Shawn Mendes is speaking about how Camila Cabello influenced his newest record, Wonder.
The Canadian artist stars on this month’s cover of British GQ, after the outlet crowned him their Solo Artist of the Year.
GQ describes Wonder as “a record that manages the impossible feat of being both emotionally honest and more extravagantly sexy than any he’s put out before.”
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.@ShawnMendes' Wonder is a record that manages the impossible feat of being both more emotionally honest and more extravagantly sexy than any he’s put out before. #GQAwards @HUGOBOSS #BOSSxGQAwards #GQAwardsAtHome #BOSSBOTTLED #SuitedByBoss https://t.co/YoC9xSTJXc
— British GQ (@BritishGQ) November 26, 2020
The “Señorita” singer credited his equally talented partner for the support she gave him while creating the record.
“You have a choice to either open up and be very vulnerable or to be locked down and not show her anything,” he said.
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“There are so many instances during making an album when you want to drop an idea because it’s stupid or it’s not sounding great. And it does! It sounds stupid and doesn’t sound great for some weeks. But then it comes out on the other end and ends up being everything you wanted it to be. And you need a support system. And I had support from her, which was different from any support I’ve ever felt before.”
Mendes also gave some insight into a song from the album that was inspired by Cabello.
Discussing “Song for No One,” he explained, “I wrote it three years ago, and it was before any conceptualization of this album. It was after three days of striking out, and we gave up the room. I started playing this really eerie guitar part, super small.”
He added, “The whole thing is really sad; [I was] not with Camila at the time. I was a little hungover and wishing I was with her. The producer I was with was like, ‘Okay, keep this, I have this grand idea for it.’ Next thing I hear, it goes from this beautiful minor progression string swell to this massive ’60s fill, and opens up into a major progression with horns and string and harp parts, and it’s like the drops open…I don’t know what it is about that one, but that one, in particular, gets me.”
He also revealed he’d begun to absorb Cabello’s attitude.
“So strong, so clear and confident with her [body] and so articulate and empathetic about other people’s,” he said, “and it really changed my view of mine. It really changed my life.”
He had come to realize, he added, that “taking that extra few hours of sleep, instead of waking up to pump iron, is a better choice sometimes.”
In the interview, Mendes also reveals how the pandemic has allowed him the opportunity to slow down and experience the kind of normalcy that just wasn’t possible before.
“I [was able to] have a routine, watch a movie nightly with family, do the dishes, stuff that sounds pretty mundane, but actually… when you’re living in a hotel room, you never do laundry,” he explained.
