In 2023, the last time Troye Sivan released an album (namely, Something to Give Each Other), he was still in his twenties. In between that time, the whirlwind of becoming an even bigger success (although his role on The Idol doesn’t really count as part of that) and touring with Charli XCX at the height of her Brat era has seemed to bring as much wisdom and reflection on She’s the Best as entering a new decade of his life has. And part of that wisdom is the realization that, throughout his life, it is women he has felt the safest and most protected around. Starting with one of his teachers in school who decided to spare him from the shame of another year being forced to participate in the “swimming carnival” (which just means a competition, apparently, that many schools in Australia have) that he was embarrassed by because he was terrible at it and presumed it would “out” him to other boys as being gay for his lack of athletic prowess. To find an exit strategy for Sivan without excluding him entirely from the festivities, the next time the “carnival” came around, she suggested he sing the national anthem for it instead.
And so it is that, from an early age, Sivan can remember women always being a “safe space” for him. Not least of which are his mother, Laurelle, and sister, Sage, who appears in the video (alongside the likes of Nicole Kidman and Sasha Colby) for the album’s title track. Which also happens to open the record as a kind of “pronouncement” of his love for women (an important message at a time when they’re being treated like shit more than ever). The irony perhaps being that he’s a gay man. But then, the deepest love, so often, can only be the kind that doesn’t incorporate sex or sexual tension.
This isn’t to say that She’s the Best is by any means a “non-sexual” record. Quite the opposite really. Especially since the “objective” of She’s the Best, in a sense, isn’t just to show love for the women in his life, but also to conjure up the man of his dreams. In fact, call him Sally Owens (Sandra Bullock) from Practical Magic (another tie to Nicole Kidman) because he is manifesting his very own Gary Hallett (Aidan Quinn). Hence, telling Zane Lowe during his Apple Music interview, “This album is kind of dedicated to this, like, man that I don’t know. To this person that I have never met—or maybe I have and I just don’t, haven’t realized it yet.”
The revelation of wanting—needing—romance/that “someone special” in his life came as a result of the extreme highs of being onstage during the Sweat Tour, followed by the intense lows going home to no one. In a sense, it’s not unlike what Taylor Swift was talking about in Miss Americana after winning the Grammy for Album of the Year the second time: “I remember thinking afterward, ‘Oh my god, that was all you wanted… That was all you focused on. You get to the mountaintop and you look around you and you’re, like, ‘Oh god. What now?’ I just wondered, ‘Shouldn’t I have someone that I could call right now?’” However, that loneliness and sadness Sivan was feeling—and is conveyed on this record—gets tempered by the interspersed “party” sound that he learned only too well how to perfect from spending so much time from Charli XCX.
Indeed, Sivan remarked to Lowe of XCX, “To know her is to be inspired by her.” And yes, she technically did spur the creation of this record by agreeing to do a joint tour with him (as suggested by their mutual manager, Brandon Creed). The very tour that made him feel both “alive” and “ghostly” at the same time. Maybe that’s why Sivan chose to honor Charli on the record by actually having her close out the opening track with vocals that reiterate, “She’s the best/She’s the heartbeat pumpin’ in my chest/She’s the best.”
And another pop star that Sivan clearly thinks is the best is Madonna (who, incidentally, collaborated with Charli on the Afterhours Mix of “Danceteria”). Not just because he samples “Music” in a big way on “Party,” but because, even before that song, there’s track two, “Canada Dry,” which is also blatantly awash in the Mirwais-helmed sounds of the Music album. And yet, it isn’t Madonna that Sivan puts on his “mood board” for the track when describing it to Billboard News, stating, “Something about this track captures a specific feeling in pop music that I love, which is, like, slinky sexy… I feel like Addison does a really great job of it, Janet is sort of the, like, queen of it, Kylie is amazing at it. And these are all artists that I love. This song made me feel, like, slinky sexy [like them].” With regard to that kind of “emulation,” throughout this record, Sivan does what gay men so often do best: imitate women. For, as it is said, “Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery” (which is now rarely completed by its second half, “…that mediocrity can pay to greatness”). And oh, how Troye is down to do that for “Canada Dry,” a song he also mentions as being, “In my head it’s about this, like, hot Canadian man that I’ve met.”
