Country singer Aaron Lewis has confirmed that his record label shredded pages from his album and used the scraps as protective packing material for Taylor Swift merchandise shipments.

Lewis addressed the incident publicly this week, saying he was stunned by the discovery and that he does not yet know whether the decision was deliberate. No representative for the label has issued a comment on the matter.

The mechanics of the incident are straightforward enough: physical album pages, bearing Lewis's name, reduced to filler and stuffed into boxes destined for Swift customers. Whether that sequence was a fulfillment-warehouse accident or something more considered remains, per Lewis, an open question.

Lewis rose to mainstream attention as the frontman of Staind before pivoting to a country career. His politics and fanbase are not easily confused with Swift's.

The label has not clarified what, exactly, it had an overstock of — or why Lewis's album was the material available.