Teen Idol: Justin Bieber

Justin Bieber is a Canadian pop musician, actor, and singer-songwriter. Bieber was discovered in 2008 by American talent manager Scooter Braun, who came across Bieber's videos on YouTube and later became his manager. Braun arranged for him to meet with entertainer Usher Raymond in Atlanta, Georgia, and Bieber was signed to Raymond Braun Media Group (RBMG), and then to an Island Records recording contract offered by record executive L.A. Reid. His debut extended play, the seven-track My World, was released in November 2009, and was certified platinum in the United States. He became the first artist to have seven songs from a debut record to chart on the Billboard Hot 100. Bieber's first full-length studio album, My World 2.0, was released in March 2010. It debuted at or near number-one in several countries and was certified platinum in the United States. It was preceded by the worldwide top-ten single "Baby". He followed up the release of his debut album with his first headlining tour, the My World Tour, the remix albums My Worlds Acoustic and Never Say Never – The Remixes, and the 3D biopic-concert film Justin Bieber: Never Say Never. Bieber released his second studio album Under the Mistletoe in November 2011, when it debuted at number-one on the Billboard 200. Bieber released his third studio album Believe on June 19, 2012, and it became his fourth chart topper in the United States, debuting at number-one on the Billboard 200.

Bieber has received numerous awards, including both Artist of the Year Awards at the 2010 American Music Awards and the 2012 American Music Awards, and was nominated for Best New Artist and Best Pop Vocal Album at the 53rd Grammy Awards. With a global fan base, termed as "Beliebers", and over 33 million followers on Twitter, he was named by Forbes magazine in 2012 as the third-most powerful celebrity in the world. He had earned an estimated U.S. $55 million in the previous 12 months. As of May 2012, Bieber has sold 15 million albums. He is also currently the youngest artist to have five consecutive number one albums. (Five in a row and first five albums)

Justin Drew Bieber was born on March 1, 1994, in London, Ontario, at St Joseph's Hospital, and was raised in Stratford, Ontario. He is the son of Jeremy Jack Bieber and Patricia "Pattie" Mallette. Bieber's mother was 17 years old when she became pregnant. His parents were never married, but maintain a close friendship and common goals regarding their son's personal and professional life. Mallette raised her son with the help of her mother Diane, and stepfather, Bruce. In September 2012, Mallette's memoirs, titled Nowhere but Up, were published. The book tells of her early life and her work with her son to pursue a career in the music industry. In her book, as well as in an interview with the Today show, Mallette talked about how everyone around her tried to push her toward abortion, and how she refused to abort her baby. Mallette worked a series of low-paying office jobs, raising Bieber as a single mother in low-income housing. Bieber has maintained contact with his father, who married another woman and had two children. Bieber's paternal great-grandfather was German. Bieber's mother's ancestry is French Canadian. He has stated that he believes that he has some undetermined Aboriginal Canadian ancestry. He attended a French-language immersion elementary school in Stratford, the Jeanne Sauvé Catholic School. Interested in hockey, soccer, and chess, he kept his musical aspirations to himself. As he grew up, Bieber taught himself to play the piano, drums, guitar, and trumpet. In early 2007, aged 12, Bieber sang Ne-Yo's "So Sick" for a local singing competition in Stratford and was placed second. Mallette posted a video of the performance on YouTube for their family and friends to see. She continued to upload videos of Bieber singing covers of various R&B songs, and Bieber's popularity on the site grew.

While searching for videos of a different singer, Scooter Braun, a former marketing executive of So So Def, clicked on one of Bieber's 2007 videos by accident. Impressed, Braun tracked down the theater Bieber was performing in, located Bieber's school, and finally contacted Mallette, who was reluctant because of Braun's Jewish religion; she remembered praying, "God, I gave him to you. You could send me a Christian man, a Christian label!... you don’t want this Jewish kid to be Justin’s man, do you?" However, after praying with her church elders and receiving their encouragement, she permitted Braun to fly Bieber, then 13, to Atlanta, Georgia, to record demo tapes. A week after arriving, Bieber sang for R&B singer/songwriter Usher. Bieber was soon signed to Raymond Braun Media Group (RBMG), a joint venture between Braun and Usher. Justin Timberlake was also reportedly in the running to sign Bieber, but lost the bidding war to Usher. Usher then sought assistance in finding a label home for the artist from then manager Chris Hicks, who helped engineer an audition with his contact Antonio "L.A." Reid of Island Def Jam Music Group. Reid signed Bieber to Island Records in October 2008 (resulting in a joint venture between RBMG and Island Records) and appointed Hicks as executive Vice-President of Def Jam where he would be able manage Bieber's career at the label. At that point, Bieber and his mother moved to Atlanta temporarily, also the home of Usher and Braun, to record and get counseling from Braun. Braun became Bieber's manager.