While that’s not very “deep” (no sexual innuendo intended), Sivan works to make it so with his evocative lyrical descriptions that allow the listener to inhabit the same space as he sings, “Jealous of his sweat, it’s in the lead/From his neck down to his chest, down to his feet/Something ‘bout this temperature is ripe for desire/And right for the beat.” Not all of the lyrics are so “coyly” poetic. For example, in another verse, Sivan is more direct with the “warning,” “Better get those eyes up off of me, unless you want it right now on sight” (this sentiment channeling Tinashe on Popstar’s “Nobody Wanna Dance Anymore” when she, too, offers a similar warning in the form of, “Quit starin’ if you ain’t gon’ touch”)
And when Sivan raises the pitch of his voice for the chorus, “Pull me closer now, we’re getting this right/And I wanna sip your body till it’s Canada Dry/‘Cause I see no other way around it, baby, you’re mine tonight,” it makes sense for him to have also said to Billboard News, “I feel very empowered in my femininity in this chorus.” Ah, if only more men (not just the gay ones) could feel that way. The world would be a less violent place. The kind of place where Sivan wouldn’t have felt the need to hide who he was for the first fifteen-ish years of his life, telling Lowe, “Some of my earliest, earliest, earliest memories in my life were, like, of suppression of self, so it’s, like, I think maybe that’s why I pursue self-expression with so much, like, vigor now…” My, how that vigor is expressed in “Party.” Not just the song itself, but, of course, the now legendary music video, wherein Sivan makes ass-eating in medieval times look positively de rigueur.
Incidentally, considering the rather “basic” and repetitive lyrics, Sivan himself called out how many songwriters it took to pull the final product together, including Elvira Anderfjärd and Luka Kloser (who gained greater recognition for co-producing all of Addison’s Rae’s debut album, Addison). But sometimes, it does take many complicated minds to cultivate “simplicity.” A word that itself might apply to the act (and art) of partying, but, like the song, belies how even the most unsophisticated of practices can lead to the most complex “releases.” Or, as Sivan phrased it to Lowe, “[Partying] is something that’s, like, really important to humanity… And this idea of, like, letting loose, I think, is something that’s very innate and, like, required.”
Alas, with the state of the world being what it is, finding the “party spirit” can be difficult for some. Though there are also others who prefer to party all the more in the face of what feels like an imminent apocalypse (as was evidently the case during the debauched days before the fall of Rome). Which is, to an extent, something that the world already endured during the pandemic days of 2020, with lockdowns that found many people forced to reckon with and reassess their priorities. Including Sivan himself, who had something of an “awakening” about how he was still repressing who he was in the public eye, noting to Lowe, “I think that [during the lockdowns] was really when I was like, ‘Okay, you know what? I’m going to, like…I’m not afraid to, like, kind of make some noise and, like, take up some space.’ ‘Cause I always think that’s sort of another, like, side effect probably of growing up in the closet was just, like, not wanting to take up too much space or bring too much attention to myself.”
So it is that Sivan might say “I Do This For You” to the entire gay community. The “this” being “loud and proud,” as it were, and absolutely unapologetic about it. Switching it up a bit from the Music-inspired sound of “Canada Dry” and “Party,” “I Do This for You” instead opts for a more 90s house flavor, thanks to co-production from Sivan, Oscar Görres and, once again, Jack Antonoff (who also co-produced “She’s the Best,” which is fitting considering what a “guy’s girl,” as Lana Del Rey once called him, he is). In fact, the 90s are baked right into the song with an intro pulled from Forest for the Trees’ 1997 single, “Dream.” With Sivan homing in on the lines, “We’re all here in the after-creation/Let’s fly away on a, let’s fly away on a/I’m the first person, you’re the second person/Earlier today, I was in the third person.”
