(Single from album, “Believe”)
What the hell happened here? Security failed to do their job properly, because these two people were allowed to be in the same room together - that or a very insecure telephone recording session is to blame for this abomination...
Straight off , you begin to wish you were dead as an alternative for listening to this, with Minaj's unintelligible 5 year old squawks of "Juuuuusssssttttiiiiiiiinnnnnn" are heard. Then Bieber starts singing. Look, I'm going to be fair, he cansing - but there is no explanation for it anymore; girls can't even get away with calling him cute. He isn't pre-pubescent anymore and talking about a smooch under the mistletoe. No. Now he's 18, covered in bad tattoos as news coverage has unashamedly informed us, and singing about 'showing off' his girl, and how all he needs is a 'beauty and a beat' - this immoral bastard has ditched personality, and now his priorities are loud Skrillex records and a nice rack - charming. To make things worse the 'beauty' is self-proclaimed 'stupid hoe', Nicki Minaj and she's 'looking out for Selena'. Lyrically, its (figuratively) worthy of the death penalty...
Now that's the abrasively awful singers on the track, the bad characters here. How about turning your heads one moment to the geniuses here - the producers. These are the guys whose heads cut open show a mixing deck for a brain, as opposed to glitter. The opening tremolo riddled synth wah-wah is great and then the fatter beats roll in, with a very nicely played bass-line, which is raw and real. There's a music box like tinkling over the top before a kind of typical build/drop section - I say kind of, because its been done very well and doesn't just sound like any old will.i.am effort. Then at 1:15 the amazing sound starts - the dubbywubby bridge section beautifully executed and, perhaps, the best sound from a dance record this year.
I'm not saying that you'd of gotten Muse or Blur to use this - but Scouting For Girls, P!nk, The Killers - even Depeche Mode (with some tweaking) - anyone else could have done something interesting here with this sound - but no, it was wasted on pop music two biggest idiots.
Right now the song has peaked at a pretty mearge-for-Bieber #16 - let's keep it that way...
★
Versions of "Beauty And A Beat"
Album/Single Version - 3:48
Wideboys Radio Mix - 3:53
Wideboys Dub - 6:08
Bisbetic Remix - 6:10
Bisbetic Radio Mix - 3:27
Bisbetic Instrumental - 6:10
Steven Redant Beauty And The Club Mix - 7:22
Steven Redant Beauty And The Dub Mix - 7:22
Steven Redant Beauty And The Vocal Dub Mix - 7:22
DJ Laszlo Body Rock Club Mix - 7:30
DJ Laszlo Body Rock Radio Mix - 3:59
DJ Laszlo Body Rock Instrumental - 7:31