From Iceland — Fuck You Justin Bieber

Fuck You Justin Bieber

Published September 9, 2016

Fuck You Justin Bieber
Hannah Jane Cohen
Photo by
Timothée Lambrecq

Justin, please listen to me: I loved you. I begged the Grapevine to let me review you. I was a fan. I listened to your album all the time. I sang along to the songs. I learned the dance to “Sorry”. When people made fun of you, I would say, “No, you don’t understand!” When people laughed at your face tattoo, I would say, “No, it’s great!” I was there for you baby. I defended you.

With absolutely no irony, your songs are incredible. Maybe it’s your producers, or maybe it’s you, but nevertheless, ‘Purpose’ is one of my favourite albums of the last few years. “Love Yourself” is a classic. “Sorry” is infectious. Your music videos are also breathtaking. The fashion, the dancing… you know how to make spectacle, and that’s why I was so excited to see you.

The whole city of Kopavogur shut down for you. Do you know that? Do you understand how much Reykjavík was put out just for you and your ever-changing hair? Streets were shut down. Buses were re-routed. The organisers of your concert bent over more than backwards to accommodate you. Hats off to them seriously, because I’ve never seen a more organised and tightly-run ship. It was impressive.

But regardless: Today, you let me down, Justin. Today, I was hurt. Today, I found out I’ve been deceived all these years.

Bad is not even the word I would use to describe this performance—the right word is “insulting”. Justin, you’re world famous. People love you. People in Iceland love you. How dare you go on that stage and lip-synch about 80% of the time? And how dare you—when you lip-synch—dance really badly?

I’ve seen Taylor Swift. I’ve seen Beyoncé. I’ve seen Madonna. They lip-synch occasionally, but only when they are doing a damn hard dance number. You never did one of those! You just don’t seem to care. Your performance was lazy. Your choreography was mediocre. And let’s just get back to the fact that you lip-synched almost everything: Darling, your songs aren’t even hard to sing!

It’s also sad because there are so many Icelandic performers that are much more deserving: Kælan Mikla, Emmsjé Gauti, Agent Fresco. All of them could outperform you in a second, and do regularly actually. But no, you were the chosen one discovered by Usher, so you’re the bazillionaire and they are not.

Look, I’m not even a fan of Sturla Atlas, in fact, I think their music is really generic. But they even fucking killed it when they opened for you. They really fucking cared. You could tell they were giving it everything.

And you just weren’t trying. It felt like it was just another paycheque for you. What are you even going to spend it on? More stupid face tattoos? Maybe you should get “Mediocre” tattooed on your forehead. That’s what you deserve.

Fuck you Justin. I’m really upset. And it’s too late to say sorry, baby. You showed us. We’ve been showed. You’re a talentless hack. I know what your mindless Beliebers will say, “Where are Ü now?”

Far away from you. Far. Away. From. You.

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