Number Ones: Justin Bieber’s ‘What Do You Mean?’ Is One Of The Most Interesting Chart-Topping Singles Of The Year

Bringing his popular column to Junkee, musicologist Tim Byron takes a deep dive into the song at the top of the ARIA Singles Chart.

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There’s an old Harry Nilsson song called ‘Mr. Richland’s Favorite Song’, from his 1968 album Aerial Ballet, which tells the story of a teen idol.

In the first verse, the teen idol has screaming fans who stay for three shows. In the second verse, “the calendar changed and the pages fell off”; the fans are now older, mostly married, and go to two shows instead. In the third verse, the singer’s working at a bar, and the remaining fans – who he now knows by name — only stay for an hour or so.

That’s the cycle of pop; music made for the young inevitably has a quickly ticking expiry date. And almost fifty years later, nothing much has changed.

Justin Bieber, of course, was the big teen idol of 2010. His ability to look cute while guilelessly singing the word “baby” over and over was extremely bankable. 13-year-olds across the world heard his song — and then they saw his face, and they were Beliebers.

But now that it’s 2015, the 13-year-old Belieber caught up in the rush of ‘Baby’ is 18 years old. Enormous numbers of former Beliebers are now at university. Many of them are signed up for Tinder, going to clubs to dance, and — in Australia at least — getting legally drunk. They’re not going to be as rabid about the boy as they were five years ago. So something had to give.

Enter ‘What Do You Mean’ — Bieber’s latest single, which just hit the top of the ARIA charts.

Bieber Can’t Coast On The Past Anymore

Bieber himself is no longer the cute, mop-topped teenager he once was. After an annus horribilis or two involving a Brazilian prostitute, some eggs, a police mugshot, and old footage of a quite-young Bieber using pretty offensive language, it’s a wonder that he has any fans left at all. I mean, a quarter of a million people signed a petition to the White House asking for the young Canadian to be deported.

Realising that his image had grown toxic, Bieber and his team have been trying to rehabilitate it. He recently appeared on Ellen to make a show of contrition to the general public. He came to Australia for a Hillsong conference. He went on Jimmy Fallon to get a nod of approval from Questlove, and showed off his skills as a drummer.

The change in image came hand-in-hand with something of a change in Bieber’s musical style. After all, if he wants to retain the public interest, he needs to be doing something new; something that raises eyebrows. And so earlier this year, something hitherto unlikely occurred: Bieber collaborated with big name DJs Diplo and Skrillex on a song titled ‘Where Are Ü Now’.

To appreciate how odd this was, understand that both Diplo and Skrillex make up a sort of hipster EDM duo. Diplo especially comes across as something of a music snob, a relentless searcher for The New Sound. According to reports, Diplo spent years telling his then-girlfriend and collaborator M.I.A. that she should avoid trying to get on the charts, and be an underground artist instead. And look at him now: going out with Katy Perry, and collaborating with Bieber.

‘Where Are Ü Now’ was a #3 single earlier this year. And more importantly, for perhaps the first time in his career, Bieber was making an impression on people who had never been Beliebers. The song has a similar, slightly exotic ‘jaywave’ sound to Major Lazer’s ‘Lean On’, replete with high-pitched whale noises. It definitely gives off the impression of being from the hipster side of EDM; ‘Where Are Ü Now’ would have been played to death on Triple J at the time if the lead vocal was by anyone but Justin Bieber.

Another indication of the song’s coolness: the venerable, oh-so-serious New York Times produced a high quality video examining the making of the song. The video featured Diplo trying to justify how he’s still cool even if he works with Bieber, with Skrillex explaining that those high-pitched whale noises were in fact electronically-altered snippets of a Bieber vocal.

In the video, Bieber seems slightly confused about why ‘Where Are Ü Now’ sounds the way it does, as if he felt the song would be commercial suicide. You’re left with the impression that he had to be gently shepherded towards doing things that might be a little hipper than usual. After all, cultural credibility has long been anathema to Bieber; music nerd notions of ‘coolness’, reserve and social positioning held no sway among his Beliebers.

