It’s been five years since American popstar Justin Bieber
dropped his album “Purpose” which saw Bieber hit the heights of his
fame with songs “Love Yourself” hitting number one on the ARIA single charts
however Bieber ended up cancelling a world tour citing a need to take a break
before suffering addiction and then getting married to his now wife Hailey
Baldwin so I thought that there was a big chance that “Changes” could be an
interesting listen especially if Justin could channel everything he has been
through and drilled into his emotions around events in his life to make an
interesting and somewhat fascinating album and given that Justin Bieber was
pursuing an R’n’B vibe, I was curious so was “Changes” as interesting as I had
hoped?
Well no, we didn’t get anything close to an interesting
album sonically or especially lyrically as it seems like Justin Bieber and the
bevy of songwriters and producers which included Timbaland, Poo Bear, Ski Mask
the Slump God, Travis Scott and Post Malone weren’t interested in making an
interesting and diverse album where Justin Bieber opens up about his life, they
were more interested in creating an album that’s bereft of effort and sounds
like a modern day Chris Brown album without the god damn auto tune plus the same grossness and underlying toxicness of a modern Chris Brown album.
When I say bereft of effort, the lack of effort begins with
the sound of this album which basically takes all the bad elements of music
from the 2010s and turns a majority this album into a generic slurry of tired trap
and pop tropes straight out of the mid to 2010s, “Changes” is nowhere near
close to being R’n’B because I will not sit here and believe that this
lifeless, passionless, devoid of creativity and lack of energy is supposed to
be rhythm and blues music, in my experience with R’n’B listening to the likes
of Jhene Aiko or even Usher’s best album back in the day, they had passion, energy,
soul and the music while not always perfect showed vision, creativity and a
direction/purpose, I can’t say that any of that for “Changes”. Sound wise this
album is boring by the time I’d heard “Available”, I was wondering why I was
torturing myself.
Every single song bar the last few songs sound the same with
the same sounding trap with hints of bass guitar and the occasional synth that
fits with nothing on the song for good measure, Bieber is basically doing the Chris
Brown meets Drake sound from the mid-2010s in 2020 although it’s not surprising
considering how much Bieber has come to Brown’s defence calling him a legend
and ‘king of R’n’B and collaborated with Brown to horrendous results.
The last few songs on this album are basically Bieber and an
acoustic guitar but they also run together and start feeling like they sound
the god damn same, there’s nothing positive to be said about the instrumentation
on this thing.
As for the lyrics, I don’t expect Justin Bieber to write music
akin to that of a Father John Misty or anyone else but my god, these lyrics have no emotional depth or pathos to
them and follow a very set structure except when there is a collaborator
involved on the song, a song like the album’s title track “Changes” where Bieber
sings about some days he might push further or not in the verses but then in the
chorus sings “I’m goin’ through changes (x3)..Doesn’t mean I’ll change” so if you
are going through changes but not willing to make the changes doesn’t mean you
are changing at all, Justin, he also doesn’t outline how he is going to change or
what changes he has actually made to be a better husband to his wife although
when you look at who was behind the song writing, it’s not surprising it’s a
clusterfuck given Nasri Atweh was behind Magic’s 2014 hit “Rude!” and Poo Bear
recently worked on the cacophonous disaster that was the last Zac Brown band
album.
Also if you are expecting a good hook, you are in hard luck,
most of the hooks are these repetitive lazily written things that go nowhere
close to being memorable except for “Yummy” which I have already talked about at length.
The lyrical gangbang continues, on “Available” which could
be interpreted as this relationship being abusive because Bieber is complaining
that she is busy and that she belongs in his bed, you know not working or providing
for Bieber so he can live his lifestyle but she should just stay in bed all day
as though that is going to pay the bills or pay for groceries etc, there’s this
clinginess that infects this song and makes it icky to say the least, this is
also the same thing that pervades on “E.T.A” where Bieber is desperate for her
to get home or give him her estimated time of arrival presumably so she and him
can go to bed, there’s just something borderline abusive about the writing of
some of these songs.
Then there’s the most recent single with Quavo (we’ll get to
the collaborators on this thing in a moment), “Intentions” where Bieber sings “Heart
full of equity, you’re an asset” which could be very much misinterpreted as
this girl being Bieber’s property! Also “Stay in the kitchen, cookin’ up, got
your own bread”. Hey Justin, it’s 2020, men can make bread to, the kitchen isn’t
a space confined to just a woman! The whole song is just cringey and raises a
lot of red flags. It’s almost sad that Quavo’s verse while not great is the
best part of the song.
So let’s deal with the collaborations, Post Malone’s verse
while his worst since “Stoney” is delivered with a passion that doesn’t match
anything else on “Forever”, Kehlani is just about the best thing on “Get Me”,
Travis Scott clearly decided he was just having an off day and phoned it in on “Second
Emotion” and as for Lil Dicky on “Running Over”? Like anyone would expect good
quality from Lil Dicky, he slips a basketball reference in all before telling this
girl he’ll kiss her breasts all tenderly…ewww.
This album does not deserve the most generic of passes, music
has evolved and changed from the sounds that were popular in 2015/16 when
Justin released Purpose which at least had a pulse, some passion and creativity
behind it, you could at least appreciate songs like “Sorry” and “Love Yourself”,
we are moving beyond the trap sound especially as you look at what is ruling iTunes
right now, this album is a lazy, generic, slapdash slog that is actually an
insult to background noise, don’t punish your friends and family with this,
play “Purpose” or even Usher’s albums, they are load better than this and those reviews you Beliebers are reading and most likely pissed at? Those reviews likely had more effort put into them than Justin Bieber or anyone associated with this album put into the writing and recording of it.
Changes gets a very light 3/10
