Mike Posner on Spending the Summer with Biebs and Writing Rhymes for Big Sean
The hip-hop golden boy spills about his upcoming album and impressive collabs.
Teen Vogue: Mike Posner first came on the scene with the 2010 hit “Cooler Than Me,” but after hanging out with the singer/songwriter/producer triple-threat, we get the feeling that very few are cooler than him. He spent the last few months touring with Justin Bieber, dropping a song of the summer-worthy hit with Sammy Adams, and hitting the recording studio with the likes of Big Sean and Diplo for his next album. Really, how can you get cooler than that?
But Mike’s unaffected and unassuming, and instead of telling us about all the famous-person things he and Biebs did on the road this summer, he was way more interested in talking hijinks. Justin is an accomplished prankster (remember that time he Punk’d Taylor Swift?) and his opening acts are never spared. “When I was performing, Justin snuck on stage and was dancing with this mannequin behind me. So, I had to get him back,” Mike explains. “He plays piano on a song, and when his piano was wheeled out, I was on top of it dressed in all his clothes. The full Bieber uniform—glasses, all-white, drop-crotch pants.”
More than just a tour mate, Mike also happens to be the man behind “Boyfriend,” one of Justin’s biggest hits to date. When he isn’t penning songs for himself, the hip-hop insider can we found churning out beats for everyone from Austin Mahone to 2 Chainz to Big Sean, who he’s been collaborating with since high school. “I started out rapping when I was young, and then I started making beats for other people at 13,” says Mike. “I used to make beats for this guy named Sean. Back then he actually went by Sean the Don.” This guy named Sean? Yeah, that’s Big Sean to us.
What can we expect from his forthcoming album, other than a collaboration with—you guessed it—Sean the Don? “A lot of people I wrote and produced for returned the favor and helped me with this album. It has a lot of musicality on it. I’m really excited.” And, suffice to say, we are too.
Side note: Unfortunately, this article fell short. It’s missing some key information, and seems like to me that it was halfway written. Why did the writer not mention Mike’s new single “The Way It Used To Be,” which he dropped over the summer? Or that his new album is titled Pages? Everything in this article has already been mentioned before by others, so there’s nothing new in here we don’t already know.