On the heels of ‘Where Are Ü Now’ comes ‘What Do You Mean?’. The new song is not produced by Skrillex and Diplo, but the sounds are close enough, as if Bieber is trying to do his own version. Which is to say that it’s a fairly up-to-date hipster EDM sound, in a year where out-and-out dance music has had a resurgence.

Like the Diplo/Skrillex track, ‘What Do You Mean?’ includes that odd, high-pitched, flute-ish whale noise that’ll turn out to be a human vocal that’s been tortured and degraded in Ableton. It also has the chilled-out vibe that dominates dance music these days; as far as the top of the charts are concerned, the aggressively loud and thumping Black Eyed Peas/David Guetta stuff has been replaced by music that feels calmer, even as the relentless beats pound away in the background. ‘What Do You Mean?’ wouldn’t sound out of place in a club next to Omi’s ‘Cheerleader’ or Major Lazer’s ‘Lean On’.

And it’s actually one if the more interesting #1 singles of the year so far. It starts with a piano and a ticking clock sound. Then there’s the aforementioned whale noises. When the synth riff comes in, it bleeps and bloops unpredictably, occasionally sounding as if it’s falling in a heap. It’s a world away from the shiny primary colours of ‘Baby’, instead trading in pastels and shades of grey. And once again, if it had vocals by Chet Faker rather than Justin Bieber, it would have won high rotation on Triple J.

Bieber’s vocal itself is pretty subdued, and spot-on for the genre. The whole song is lyrics like “first, you’re up and you’re down and you’re between“; “trying to compromise but I can’t win“; and “don’t know if you’re happy or complaining“, and in all of this, he actually sounds believable. Bieber still has a teen idol’s purity of tone, but he sort of sounds hung over, exhausted — there’s no melisma, no faux-soul emoting, no bludgeoning of emotions — and the repeated lyric works either as a lover’s confusion, or as Bieber’s plea to the public. It must be an oddly schizoid world that he has to live in, where he has to be shepherded away both from crazy fans, and people who hate him so much they want him deported.

Just Lose Yourself To Dance

In the end, the combination of the vocals and the music ends up feeling like a kind of catharsis, both for the artist and a sympathetic listener. The song gives the distinct impression that while you probably don’t understand why he’s been such a dick in public recently, Bieber doesn’t know what you mean, either. But whatever; let’s lose ourselves in the beat.

The video for the song reinforces that catharsis. Bieber and his lover are kidnapped by masked men; they escape from their captors by jumping out an open window. And, instead of injured limbs, they land on a cushion filled with air and then find themselves surrounded by partygoers. It all works surprisingly well, even if you never really bought into him. And if you did, ‘What Do You Mean?’ probably works even better.

Longtime fans will relate to ‘What Do You Mean?’ in 2015 as much as they related to ‘Baby’ in 2010. Where the 13-year-old wanted to bask in the group worship of the teen idol, the 18-year-old wants to stand out, to define themselves from the pack. They’re open to the arguments of cool, in other words. And — oddly, considering it’s a song by Justin Bieber and all — ‘What Do You Mean?’ trades in those arguments.

On top of that, the chorus resonates: the former fans are likely old enough to be dealing with all the ins and outs of being newly adult — including such hits as, “So I swiped right, and then you didn’t respond. What does that mean?” Nobody at age eighteen knows anything about what other people want from them; they barely know what they want themselves. ‘What do you mean?’ is a prevalent question, and now every time it’s asked it’ll trigger this earworm.

Bieber previously had a limited but rabid appeal, but ‘What Do You Mean?’ feels like a genuine hit. It feels like the kind of song radio will play strongly for weeks; the kind of song that’s going to sell consistently for months on iTunes (in contrast, songs that sell to a rabid fanbase last a few weeks until the fanbase is exhausted). Already, ‘What Do You Mean?’ is being played twice as many times per day on Spotify as the next most popular song (‘Can’t Feel My Face’ by The Weeknd).

So yes: while the fact that I’m writing this in 2015 is deeply confusing, it really does seem like the pop world still can’t get enough of Justin Bieber. Who knew?

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Tim Byron completed a PhD in music psychology, plays in too many bands, and chronically overanalyses everything musical. He has written for Max TV, Mess+Noise, The Guardian, The Big Issue, and The Vine.