Neil Hagerty was born in Baltimore, Maryland. He is a composer and guitar player represented by Drag City, Inc. His written work has appeared in many periodicals, including Index, Raygun, Comics Journal and The Lowbrow Reader. Public Works, a collection of his articles and essays, was published by Drag City Books. He currently resides in Denver, Colorado. You can follow him on Twitter here.
Gifted castrati were always a precious set. Living above common humans and apart from gender they could demand much and were given all in exchange for the presence of their voices, their unbroken voices. Yet, they were simultaneously looked down upon, regarded as ill-formed and ignorant beings. This ideal still remains among our desires, beautiful and tantalizing — illicit like the dish of the rare ortolan bunting: force-fed in the dark, drowned in Armagnac, roasted and eaten whole.
The relationship between the creature and the consumers of the creature’s flesh is at the heart of Justin Bieber’s new album. On this subject he is an unassailable authority. In this audio recording he both demonstrates and speculates about the worth of his voice. What is his role in our lives? In our economy? What can he do and what can he have? It is, above all, a detailed analysis of the value of his voice — to the listener and to himself.
The voice is lonely and isolated but at the same time demands to be regarded — demurely, yes, but the voice is surrounded and trapped inside a dome of melody and rhythm constructed from itself asking again and again for proof of humanity, evidence of trust, a definition of faith. The voice has demanded the company of uncluttered purity, FM synthesis — constancy along the path of wayfaring through opaque universes of achievement in search of sustainability. The voice wants to know if a life’s mission to deliver happiness and pleasure is enough. Is it enough for him? Is it enough for us? By building itself with fragments of Bieber as constituent parts, the music allows only that there is but one question the listener is called to answer.
Occasionally, he is confused by resistance. Someone has told him there are limits to what he might have, suggested to him that although he can have everything, perhaps he should want nothing. There is a sadness, for he is aware that physically, the most he can give to another is a moment to share some of his light. What they do with that, he seems to be consistently disappointed in — and that is predictable to him, judging from the skeletal lack and emptiness of the musical array encircling his voice. It is pleasurably cold and austere. This bitterness seems youthful, however, naïve and not chronic. Unknowingness is part of what makes the magic act. Confusion in one moment balanced immediately by a return to confidence through the gift of his own voice, one bent glissando that is his private mindfulness bell.
But then he is abandoned again when the music refuses to walk behind him as he succumbs to another mood. The music, the production and arrangements have a secondary function beyond his concerns; we cannot forget that. The function of the musical backdrop is a little more grounded in raw economics, earthbound. And all through the entire recording, the frequency range that sounds fantastic through an iPhone is relentlessly full, like the beautiful warm edge of the sea beyond which it is feared that the ocean floor might drop away to inhospitable depths. Wisely, the personality is presented in dissected samples, a deck of Justins, a set of swatches in every realistically useful hue. The absence of contiguity is intended to allow listeners a space for their own vulnerability to safely emerge without being overwhelmed by the elusive majesty of the special creature possessing the voice.
There can be strength and pride in vulnerability when this voice is a warrior for it. That is part of the bargain too, part of the negotiation for the proper distance: it is clearly stated in the songs that the voice can be smothered — history shows that — but also that our lives seem to be about learning that again and again. The lesson will be forced upon us every day, and an open heart can be inspired by the voice as it illuminates a path through all the scenes that might confront us, advising us never to stray too far from what we know to be true about ourselves, not to put ourselves into uncomfortable postures we can’t sustain — it cautions us not to try to possess the voice for ourselves but rather to let it guide us, let it protect us like a quietly fierce Canadian ice wall erected temporarily and on-demand for a moment of peace and clarity as its gift to us.
With Purpose, Justin Bieber has clearly justified himself and acquitted himself of many future accusations and psychic incarcerations for a period of time, the duration of which will be equal to how long the desire to literally consume his flesh remains satiated by this work, before the intensity begins once again to elevate beyond his control.
