Brian Ziff“In My Blood” is not only the first single from Shawn Mendes’ upcoming album, it was the first song he ever wrote for the album.
In a new interview with Billboard, Shawn explains the magical process of how the tune — which shows a more vulnerable side of the singer — came together.
“What we kind of started doing for this entire album was we would just spend time talking about what it was I wanted to talk about, instead of just diving in and trying to find what to talk about,” Shawn says.
Shawn wrote the song with Teddy Geiger, Scott Harris, Geoff Warburton and George Seara at a Malibu studio called The Woodshed. The studio was located on a cliff with views of the ocean. Shawn explains that his cure for writer’s block would be to go outside and stare at the ocean until an idea struck.
“For some weird, magical reason, something always did,” he says.
Shawn says they sat outside for about an hour and came up with the concept for the song. The lyrics — which delve into Shawn’s struggle with anxiety — and the track’s guitar-driven instrumental part came together shortly after and the song was done by noon that day.
Shawn says he was nervous for his manager and other team members to hear it, but once he hit “play,” he says, “Everybody in the room was kind of just, like, emotionally blown away by the song and the concept and the feel, and after that it was kind of, ‘Let’s roll, we got this thing.’”
Shawn Mendes: The Album comes out May 25.
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