Purpose

The acerbic kiss-off Love Yourself feels like an honest stab at subverting the standard breakup ballad, but elsewhere his lyrics are overly concerned with righteousness and keeping things PG-rated.

If Purpose focused on the excursions into global dance sounds that earned him popularity outside the insular Belieber fandom, it might have been one of the best pop records of the year and alleviated some of the headaches induced by his lyrical persona. It certainly doesn't help that Purpose is another entry in an ever growing catalog of big tent releases that relegates some of its best tracks to bonus track status.

A bumpy, oddly compelling restart, Purpose should hook open-minded pop fans who previously paid him no mind, and it could even win back some of those who wrote Bieber off years ago.

The lead-up to Purpose produced three unexpectedly great beats, for Where Are Ü Now, Sorry and What Do You Mean? respectively. Just as unexpectedly, there are even more where these came from.

The musical direction owes much to co-producer Skrillex, whose unexpectedly subtle electronic palette complements Bieber’s affectedly breathy voice. The voice soon palls, but the songs are often interesting.

It’s clear plenty of good choices have been made here. It’s not quite redemption--only time will tell if he’ll curb the recklessness--but it’s certainly a start at reinvention.

You can’t hear The Feeling in his voice, which is still one of the most infectiously beautiful in the industry, because as his faith has saved him from his pain, his production team has saved his voice from Justin. It makes for a series of unbeatable mainstream and crossover singles, and a desensitized, unnerving album.

The album also takes itself so seriously that too often it inadvertently suppresses exactly what made Bieber so appealing in the first place.