{"id":905843,"date":"2026-05-14T08:33:41","date_gmt":"2026-05-14T13:33:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2026\/05\/14\/justin-biebers-coachella-performance-wasnt-lazy-and-actually-references-50-years-of-music-history\/"},"modified":"2026-05-14T08:33:41","modified_gmt":"2026-05-14T13:33:41","slug":"justin-biebers-coachella-performance-wasnt-lazy-and-actually-references-50-years-of-music-history","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2026\/05\/14\/justin-biebers-coachella-performance-wasnt-lazy-and-actually-references-50-years-of-music-history\/","title":{"rendered":"Justin Bieber\u2019s Coachella performance wasn\u2019t \u2018lazy\u2019 \u2013 and actually references 50 years of music history"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Music <\/p>\n<div itemprop=\"articleBody\">\n<p>After a four-year break from touring, Justin Bieber is headlining Coachella\u2019s main stage. In a controversial section of the show he sang along to YouTube clips \u2013 and at times didn\u2019t sing at all.<\/p>\n<p>Up to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.aol.com\/news\/coachella-numbers-many-people-attend-220000483.html\">125,000 punters<\/a> attend Coachella each weekend. The festival is also livestreamed to an enormous international audience: 5.89 million people subscribe to the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/coachella\">YouTube channel<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Audiences and reviewers argued over whether Bieber\u2019s performance was a clever statement on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.com\/news\/articles\/c75kx5dw395o\">nostalgia<\/a> or a <a href=\"https:\/\/celebrity.nine.com.au\/latest\/coachella-justin-bieber-performance-backlash-from-fans-lazy-youtube-videos-kid-laroi-guest-apperance\/f1b5fc8f-e380-4560-9656-fed51808fe58\">lazy<\/a> display of disrespect. <\/p>\n<p>But, placed in a historical context, Bieber\u2019s performance can actually be read as an interesting contribution to \u201clive\u201d performance.<\/p>\n<figure>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/IYX2QWUKpk4?wmode=transparent&#038;start=0\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen width=\"100%\" height=\"400\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n<h2>Music What happened during Bieber\u2019s performance?<\/h2>\n<p>The controversial section ran for around 20 minutes of the 90-minute set. <\/p>\n<p>Coachella is known for guest appearances, and in other sections of the performance, Bieber welcomed <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/shorts\/inN-CvbjZY4\">Dijon<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/shorts\/UrOwtZ-8jIM\">Tems<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/shorts\/Ff8inlB_OlI\">Wizkid<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/reels\/DXBi3aODg4e\/\">Mk.gee<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/shorts\/I7GvLeV6SWg\">The Kid Laroi<\/a>. Much of the set played out like a typical festival show. <\/p>\n<p>Still, there were early hints at something different. After performing Speed Demon, Bieber peered directly into the camera to shout-out his \u201cliving room\u201d audience, and Coachella\u2019s giant screens showed the chat feed on the festival\u2019s livestream.<\/p>\n<p>When the show approached 50 minutes, Bieber addressed the audience again: \u201ctonight is such a special night, but I feel like we gotta take you guys on a bit of a journey. You guys remember this song?\u201d  <\/p>\n<p>Sitting at a laptop, he typed \u201cbaby\u201d into the YouTube search bar displayed on screen. The <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=kffacxfA7G4\">video<\/a> for his 2010 hit appeared and he sang along, omitting certain lyrics and silently mouthing others.<\/p>\n<figure>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/-xbuEaSQx0Q?wmode=transparent&#038;start=0\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen width=\"100%\" height=\"400\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n<p>Modern performances are increasingly supported by backing tracks, but often attempt to hide this fact. Today\u2019s Bieber, the backing vocalist, sounded far more adult than his high-pitched, former self. It was a duet of sorts. <\/p>\n<p>After the main hook, Bieber cut the song abruptly and revisited the \u201cgoing back\u201d theme: \u201cBut how far back do you go?\u201d He pressed play on 2009\u2019s Favorite Girl and again sang over the chorus before another abrupt ending.  <\/p>\n<p>As he moved quickly through a range of YouTube hits, Bieber apologised only once, not for the backing tracks but for the swift ending to 2013\u2019s Confident: \u201cI\u2019m sorry to cut it but these are just little snippets.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>He played early YouTube cover versions of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/Billboard\/videos\/1611636556772251\/\">Chris Brown<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/reel\/DXCqtvuifLW\/&#038;ved=2ahUKEwiRla3phuuTAxUjQ2cHHVstGPkQtwJ6BAgLEAI&#038;usg=AOvVaw2Bx4SpaX6gEMShCBdwr7SC\">Ne-Yo<\/a> songs, then his commercial hits Sorry and Where Are \u00dc Now.