After a four-year hiatus, Justin Bieber made an underwhelming return to the music industry with his 2025 albums, “SWAG” and “SWAG II,” released two months apart. With a whopping 44 tracks combined — ranging from upbeat snapshots of married life to religious spoken poetry — the records provide little more than feel-good walking music.
While Bieber strays from his original pop-centric production style in favor of a refreshing R&B sound, the albums’ smooth instrumentals and catchy beats — as seen in tracks like “I THINK YOU’RE SPECIAL” and “SWAG” — are unable to make up for the projects’ sloppy, hackneyed lyrics.
In “POPPIN’ MY S***,” listeners can observe a perfect example of Bieber reaching for rhymes at the expense of meaningful lyricism: He sings, “I’m tryna make sure that you comfortable, got leather seats / Take you home and bend you up just like the letter C.”
While most of the records’ lyrics lack originality, others stand out as shockingly lazy. In “PETTING ZOO,” Bieber begins by telling a somewhat promising story of not wanting to fight with a significant other, only to lead into the chorus with “I told you that you f*ckin’ with a man (Man) / Yeah I told you I don’t play that sh*t, no cap (Yeah, no cap).”
Other tracks, like “405,” “SAFE SPACE” and “TOO LONG,” repeat the same few phrases to the point of vapidity. Excluding filler words like “uh” and “oh,” “TOO LONG” has under 250 words, and a striking 50% of these make up the phrases “it’s been too long” or “is it too long.” This repetition ultimately begs the question: If a musical team is lost for ideas, why did they need to release 44 songs?
But “SWAG” and “SWAG II” do admittedly have their fair share of decent songs — they’re just buried in the trenches of the albums. With its relaxed, indie-pop sound, “DAISIES” tells a playful story of missing someone through a catchy melody. It’s the perfect song to listen to while driving in the summer, and the chorus makes it easy to get lost in the satisfying acoustic guitar loop.
The song “MOVING FAST” also showcases some of the records’ better storytelling moments. Bieber recounts his fast-tempo lifestyle, singing, “I was speeding towards the wall, I was 25 / Closed eyes, looking for a light, hundred miles riding.” Now, he’s “sick of speeding,” and embraces the idea of living a slower life with his partner — who he thinks will “make a better man” out of him. “Now I roll the windows down and I’m slowing it down for you,” Bieber repeats throughout the chorus.
The combined lengths of “SWAG” and “SWAG II” serve to highlight Bieber’s lack of artistic originality and range. But surprisingly, the records’ enjoyable R&B and indie instrumentals make for a pleasant listen nonetheless.
