8 Ways to Tell the Difference Between Shawn Mendes + Charlie Puth

Publish date: 2024-09-21

If you pay a modicum of attention to pop culture, you've probably heard, at least tangentially, about Shawn Mendes and Charlie Puth. Mendes is the internet star turned teen heartthrob behind 2010-era chart hits like "There's Nothing Holdin' Me Back" and "Treat You Better," while Puth is the wild-haired pop whiz responsible for radio staples like "Attention" and "How Long."

Let me preface this by saying there are some discernible, if marginal, differences between the two: Mendes leans more toward starry-eyed, guitar-charged crowd-pleasers, while Puth, at least as of late, has been embracing '80s funk meets R&B-style soft rock. And yet, it somehow feels impossibly difficult to tell them apart.

Both are two affluent, pretty inoffensive white dudes. Both cropped up on the music radar around the same time (Mendes with Handwritten in April 2015, Puth with Nine Track Mind roughly eight months later). And both have released new albums within the last two weeks, each with one gun control-inspired song (Mendes with "Youth," Puth with "Change") and one about the anxieties of newfound fame (Mendes' "In My Blood," Puth's "The Way I Am") that peel back to reveal their more "honest," "authentic" selves. They may not be the same person, but they are almost certainly following the same career trajectories.

So if you, like much of the greater American public, are having trouble keeping track of which one is which, read on for a few tips on telling these two incredibly similar artists apart.

ncG1vNJzZmion6Wws8HSoWWcp51ksKmt0aWgnmWgqsGpedKhmLCmXaKyr7DErGSdoZabsrOxzZycrGc%3D