Camila Cabello

The pop star on being obsessed with early-aughts pop and why falling for Shawn Mendes was ‘awkward’

- Brittany Spanos

CAMILA CABELLO was thinking about performing her new album even before she recorded it. After playing stadiums in 2018 as an opening act on her friend Taylor Swift’s Reputation world tour, the 22-year-old entered the studio to record her upcoming second album, Romance, with a goal: to record bombastic songs that would sound great live.

“I was really inspired by the big sounds of the Eighties,” she says, jet-lagged and calling from London. “I just liked the drama — like Queen, where everything is so intense. I want these songs to feel amazing to perform.”

While tracks on her self-titled debut tackled her roots, relationships, and establishing herself as a solo artist separate from her group Fifth Harmony, Cabello wanted Romance to be more thematically focused. Helpfully, she fell in love with a close friend, fellow star Shawn Mendes, and channeled the newness of it all into singles like “Shameless” and “Cry for Me.” In her conversation with rolling stone, Cabello covered the love gamut, from Mendes to Sex and the City.

What’s scarier: releasing your debut solo album, or following up that success?

My personality is pretty extreme, so I’m either scared of everything or scared of nothing. With my first album, I would come to the studio super-overly prepared, with every lyric of the song written before I went in and 10 concepts and titles for [the next] songs. But with songwriting, the most magical moments are the ones where you’re not trying.