Demi Lovato‘s fans believe her new song, “29”, will be a controversial one when it’s released with her forthcoming album, Holy Fvck, on August 19. The singer, who recently announced she has gone back to using she/her pronouns, seems to address the 12-year age difference between her and her ex-boyfriend, Wilmer Valderrama, in the new track, which you can listen to here.
The lyrics from the track include the following: “Fibre on the vine / too young to drink wine / Just five years of bleeders, student and a teacher / Far from innocent / what the f*ck’s consent? / Numbers told you not to / but that didn’t stop you.”
The 29-year-old then sings, “Finally 29 / Funny, just like you were you at the time / Thought it was a teenage dream / just a fantasy / But was it yours or was it mine?” While we can’t independently confirm what Demi’s singing about, her fans think she’s referring to the age the now-42-year-old actor was when she started dating him.
She later sings, “Seventeen, 29 / Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh / 17, 29,” which were their ages when they first met.
Demi has talked about her romance with Wilmer many times in the past. She has also noted how he was not interested in dating her until she turned 18. “We shot a PSA together for the 2010 Census forms for Voto Latino. We shot them at his house, so we actually met there,” she told Complex in 2015. “Of course, I was like, ‘Oh my god. You’re so attractive.’ And he was like, ‘You are not 18. Get away from me.’ Then we became really good friends, and he was there for me through a number of situations and breakups and whatever. Then as I got older and we grew closer, it was like, ‘Hey, maybe we should try this thing out.’ We did, and we’ve basically been together ever since.'”
And in her 2017 documentary, Simply Complicated, Demi talked about their age difference when they first met. “When I first met Wilmer he was 29. I met him on January 11 of 2010, and it was at a PSA shoot at his house for the 2010 census forms,” she said. “To be honest, I only did it because I heard it was at his house and I thought he was really cute. I didn’t really care about the census forms. But [when] I met him and I laid eyes on him for the first time, I was in hair and makeup and he came in and sat down and I was like ‘I love this man’ and ‘I have to have him.’ But I was only 17, so he was like, ‘Get away from me.’ After I turned 18, we began dating.”
Demi and Wilmer split in 2016 after six years of dating. And while she revealed in April 2020 that haven’t spoken all that often as of late, he did show his support for her in January 2021, after his animated film, Charming, which she was a part of, dropped on Netflix.