Benny Blanco recently teamed up with Justin Bieber for his emotional ballad "Lonely," and this weekend he's teaming up with our own Maxwell for an interview via Zoom to talk about the collab, what he's been up to and lots more. Check out the highlights and then watch the full #MostRequestedLive interview below.
On working with Justin Bieber and Finneas on "Lonely":
"Me and Justin worked since 2009. I was always a huge fan of Finneas, like since I met him... We worked with Billie once in the studio like 4 years ago, and since I met him there, I was like, this kid is so talented. Justin is such a big fan of Finneas, and it just made sense. The record wasn't as easy as it sounded. When we came together on it, it was such a hard record. Justin was like, 'Man it's so hard to even listen to my voice on this.' He's never shown people that side. He was like, 'Should I even put this record out? I don't know, do people want this from me?' I was so happy he did it, because it was so brave."
On how he decides who he wants to collaborate with:
"Any artist who I'm doing a song with, I gotta feel comfortable having dinner with them with my Mom. I don't really work with people unless they're giving out good energy. I don't wanna work with an a**hole. If I wanted to work with an a**hole, I'd get a desk job. I think the best thing I can do is tell these people's true stories. So many artists are scared, they put on this image, on Instagram everyone's smiling, they're so happy, they're this, they're that... I wanna know what's really happening. So when I sit down with artists... I'm like, 'What's really happening? What's really real?'"
On the concept for the SNL performance of "Lonely"
"So first we were like, we could go in there we could make it big lights, we could do this whole thing. And then we were like, we gotta make it true to the song and true to the video, so we just really wanted to make it feel raw. We're actually showing the rest of the sound stage there, we're just filming Justin. When he went up there, he just was the song. It was just him. It was insane, oh my God, so many little tears. It was a surreal experience, it was great."
Watch the full #MostRequestedLive conversation between Benny Blanco & Maxwell below or on our IGTV.
Watch the video for Benny Blanco's collaboration with Justin Bieber, "Lonely," below.