<\/p>\n<p>After feigning a wifi dropout, the focus switched to pop culture references: a blooper reel included footage of young <a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/reels\/DGOG_XqM67V\/\">Bieber walking into a glass door<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=ILSxJZ3qoxQ\">falling through a stage floor<\/a>, followed by a more recent <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/shorts\/X2qW4WZLJDc\">rant about paparazzi and privacy<\/a>. <\/p>\n<p>As a producer of live-shows and researcher of performance technologies, I was fascinated and entertained. I\u2019m hardly a <a href=\"https:\/\/justinbieber.fandom.com\/wiki\/Belieber\">Belieber<\/a>, but I liked how this performance challenged expectations around \u201cliveness\u201d. <\/p>\n<figure>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/LvStLe4R1us?wmode=transparent&#038;start=0\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen width=\"100%\" height=\"400\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n<p>I wonder if the \u201clazy\u201d reviewers realise that every pause and anecdote in this section was likely rehearsed, and that the on-screen \u201ctyping\u201d was produced in advance? There is too much at stake in a performance of this scale to leave it to chance. <\/p>\n<h2>Music What makes music \u2018live\u2019?<\/h2>\n<p>There is a long history of artists interacting with their recorded selves and confusing the audience. <\/p>\n<p>In 1967, The Doors <a href=\"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.4324\/9781003031314\">brought a television on stage<\/a> to watch themselves in a pre-taped variety show performance. In the next decades, Kraftwerk presented themselves as <a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/reels\/DTGhi6KjnT9\/\">robots rather than virtuosi<\/a>. In the 21st century, Deadmau5 exposed conventions for <a href=\"https:\/\/www.musicradar.com\/news\/dj\/deadmau5-we-all-hit-play-550353\">pre-recorded festival sets<\/a> in electronic dance music.  <\/p>\n<p>In using pre-recorded or sequenced audio in place of playing their instruments live, these artists played with audience expectations about what is seen and how it connects to what is heard.   <\/p>\n<p>As a child, I watched Natalie Cole\u2019s 1992 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=1Xi2SWRyduM\">Grammy performance<\/a> alongside her deceased father, Nat King Cole. My parents found it moving, I found it creepy. <\/p>\n<p>Other duets with the deceased include a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=uJE8pfPfVRo&#038;list=RDuJE8pfPfVRo&#038;start_radio=1\">hologram of Tupac Shakur<\/a> \u201cperforming\u201d at Coachella in 2012 and a hologram of Maria Callas \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/theconversation.com\/a-long-dead-soprano-has-taken-to-the-stage-with-the-melbourne-symphony-orchestra-are-holograms-the-future-219716\">singing<\/a>\u201d with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra in 2023. <\/p>\n<p>These holograms offer access to otherwise inaccessible performances and attempt to keep the past alive. <\/p>\n<p>In a way, the Bieber performance attempted something similar as he engaged directly with his own past performances. <\/p>\n<p>He not only called upon pre-recorded materials, but his own viral history. His self-referential performance was directly inspired by online cultural consumption. His interaction with YouTube was relatable and human, rather than detached and lazy. <\/p>\n<h2>Music YouTube and performance<\/h2>\n<p>As a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theage.com.au\/politics\/victoria\/the-man-in-the-cage-15-years-inside-melbourne-s-most-famous-nightclub-20251027-p5n5le.html\">DJ<\/a>, I first became aware of YouTube\u2019s impact on the presentation of performances through the emergence of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/boilerroom\">Boiler Room<\/a>, a channel that shows videos of DJs performing while surrounded by punters. <\/p>\n<p>Eventually, the optics of these videos informed how clubbing might look: nightclubs and festivals configured \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/prosoundlighting.com.au\/videos\/1415392399478303\/\">Boiler Room setups<\/a>\u201d, with DJs surrounded by a dancing audience instead of elevated and separated. <\/p>\n<p>Despite encouraging a generation of overt posers, it showed how what we see online influences what is presented on stage. <\/p>\n<p>Bieber takes this thinking to a much larger audience, demonstrating real engagement with his presence in pop culture online. In turn, how we react to this performance might inform future live shows.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/theconversation.com\/justin-biebers-coachella-performance-wasnt-lazy-and-actually-references-50-years-of-music-history-280463\" class=\"button purchase\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Music After a four-year break from touring, Justin Bieber is headlining Coachella\u2019s main stage. In a controversial section of the show he sang along to YouTube clips \u2013 and at times didn\u2019t sing at all. Up to 125,000 punters attend Coachella each weekend. The festival is also livestreamed to an enormous international audience: 5.89 million [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":905844,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[131522],"class_list":{"0":"post-905843","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business-news","8":"tag-podcast-music"},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/905843","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=905843"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/905843\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/905844"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=905843"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=905843"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=905843"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}