Justin Bieber delivers sleepy Coachella performance, doomscrolls and watches YouTube videos mid-show

Kathleen PerriconeSun, April 12, 2026 at 2:24 PM UTC

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Justin Bieber performs on the main stage at Coachella 2026Credit: Coachella/YouTube

Maybe it was the 11:30 p.m. showtime, but Justin Bieber was lacking some swag on the Coachella main stage Saturday night.

Dressed in a red hoodie and shorts with rain boots (in the desert, no less), the "Daisies" singer delivered a 34-song set spanning his two-decade career, but heavily favoring tracks off his 2025 albums, Swag and Swag II. In fact, it wasn’t until the 18th song — 50 minutes into the show — that Bieber finally gave OG fans what they came for: “Baby,” his 2010 debut single.

The late-night event got off to a sleepy start, as Bieber opened with Swag’s “All I Can Take” while staring down at a camera, so all we could see was a shadow figure and the stage’s ceiling the entire song.

But the voice was unmistakeable, as the Biebs’ smooth stylings carried us through a no-frills musical journey powered by his laptop (and the energy of a few special guests).

Instead of interacting with the 125,000 people gathered in the Coachella Valley desert, Bieber stayed glued to his screen in-between songs, tailoring his setlist to the real-time feedback he claimed he was getting from an undetermined online chat.

Justin Bieber performs on the main stage at Coachella 2026Credit: Coachella/YouTube

The first guest appearance was from The Kid Laroi, who popped up on a stage opposite Bieber for a shortened rendition of “Stay,” their collab for the Australian rapper’s 2021 mixtape.

But just as the pace stared to pick up, Bieber announced he was going to “slow it down a bit” with an acoustic set of five more Swag songs, culminating in “Everything Hallelujah” during which the camera cut to Mrs. Bieber in the audience as her husband sang the lyric, “Hailey, babe, hallelujah / Baby Jack, hallelujah.” (Alas, it must have been past the 19-month-old’s bedtime because Jack Bieber wasn't at Coachella.)

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Justin Bieber and Kid Laroi at Coachella 2026Credit: Coachella/YouTube

“Baby” kicked off the nostalgia act, in which Bieber pulled up his old music videos on YouTube and played them on a massive screen onstage while singing along like it was a Justin Bieber-themed karaoke night.

Joking aside, there were sweet moments watching the 32-year-old harmonize with his pubescent self to “That Should Be Me” (2010), “Beauty and a Beat” (2012), “Never Say Never” (2010), “All Over the World” (2012), and finally, the 2007 clip that helped him get discovered on YouTube, a cover of Ne-Yo’s “So Sick” at a local talent show.

Bieber then shifted to snippets of two Purpose-era Skrillex bangers, “Sorry” and “Where Are Ü Now” (with Diplo), before segueing to a blooper reel of himself falling offstage during a concert — and then completely down a rabbit hole.

Justin Bieber performs on the main stage at Coachella 2026Credit: Coachella/YouTube

For an uncomfortably long period of time, he sat at a desk onstage and doomscrolled on YouTube, pulling up viral videos on his MacBook such as “Deez Nutz,” “Double Rainbow,” and even his own 2025 paparazzi encounter in which he delivered the instant classic, “It’s not clocking to you that I’m standing on business” — which he awkwardly re-enacted onstage at Coachella.

Bieber brought it back to the Swag albums for his final act: “Yukon,” “Devotion” with Dijon, and “I Think You’re Special” with Tems (the Nigerian singer stuck around for a second song, Wizkid’s “Essence,” which featured her and Bieber on the 2021 remix).

Ironically, Bieber’s liveliest performance was his closing number, “Daisies,” which was punctuated by a fireworks display. “You guys have my heart,” he told the crowd. “I loved spending time with you guys.”

on Entertainment Weekly

Original Article on Source

Source: “AOL Entertainment”