Bieber's first single, "One Time", was released to radio while Bieber was still recording his debut album. The song reached number 12 on the Canadian Hot 100 during its first week of release in July 2009, and later peaked at number 17 on the Billboard Hot 100. During fall 2009, it had success in international markets. The song was certified Platinum in Canada and the US and Gold in Australia and New Zealand. His first release, an extended play entitled My World, was released on November 17, 2009. The album's second single, "One Less Lonely Girl", and two promo singles, "Love Me", and "Favorite Girl", were released exclusively on the iTunes Store and charted within the top forty of the Billboard Hot 100. "One Less Lonely Girl" was later also released to radio and peaked within the top fifteen in Canada and the US, being certified Gold in the latter. My World was eventually certified Platinum in the US and Double Platinum in both Canada and the UK. To promote the album, Bieber performed on several live shows such as mtvU's VMA 09 Tour, European program The Dome, YTV's The Next Star, The Today Show, and many others.

Bieber performed Stevie Wonder's "Someday at Christmas" for U.S. President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama at the White House for Christmas in Washington, which was broadcast on December 20, 2009, on US television broadcaster TNT. Bieber was also one of the performers at Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve with Ryan Seacrest on December 31, 2009. Bieber was a presenter at the 52nd Grammy Awards on January 31st, 2010. He was invited to be a vocalist for the remake of We Are The World (a song written by Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie) for its 25th anniversary to benefit Haiti after the earthquake. Bieber sings the opening line, which was sung by Lionel Richie in the original version.

"Baby", the lead single from his debut album, My World 2.0, which features Ludacris, was released in January 2010 and became an international hit. It charted at number five on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 and reached the top ten in several international markets. Two promo singles "Never Let You Go", and "U Smile" were top thirty hits on the U.S. Hot 100, and top twenty hits in Canada. According to review aggregator Metacritic, the album has received "generally favorable reviews". It debuted at number one on the U.S. Billboard 200, making Bieber the youngest solo male act to top the chart since Stevie Wonder in 1963. My World 2.0 also debuted at number one on the Canadian Albums Chart, Irish Albums Chart, Australian Albums Chart, and the New Zealand Albums Chart and reached the top ten of fifteen other countries. To promote the album, Bieber appeared on several live programs including The View, the 2010 Kids Choice Awards, Nightline, Late Show with David Letterman, The Dome and 106 and Park. Bieber collaborated with Sean Kingston on his single "Eenie Meenie" which also appeared on Bieber's debut album. The song reached the top ten in the United Kingdom and Australia, and the top-twenty of most other markets. On April 10, 2010, Bieber was the musical guest on Saturday Night Live. On July 4th, 2010, Bieber performed at the Macy's Fourth of July Fireworks Spectacular in New York City. The second single from My World 2.0, "Somebody to Love", was released in April 2010, and a remix was released featuring Bieber's mentor Usher. On June 23, 2010, Bieber went on his first official headlining tour, the My World Tour, starting in Hartford, Connecticut, to promote My World and My World 2.0. In July 2010, it was reported that Bieber was the most searched for celebrity on the Internet. That same month his music video, "Baby", surpassed Lady Gaga's "Bad Romance" to become the most viewed, and most disliked YouTube video ever. It remained the most viewed video until November 2012. In September 2010, it was reported that Bieber accounted for three percent of all traffic on Twitter, according to an employee of the social-networking site.

A 3-D part-biopic, part-concert film starring Bieber entitled Justin Bieber: Never Say Never, was released on February 11, 2011, directed by Step Up 3D director Jon Chu. It topped the box office with an estimated gross of $12.4 million on its opening day from 3,105 theaters. It grossed $30.3 million for the weekend and was narrowly beaten by the romantic comedy Just Go With It, which grossed $31 million. Never Say Never reportedly exceeded industry expectations, nearly matching the $31.1 million grossed by Miley Cyrus's 2008 3-D concert film, Hannah Montana & Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert, which holds the record for the top debut for a music-documentary. Never Say Never grossed a total of $98,441,954 worldwide. The film is accompanied by his second remix album, Never Say Never – The Remixes, released February 14th, 2011, and features remixes of songs from his debut album, with guest appearances from Miley Cyrus, Chris Brown, and Kanye West, among others.

