Read Online Justin Bieber by Justin Bieber - Free Book Online Page B

Def Jam – that was the Holy Grail. We’d really be on our way. I couldn’t let myself think about it too much or I’d have been totally psyched out.
    I’d seen the movie August Rush a few days earlier and loved that part where the kid is playing that crazy slap-style guitar with the guitar lying down flat, and he’s wailing on it like it’s a guitar and drums and piano all at once. (Check it out on YouTube. It’s sick.) I channeled all my nervous energy into figuring out how to do it. The morning of the meeting, I couldn’t keep still. I was slamming away on that slap-style guitar, and Scooter shot a video of me so we could throw it up on YouTube and share it with my fans.
    In the car on the way to the meeting, I was still slapping and drumming on my lap, humming, making bad jokes, driving Mom crazy. Finally we were walking into L.A. Reid’s office withChris Hicks from Def Jam, a man who was to have a big part to play in shaping my career and who has supported me every step of the way. L.A.’s office was like a cathedral – if a cathedral had cigars on the table. The walls were covered with pictures of music history: him laughing with Stevie Wonder and Lionel Ritchie, him at the Grammys with one gigantic hit maker after another, him shaking hands with President Obama. Huge windows look out over New York City. The sofas were white as piano keys. I was afraid to sit down.

    L.A. Reid is totally the most suave individual in the world. His designer suit was sharp enough to put your eye out. He said, “C’mon in. Nice to meet you, young man.”
    He sat behind his desk, which was bigger than Grandpa’s car. Scooter and Usher pushed seats out of the way, and I stood in the middle of the room with my guitar and sang a couple of songs. Scooter said, “Do the August Rush thing.”
    I did that too, and then I stood there waiting.
    Finally, L.A. said, “Wow!”
    He picked up the phone and made a few calls. In about thirty seconds, six more people came in and sat on the white sofas.
    “Do it again,” he said, and you better believe I did.
    We thanked everybody. Everybody thanked us. They left. Then we left. I guess, if life was a movie, the director would say, “Cut, cut, cut. There has to be more to it than that. Where’s thedrama? Where’s the big moment?” But it just doesn’t work like that. The way it works is you go to these meetings, and then you go home and wait and wait and wait... and still wait for the phone to ring until you hear that you’re going to take the next small step forward. Or not.
    “Island Def Jam wanted to sign me. I was on top of the world.”
    Mom and I went back to Stratford, jumped out of our skin every time the phone rang, and finally – finally – got the amazing news we’d been waiting for. Island Def Jam wanted to sign me. I was on top of the world, but Scooter said, “Keep your shirt on. This is huge, but we’ve got to work through the details before we celebrate.”
    It would take another whole book to try to explain the business side of all this, but Scooter wanted me to understand it, so he made me sit in. Didn’t matter if I was falling asleep, tapping my feet, going insane from boredom, he wanted me to know what was going on. There was only one thing I really wanted to know: “Do I get a tour bus?”
    “Eventually,” said Scooter. “I definitely see that down the road.”
    “Yes! Will the bus have an Xbox?”
    Scooter laughed and said, “That’s the dream.”
    Long story short, the paperwork was finally worked out,and Mom and I flew to Atlanta. The night we officially signed the deal with Def Jam, Scooter took us all out to Straits, this restaurant owned by Ludacris. Scooter’s other artist Asher Roth and his buddy Boyder came along, and kept teasing me about toasting with ginger ale while everyone else had champagne and how they could still beat me playing Rock Band and Guitar Hero, even if I was in the big leagues now. Asher was really blowing up huge on the