Shawn Mendes says he’s ‘just figuring out’ sexuality

Singer Shawn Mendes opened up about his sexuality during a performance in Colorado on Monday, saying he’s “just figuring it out like everyone”.

“I don’t really know sometimes and I know other times. It feels really scary because we live in a society that has a lot to say about that,” he told concert-goers.

According to fan footage of the concert posted on social media, Mendes made the comments before performing an unreleased song which seems to be inspired by how speculation about his sexuality made him feel.

The Canadian singer has previously criticised such speculation, calling out its intrusiveness.

Speaking during the performance Morrison’s Red Rocks Amphitheatre, Mendes said he had “thought about this for a minute today if I was gonna say something tonight”.

Cheered on by the crowd, he continued: “The truth is that I didn’t get to do a lot of 15-year-old things and discover parts of myself that you do at 15.”

He continued: “There’s this thing about my sexuality, and people have been talking about it so long”, adding that it’s “kind of silly, because I think sexuality is such a beautifully complex thing, and it’s so hard to just put into boxes.”

“It always felt like such an intrusion on something very personal to me. Something that I was figuring out in myself, something that I had yet to discover and still have yet to discover it.”

“The real truth about my life and my sexuality is that, man, I’m just figuring it out like everyone.”

He went onto speak about his unreleased song The Mountain, which includes the lyrics: “You can say I’m too young, you can say I’m too old, you can say I like girls or boys, whatever fits your mold”.

Mendes told the crowd it was important to write that new song because “it felt like a moment where I could address it in a way that felt close to my heart”.

“And I guess I’m just speaking freely now, because I just want to be able to be closer to everyone and just kind of be in my truth,” he added.

In a 2018 interview with Rolling Stone, Mendes spoke about “this massive, massive thing for the last five years about me being gay”.

The next year, he told the Guardian speculation had been “hurtful… I get mad when people assume things about me because I imagine the people who don’t have the support system I have and how that must affect them”.

Mendes has had a number of chart-topping hits in the UK, US and Canada, including the single Señorita, which he released with Camilla Cabello – whom he also previously dated.