world that wants to destroy me, hopefully making this world more survivable for all of us along the way, I cut the bullshit and return to who I am. I look in the mirror and see someone who has been loved into staying, my people once again lighting my way to the stage ahead.
Thank you!
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Great analysis, Alex! Love the love you have for Justin and the appreciation for how we’ve grown up with him and into our adulthoods. Though we all live our own lives, famous and not, we can all relate in one way or another.
Love this. Love you. 🫶🏿
Always so dope to hear your perspective. The way you continue to keep community and love at the forefront my boy.