In June 2011, Bieber was ranked #2 on the Forbes list of Best-Paid Celebrities under 30. He is the youngest star, and 1 of 7 musicians on the list, having raked in $53 million in a 12 month period. On November 1, 2011, Bieber released Under the Mistletoe, his second studio album. It debuted at #1 on the Billboard 200, selling 210,000 copies in its first week of release.

In late 2011, Bieber began recording his third studio album, entitled Believe. On February 22, 2012, Bieber announced via Twitter that the first single off Believe would be released in March 2012. The following week, Bieber appeared on The Ellen DeGeneres Show to announce that the first single would be called "Boyfriend" and would be released on March 26th, 2012. The song was co-written by Mike Posner. The song debuted at number two on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 chart, selling a total of 521,000 digital units, the second-highest-ever debut digital sales week. Bill Werde of Billboard noted that it failed to debut at number one because the digital download of the track was available only through iTunes Store, "restricting the buying option for those that do not frequent the Apple retail store." "Boyfriend" became Bieber's first single ever to reach the top position on the Canadian Hot 100 by debuting at number one and staying on for one week.

His third studio album, Believe was released on June 19, 2012, by Island Records. The album marks a musical departure from the teen pop sound of his previous releases, and incorporates elements of dance-pop and R&B genres. Intent on developing a more mature sound, Bieber collaborated with a wide range of urban producers for the release as well as some long-time collaborators, including Darkchild, Hit-Boy, Diplo and Max Martin. Entertainment Weekly praised Bieber's evolution, calling the album both a "reinvention and a reintroduction." Rolling Stone noted the deeper voice and more intense beats found on the album, although it lampooned one of his euphemisms for newfound sexual maturity. Believe debuted at number one on the Billboard 200, becoming his fourth number-one album. The album sold 57,000 copies in its first week in Canada, debuting atop the Canadian Albums Chart.

The Believe Tour, which further promoted the album, began in September 2012 in Glendale, Arizona. On December 14, 2012, Bieber appeared on The Ellen DeGeneres Show, where he announced plans to release an acoustic album titled Believe Acoustic, which is scheduled for release on January 29, 2013. He has stated on Twitter that he will host and perform as the musical guest on Saturday Night Live sometime in 2013.

Justin Bieber has a higher score on the Klout online "influence" scale than Barack Obama or The Dalai Lama. According to Jan Hoffman of The New York Times, part of Bieber's appeal stems from his YouTube channel. Long before he released his EP, My World, in mid-November, the YouTube videos attracted millions of views. Braun recognized the appeal. Before flying him to Atlanta, Braun wanted to "build him up more on YouTube first" and had Bieber record more home videos for the channel. "I said: 'Justin, sing like there’s no one in the room. But let's not use expensive cameras.' We'll give it to kids, let them do the work, so that they feel like it's theirs", recalled Braun. Bieber continues to upload videos to the same channel and has opened a Twitter account, from which he interacts with fans regularly; his account was reported in November 2010 to have more than six million followers. Since then he has been consistently gaining followers at an average of 24,000 per day. The accounts also serve marketing purposes; for example, Bieber's music video for "One Time" only began selling quickly after it was uploaded to YouTube.

Usher comments that while he and Bieber were both signed at the same age, "I had the chance to ramp up my success, where this has happened to Bieber abruptly." As a result, Usher, Braun, Bieber's bodyguard Kenny, and other adults surrounding Bieber constantly coach him on handling fame and his public image. After signing Bieber, Usher appointed one of his former assistants, Ryan Good, to be Bieber's road manager and stylist. Good, once nicknamed Bieber's "swagger coach", created a "streetwise look" for the singer which consisted of baseball caps, hoodies, dog chains and flashy sneakers. Amy Kaufman of The Los Angeles Times comments, "Though a product of a middle-class suburban upbringing in Stratford, Ontario, Bieber's manner of dress and speech ("Wassup man, how you doin'?" or "It's like, you know, whateva' ") suggest he's mimicking his favorite rappers. Bieber is often featured in teen magazines such as Tiger Beat, and has been labeled as a "teen heartthrob". Wax statues of Bieber are on display at Madame Tussauds wax museums in New York, Amsterdam and London. His change of hairstyle in 2010, and the consequent alterations to Bieber products, led to it being called 'the most expensive musical haircut of all time; one company spent $100,000 to fix its dolls for the 2011 Christmas season. Bieber has also been criticized for looking and sounding younger than his age, his teen-pop music, image, and frequent media attention. He has been a frequent target of Internet bloggers and message board posters, notably by users of Internet message board 4chan and users of YouTube. Nick Collins of The Daily Telegraph speculated that "Bieber's character also appears to strike a particularly sour note with his Internet critics, with many remarks commenting on his youthful appearance, his teen-pop songs, his image as a heart-throb to young teenage girls and his manner of speech". Bieber's androgynous appearance has also been frequently noted in the media, including when he appeared on the cover of LOVE magazine's androgyny issue in 2011.

