Diplo released a new song this week. It’s aggressive, has a mixed bag of features (Rich The Kid, Young Thug, and Rich Chigga), and we’d heard it before. It’s still called “Bankroll,” but its predecessor, released almost a month ago, included Justin Bieber, rapping. We had that for about a day before it was pulled from the platform. The re-release version, with Rich Chigga in place of our current prince of pop—a far less headline-inducing bit of stunt casting—isn’t as compelling.
The original version of the track has been in the works, or possibly finished, for over a year; Thug and Bieber posted snippets of it on social media (all since scrubbed from YouTube) as far back as May 2016. When it dropped it predictably caused headlines: “Listen toJustin BieberRap.”
“That’s the first time I heard him rap,” said Rich the Kid about “Bankroll” in a phone interview with Complex. It was initially conceived at Diplo’s house with Rich, a collaboration between the superstar producer (and occasional Bieber collaborator) and the up-and-coming Atlanta rapper. From there, it evolved into a posse cut, with Rich the Kid passing it to Young Thug. “Some time went by [after the recording session] and then Diplo told me that Justin Bieber liked the song. He wanted to get on the song, so he did the verse,” said Rich. He never worked with Bieber in person; the exchange was conducted over email. “I thought it was dope,” Rich said of the verse.
Bieber is, undeniably, rapping on “Bankroll.” And, arguably, rapping well. It’s hard to categorize Bieber as a good or bad rapper; because it’s Bieber, his presence on a track functions as a sort of black hole for attention—it sucks you in, impairs critical impulses. He sounds comfortable rapping, deploying the confidence that must be second nature for someone who spent their childhood in the spotlight and has possibly lost touch with what they should and shouldn’t be able to pull off. Whatever the reasoning behind it, the results are magnetic. I want to hear Justin Bieber rap more.
Despite that, losing the original version of “Bankroll” isn’t some great tragedy. Justin Bieber is only on the track for about 30 seconds and it does not elevate the overall song to anything greater than mediocre. If you really want to hear it, Diplo made it available for download when he uploaded a new version. It's since been deleted, but the mp3 is floating out there in perpetuity. Its unceremonious removal from SoundCloud, though, raises some questions.
Diplo, for his part, has not made deciphering why the original track was taken down easy. Following its release, he went on a brief retweeting campaign, sharing comments like, “The worst thing I’ve ever heard,” among other disparaging remarks, including one that insinuated Bieber was a bad Christian for rapping. That was as much as a comment as was given at the time for the takedown; some assumed that it was an unfinished track, and the poor response from some quarters ensured its spot on the cutting room floor, or maybe an afterlife as a rarity in Diplo’s live sets.
Then, when he uploaded the new version of “Bankroll” to SoundCloud on Wednesday, it came with a new explanation: “DJ Khaled and Guetta made me take the down the Justin Beiber [sic] version because they had exclusives with him.” Diplo then proclaimed to not give a fuck and provided the download link to the Bieber version of “Bankroll.”
Not long after, though, that explanation was scrubbed and a more diffuse accusation put in its place: “Other artists made soundcloud take down the Justin Beiber version because they had exclusives with him.” The free download link stayed up, but it now leads to a deleted file.
Diplo's explanation is an interesting one. Artist-level exclusives are, to my knowledge, not really a thing? Bieber's label could have a problem with him laying down vocals for everyone at random, sure, but Diplo is pointing specifically at two artists who work exclusively with A-listers as a path to success, It’s hard to imagine David Guetta making the case that Bieber shouldn’t lend his voice to anyone else’s tracks ahead “2U,” their collaborative single that dropped late last night.
And take this passage from Billboard’s recent cover story on DJ Khaled, by Chris Martins, detailing how Khaled convinced Bieber to hop on “I’m the One,” their No. 1 hit. It paints Khaled as distinctly un-Machiavellian:
Picture John Cusack holding a boom box, but with a big-bodied, hirsute man in place of Cusack, and a PA speaker instead of a boom box. This is, essentially, how Khaled won the affection of Justin Bieber and made “I’m the One.” He got the beat from—“Lemme see his name,” says Khaled, checking his phone, “I want to make sure I get it right”—Los Angeles producer Let Me See You (aka Nic Nac). He took out some drums to highlight the groove and suddenly realized he had something worthy of pop’s hook-man of the moment. He and Bieber were longtime pals, but he had been waiting to ask him to collaborate until his own career was on the level, “so I don’t play myself” (a “Major Key” to success). It was early January, his first day in his Beverly Hills mansion, and he made the call. Bieber invited him to his place. “I hung up, jumped in the Rolls and brought a PA just to make sure I presented it right,” says Khaled.
They wound up listening to the track in Bieber’s truck, which, Khaled wonderingly says, “has stars in it, a reclining fur seat, shit like a movie.” The Biebs started bobbing his head. He liked it. Bieber said he’d play around with it. Before Khaled could leave, he made him play ground hockey. “I took the beating for the song,” says Khaled.
Representatives for David Guetta declined to comment, Diplo and DJ Khaled did not respond to requests for comment. SoundCloud also declined to comment—it doesn’t provide information on individual accounts—but the company’s takedown policy typically requires a request from the creator (or rightsholder) for a song to be removed from the platform.
Still, there’s one more thing that doesn’t make any sense, and pushes this into conspiracy theory territory.
Justin Bieber has rapped on an official release precisely once on record in the past few years. The song is “Maria, I’m Drunk,” which Travis Scott made with Young Thug, before sending it to Justin after the two FaceTimed and Bieber expressed a desire to collaborate. The results are intoxicating, and over the woozy, tar-slow, lightly melancholic trap beat Bieber is again the center of gravity (a tough order, next to the compulsively commanding Young Thug).
The odd thing about the song, though—oddball pairings aside—is that it’s unusually hard to find. Though it initially appeared on Travis Scott’s album Rodeo, released in September 2015, it’s not on Spotify, it’s not on Apple Music, and it’s not available for purchase on iTunes as a single song; if you want it to hear it, you need to drop $13 on the whole album. Conventional wisdom at the time suggested that this was a marketing ploy; Justin Bieber was a way to drive album sales by dangling a big name to sell the bigger product. Now, however, it’s two years later, and the song is still not available to stream anywhere, which doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. At this point that’s money left on the table.
It hasn't always been this way. Justin Bieber has a long-documented history of rapping. Most recently, there's his unofficial remix of Kendrick’s “Humble," but it goes back much further if you know where to look. For a brief period of time he was rapping as Shawty Mane, he has a collaboration with Chris Brown that is poorly executed 2010-era party rap, a forgotten 2013 feature on Maejor Ali's "Lolly," a breathy duet with Jaden Smith, and a host of radio freestyles, most notably over Jay Z and Kanye's "Otis" beat.
After 2013, though, the rapping stops. When it does make its way out to the public, Bieber's rapping has led to internet takedowns. If industry gossip is to be believed, there’s a large quantity of hip-hop material from JB still in the vault. Which isn’t surprising in and of itself—he seems like the type, doesn’t he?—but if it’s true, that we’ve only heard it happen on official channels twice in the last few years is...weird. Moreover, the only two times its made its way out to the world, it’s been snatched back. So, if Justin Bieber has been rapping, who doesn’t want us to hear it?
If you’ve ever heard Justin Bieber rap, heard a story about Justin Bieber rapping, or have any conspiracies theories about why Justin Bieber isn’t allowed to rap, contact this reporter at brendan.klinkenberg@complex.com.
