Justin Bieber's manager warns star to 'be better' or 'quit the music business'

Producer Scooter Braun (left), Justin Bieber and Usher. Photo / AP

Justin Bieber's manager says he has warned the singer to rise above his critics and be "better than they are" or else he has to quit the music business.

Scooter Braun, the man credited with discovering the 19-year-old singing phenomenon, says that Bieber gets "so angry" about the negative publicity that he has attracted of late.

"We've talked that sometimes he doesn't help himself because he's so angry about it," he tells the March issue of GQ. "But no one really understands what he's living [through], only him."

The singer, who seems determined to make the transition from sweet, smooth-faced child star, to a gym-sculpted "bad boy" musician, was arrested in Florida last week for drag racing a yellow Lamborghini sports car. He also admitted to police that he had smoked cannabis and had drunk a beer.

This came after being accused of fighting with paparazzi, taking up graffiti when on tour in Australia, throwing eggs at a neighbour's house and been photographed leaving a Brazilian brothel.

Which all goes slightly in the face of Braun's dream that Bieber could be "better" than all his detractors, and not resort to violence.

"I think to help him get through that I have to hold him to a higher standard," added Braun. "I can't baby him, I can't tell him, 'You know what you deserve, to say f*** everybody, this is unfair.' I can say there is only one way around this, either we quit and let you try and find a normal life or you realise that this is what this is and we've got to keep fighting.

"And you're going to hate me some days because I'm going to say you can't throw a punch. You want to go out there and you want to bash their heads in and say this isn't fair; you want to say you don't know me. But the only way you're going to win them over is by being better than they are.'"

Bieber will also have to win over the tens of thousands of people who have signed a petition describing the Canadian singer as a "dangerous, reckless, destructive" force and called for his expulsion from the US.

But one person supporting him is Aerosmith singer Steven Tyler, no stranger to the sort antics and behaviour often prefaced with the phrase "rock star".

"You know I called Justin this morning," he told fishwrapper.com. "I said: 'Justin, let me ask you a question: Were you sitting next to a gorgeous woman?'

"He said 'yeah'. I said, 'Were you in a yellow Ferrari?' He said 'yeah". I said, 'Are you the biggest pop artist in the world right now?' He said 'yeah'. I said, 'That's cool.'"

The interview comes as news of Justin Bieber's Valentine's Day court date has been revealed.

The star will appear in front of a Miami Dade County judge in South Florida on 14 February.

- Independent