Bieber is a Christian, and said he has a relationship with Jesus, talks to him and that "he's the reason I'm here". Bieber's comments in a February 2011 profile in Rolling Stone sparked controversy. Asked about abstinence, Bieber responded, "I don't think you should have sex with anyone unless you love them." He said he does not "believe in abortion" and that it is "like killing a baby". He described sexual orientation as "everyone's own decision". Bieber has contributed to the It Gets Better Project, which aims to prevent suicide among LGBT youth. Bieber has said he is not interested in obtaining United States citizenship and has criticized America's health care system. Praising Canada as being "the best country in the world", he cited its health care system as a model example. In May 2012, Bieber purchased a 10,000-square-foot (930 m²) mansion on 1.3 acres (0.53 ha) of land in the community of Calabasas, California, a suburb of Los Angeles. Bieber's philanthropic activities have included visiting children's hospitals. In June 2012, the "Music Makes It Better" campaign was released, featuring PSAs by Bieber, Victoria Justice, and The Band Perry. The campaign aims to bring music, arts, and other programs to children while they're in the hospital.

On February 27, 2011, Bieber attended the 2011 Vanity Fair Oscar Party with American actress and singer Selena Gomez, confirming several months of media speculation about a romantic relationship between the pair. In early November 2012, it was reported that Bieber and Gomez had ended their relationship after approximately two years of dating. The couple reconciled later that month. However, in January 2013, it was reported that they had broken up again.

Bieber has come under scrutiny for his controversial relationship with the paparazzi. In March 2011, Bieber was photographed flipping a photographer off outside of his 17th birthday party; however he later released a public apology via Twitter. He was photographed performing the same gesture to photographers again in November 2011 and November 2012. In July 2012, Bieber was pulled over on the Ventura Freeway in San Fernando Valley, Los Angeles Metro by California Highway Patrol, where he was reportedly driving at a speed of over 100 miles per hour (160 km/h) in a 65 mph (105 km/h) zone. Bieber claimed he had been attempting to lose a team of photographers who had been following him. Los Angeles City Councilman Dennis Zine called the incident a "very dangerous, chaotic situation", and called Bieber's driving "careless" and "reckless". Bieber was ticketed for the incident, and a photographer reportedly received four misdemeanor charges, two of which were later dropped. On January 1, 2013, a photographer, later identified as Chris Guerra, was killed while attempting to cross the street after he saw Bieber's car and pursued it on foot to capture an image of him. Bieber had not been in the car at the time.

As of January 2013^[update], Bieber's Twitter account (@justinbieber) is the most popular celebrity account with over 33 million followers. His account acquires one new follower every other second. His popularity on Twitter at one point accounted for three percent of all Twitter related traffic, with a Twitter employee commenting that "racks of servers are dedicated" to Bieber. This resulted in over 180 million page views for the service each month. Bieber was frequently a trending topic on Twitter when the feature first launched because his fans frequently discussed him on the network, and he was named the top trending star on Twitter in 2010; Klout gave his account a score of 100. The size of Bieber's and Gaga's follower bases are cited as a reason why marketers should pay attention to Twitter due to their ability to reach millions of people with a single tweet. 8.3% of tweets mentioning "bieber" were semi-automated and probably Twitter related spam. Research done about Twitter and the 2011 Egyptian revolution includes Bieber as he made tweets about the topic at a time when he had roughly 8 million followers. His multiple tweets resulted in 32,000 responses each, which made Bieber's Twitter account one of the single largest nodes for discussion about the uprising on Twitter.



Source: Wikipedia

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