The Canadian wildfires have produced some truly unsettling images and videos of New York City this week, and Canadian Shawn Mendes was apparently inspired by one of them.
The musician teased his new single, “What the Hell Are We Dying For?,” on Thursday and used an image of the NYC skyline shrouded in orange to promote it. The comments and quote tweets were suspicious of just how quickly this song came together, and why exactly he was using that image.
Mendes’ follow-up tweet that included a link to the song gave off strong The Other Two vibes: “Started writing this song yesterday morning with my friends in upstate Newyork & finished it only a few hours ago..felt so important to me to share with you guys in real time.” Mendes linked to the Canadian Red Cross as well.
“did he really write a breakup song and mask it up as a charity single… he’s so unserious,” said one tweet, referring to reports that Mendes and girlfriend Camila Cabello broke up again this week.
“ur team setting Canada on fire for promo,” joked another commenter.
While there were plenty of jokes, as well as criticism for using a climate disaster as promo, others pointed out that Mendes has advocated for climate action, announcing sustainable practices for his 2022 Wonder Tour. But how sustainable is that smoothie squad?
