Stepping into a decadently decorated room fit for a King, the Australian pop icon sits self-composed amongst candles and tables draped with cloth and laden with wine, grapes and cheese. During the time we were sat down with him, Sivan was relaxed and soft-spoken, sipping a sparkling apple juice – a complete contrast to his wild and unruly attitude just a few hours later at the launch party of his new single, where he jubilantly exclaimed that there was a ‘free bar!’ and danced in the middle of a crowd of excited partygoers cheering him on.
This duality is exactly what Sivan captures in his fourth studio album, ‘She’s the Best’, a set of songs that give listeners a viewing platform into the last few years of his life – partying, feeling a sense of longing, performing in front of screaming crowds and then dealing with the wave of loneliness that came afterwards.
Sivan looks at his albums as “diaries that come out every few years”. In his 2015 debut album ‘Blue Neighbourhood’ he addressed his teenage years spent navigating his sexuality and first experience with love, ‘Bloom’ detailed his first serious relationship and 2023’s ‘Something To Give To Each Other’ saw him embracing his sexuality and relishing human connection.
His fourth diary entry, ‘She’s the Best’, is an honest account of his late twenties where he really began experiencing the perks and downfalls of fame after becoming a bigger name in mainstream pop. Despite being on the music scene for years, Sivan reached superstardom in 2023 with the release of the memorable ‘One Of Your Girls’ music video featuring Ross Lynch and the iconic 2024 Sweat Tour with British pop party girl, Charli XCX, culminating in a couple of Grammy nominations.
“It follows the last three years of my life which include some really high highs, and then, underneath it all, is this deep sense of longing [for love]. I’m really excited for people to hear the whole thing. My goal is always to be super honest, and that’s what I’ve done here. I think that the album will give a good sense of the whiplash of going from the stage to the hotel after.”
“A lot happens between albums in my life. It’s important to me that people understand the last couple years of my life.”
The announcement of Sivan’s fourth album landed in August, accompanied by the release of the title track, ‘She’s the Best’, and its visually rich music video starring fellow Aussie, Nicole Kidman. In the title track, Sivan is an observer, dissecting someone else’s behaviour instead of putting himself under the knife – ‘she always knew she had something special inside / she takes down an incel on the internet / when she just needs a little unwind.’
Sivan confesses that ‘She’s the Best’ is an “outlier on the album” because of its inspiration coming externally rather than from within – “it’s the one time where I look outward. A lot of the album is super internal and longing for this person or being on stage and having these bombastic moments that feel twisted still”.
Despite the “outlier” status, Sivan felt it was important for ‘She’s the Best’ to be the representative for this new set of songs as time spent amongst feminine energy was “the one moment where [he] had relief” from the turbulence of fame and the feelings of loneliness.
“I wanted to name the album [‘She’s the Best’], to honour the fact that [the feminine] is the one constant in my life. You’ll hear that the album is such a journey, and to arrive at that place in the songwriting process was such a nice moment for me and something that I wanted to draw more attention to. So that’s why I put it first.”
The second taste of his new album comes with the arrival of ‘party’, a dance track with simple and repetitive lyrics that truly come to life when played on the dance floor. In a dusky, intimate venue tucked away in the West End, Sivan gears up for the release of ‘party’, fittingly welcoming it into the world with a rowdy Smirnoff sponsored bash, endless drinks and a dramatic unveiling of his music video.
Being a party animal is part of Sivan’s genetic make-up, but it’s obvious that partying is more than just dancing and drinking to him – it’s about human connection.
“When you’re partying, you hear music in a different way. You feel light and heat in a different way. I just think it’s so beautiful. If I think about my favourite times when I’ve been partying, I almost get emotional in those moments because I’m like, ‘wow, this is so beautiful’. Humans gathering to listen to music and to let their hair down and everyone just being so connected – I think it’s really special.”
Reminiscing on his most poignant memories from parties past, Sivan shares that there is “a recurring moment” that happens to him – “even without any sort of substance whatsoever, I can get to a point at a party where it just tips into this new level of bliss for me where I’m like ‘wow music is so amazing, people are so amazing. Who knows what’s going to happen?’ I have that moment pretty often actually.”
Starkly contrasting the track’s contemporary electropop sound, the music video is set in medieval times featuring horses, castles and Sivan as a knight. This combination seems incredibly mismatched – the track is so drastically different from this time period that medieval citizens would think the world was ending if they heard it – but there is actually a meaning behind the peculiar match.
The music video being a period piece was a carefully considered creative decision by Sivan who sees partying as “so important and innate to human nature” and believes that “surely we’ve always done it in some capacity” – even amongst moats, armour and baileys.
Before the four minutes of medieval carnage commences legend makes an appearance via voiceover. At first glimpse, it seems like a bizarre cameo, but McKellen’s contribution was another thought out creative decision made by Sivan who “filmed a video explaining the idea and got it over to him [McKellen].”
Ian McKellen isn’t just an excellent actor, he’s a fundamental and inspirational member of the queer community. Having come out publicly in the late eighties, in spite of hostile attitudes towards his sexuality, McKellen has since spent his life loudly advocating for LGBTQ+ rights, even co-founding the LGBTQ+ charity, Stonewall. McKellen is an influential figure to Sivan who met him when he was just fourteen, during a “pivotal time” in Sivan’s life when he was “about to come out of the closet” to his mother. To Troye, Ian McKellen is not just a “queer icon”, he is “someone who paved the way and showed generations below him how to be a happy and successful queer person.”
Partying holds an important place in the queer community, with Sivan stating that “queer nightlife is the first time for a lot of people where they can go to a space where they’re not the minority, and they feel like they can really let loose and relax for the first time in their life.” So, McKellen’s inclusion in the music video for Sivan’s ode to partying is not just a random cameo, it’s a firm nod to the LGBTQ+ community.
Sivan’s sound evolution has come a long way since he released his hazy synth-pop debut album, ‘Blue Neighbourhood’, just over a decade ago. Ten years on and he has experimented with genres and landed on a sound that feels authentically him, confessing that he feels “more free” in his music career than he ever has. Although ‘She’s the Best’ is uncharted territory for Sivan, having dubbed it “very experimental” for him, there are still some distant echoes of his musical past in the fabric of the tracks.
After wincing over his teenage-selfs vocals, stating he had a “blocked, stuffy nose” due to a sinus problem he has since “fixed”, Sivan expressed that he hears some elements of his first album in ‘She’s the Best’ – “there’s moments on this album that feel quite blue-neighborhoody, I would say. Maybe it’s because it was a time in my life where I was feeling very sensitive and I feel the same way now”.
This sensitivity is a running theme in his new album, with his self-proclaimed favourite track being the unreleased ‘Sex Star’, a exposed track about “all about the attempts to mould and change myself to make myself more appealing so that the man of my dreams hopefully shows up”.
Troye Sivan’s fourth diary entry, ‘She’s the Best’, is out on October 9th. Equal parts fun and vulnerable, this collection of songs express the duality that shrouds his life and is set to carve Sivan’s name deeper into the walls of pop music history.
Troye Sivan will release ‘She’s the Best’ on October 9th.