Shawn Mendes
“Illuminate”
A
pop singer -songwriter who broke
records with his debut single, Shawn
Mendes was born and raised in Toronto,
Canada. After posting a series of his covers to various video-sharing sites, Mendes
earned himself a dedicated following of
viewers. Mendes was signed to Island records in 2014. Mendes has been
preforming since 2013 to present day.
His music theme is pop. Mendes' first album is 'Handwritten' it was released April
14, 2015. Mendes' song "life of the party"
was entered in the Billboard 100 singles
charts at number 24, making Mendes the
youngest artist to land a debut single in the
top 25. 'Handwritten' appeared to strong
sales, debuting at number one in both Canada and the U.S. 'The Shawn Mendes EP'
reached number 5 on the Billboard charts
on its way toward sales of over
100,000. Mendes has won eight
awards. Mendes' most famous song is
"Stiches.”
Illuminate was released on September 23,
2016. Mendes was the only one who performed on this album, but he had help by
many producers such as; Jake Gosling, Teddy Geiger, Laleh Pourkarim, Dan Romer,
Scott Harris, and Dj "Daylight" Kyriakides.
On the Standard version of Illuminate contains 12 different songs, but as for the
deluxe version of Illuminate 15 different songs. This album is
listed under Pop music. The overall theme
of this album is reassurance. Many of his
songs on this album talk about being honest
and shows us that we shouldn’t be held
back by a bad relationship or
by something that happened in the past,
you shouldn’t let the past keep holding you
back, you should let it all go and focus
on what's ahead of you not on what happened to you in the past.
"Treat you better" was the first single off of
Illuminate. 'Treat you better' talks about
how this girl is in such a terrible relationship
and this girl doesn’t see that, Mendes says
"I won't lie to you, I know he's just not right
for you" which is saying that she should
leave this toxic relationship and go to someone better, someone who won't lie to her,
someone who treats her the way she needs
to be treated. Mendes also implies that he
is what is better for this girl with the lyric
"When you should be with me instead, I
know I can treat you better, better than he
can." When Mendes is preforming this
song he has so much energy and feeling to
project what the song is saying. This song is
giving this girl reassurance that even if she
leaves this toxic relationship, someone will
treat her the way she deserves to be treated.
"Roses" this is the 14th single off of Illuminate, this song is only featured on the
deluxe album. 'Roses' talks about how this
girl is in a different relationship and she is
happier than when she was with him,
Mendes says "but when she's with him, she
seems happier, and I don't want to take
that away" which means even though this
girl who he is still in love with is in a different relationship he still wants to see her
happy. Mendes then says "It's not that
I don't care about the love you have, it’s not
that I don't want to see you smile, but
there's no way he can feel the same" which
implies that Mendes doesn’t believe this
other guy feels the same way he feels towards her. When Mendes preforms this
song he puts so much emotion into the
lyrics to show us what this might feel like.
This song is giving Mendes reassurance
because he says "I got you this rose, and I
need to know, will you let it die or let it
grow?" Which is basically asking this girl if
she will let this 'rose' grow or if she will let
it die, to see if he should finally move on or
keep trying to win her back.
I like this album because it has so much
meaning and feeling in each and every
song, each song has its own story. All of these songs fit together because
they all have some sort of story and a feeling of reassurance if you listen to the lyrics.
As for Mendes he is getting better in his
style. This album is much more mature than
'Handwritten' although handwritten is also
an amazing album, Mendes is getting better
at what he does. If you like + by Ed Sheeran
then you should like this album as well.
Mendes has a mix of Ed Sheeran, John Mayer, and Justin Bieber style all mixed into
one.
-Jessica Guzman
The Growler | 25