Sivan then dives right into the chorus (as repetitive as the one for “Party”), “I do this for you/I do this for you/I do this for you/I do this for you (whoever you are)/I do/I do/I do this for you/I do this for you.” The “you” he’s doing it for isn’t just the queer community though, but rather, that man he’s still trying to manifest into his life as a romantic “other half.” As he told Perfect magazine of the song, “I’m talking to the guy, whoever he is, and I’m saying, ‘I do this [a.k.a. being a pop star] for you. All of this is for you and for our future life together.’ And the production is really big and bombastic, it feels like you’re at a Janet Jackson [who also once said, “It’s all for you”] or Madonna show or something. But then it breaks down and there’s this moment where it’s like, ‘Find hot singles in the Los Angeles area.’ I sing that a few times. To me it represents that snap to reality where you get off the stage and you go home and, I don’t know, watch porn on your computer or whatever.”
That “find hot singles” part isn’t the only lyrical variation Sivan offers here. There’s also the overly flexing, “Surely can admit, I’m rich, big dick, the shit, I’m it, my baby.” And yet, despite crowing about his “attributes” in this way, it’s clear that Sivan’s desperation to not be alone anymore is radiating off of him, and that’s a deliberate effect he wants to create to get this point across (the same also goes for “Sex Star,” but that’s yet to, er, come).
His intense yearning hardly stops there, with “Cowboy” (which conjures up yet another correlation to Madonna’s Music, with the entire visual theme around it being, what else, “cowboy”) continuing the motif of white-hot desire. Even if it’s for a man who doesn’t technically exist. For “Cowboy” is billed as another “manifestation song,” with Sivan also admitting, “It’s a specific person who, like, kind of like visited me in a dream in a really nice way [read: a wet dream].” And, apparently, the vividness of that dream (like the one Tinashe immortalizes on “Empty Stadium”) is the lyrical gift that kept giving, as evidenced by such steamy verses as, “I wanna feel your shackles against my wrist/I wanna taste the blood on your busted lip/Just a sip [a “Canada Dry” callback], while knees getting blue on the floor/Man, you’re sweet like a tea” (in short, this cowboy does not have what Samantha Jones would call “the funkiest-tasting spunk”).
The slower pace of “Cowboy” compared to the more “party-centric” (a.k.a. danceable) songs before it makes way for the acoustic, melancholic sound of “Embarrassingly.” Another unabashed love and loneliness song that finds Sivan addressing an ex right from the start as he says, “Hello?/Imagine/If all of this never happened/I know, it’s crazy/I’m still so hung up on you [another Madonna reference] and I/Imagine/For you it’s nowhere as massive.” If one were to speculate on which ex Sivan might be talking about, it would be Jacob Bixenman (known of late for his frequent directing work on Miley Cyrus videos), who he even mentions during his Lowe interview, declaring, “He was kind of, like, the great love of my life I would say so far.” This after talking about how he “as a joke” (but not) put Bixenman on a list of photographers he wanted to work with for the editorial shoots relating to this album cycle (while, of course, the cover of the album itself is occupied by a “She’s the Best” video still of Anna Bloda, a photographer herself, amongst other things).
And so, it wouldn’t be entirely out of the realm of possibility for Sivan to be thinking of Bixenman when he sings, “I keep replaying/It’s kinda sick, entertaining/And so amazing/Turning on my iPhone 6S/And taking a step I shouldn’t be taking/I know, it’s crazy/I’m still so fucked up from you/You still come to meet me in my mind/You’ve been out my life for twice the time [and that’s where the math doesn’t quite math for it being about Bixenman, but still…] Adding a bit of wit and wordplay to his sorrow, Sivan later adds, “Find some sort of meditation/Deep inside this masturbation/What a sticky situation/I still love him, dedication.”
However, perhaps if Sivan had found a different boy by now, he wouldn’t still be forced to fixate on an ex for yearning and wanking inspiration. And that’s what “Le Boy” goes back to focusing on: Sivan’s impatience to meet this new love. Opening with an effect that makes it sound like the song is being heard on a tape player, the far-off, almost grainy tone of Sivan’s voice becomes crystal clear by the time he confesses, “I’m getting impatient, baby, ‘cause I/Still haven’t found/Le boy/Le boy.” In spite of his restlessness because of being unable to find this boy who is his “perfect match,” Sivan still expresses his hopefulness to find him (like the prince looking for Cinderella). Particularly around the two-minute-thirty-one-second mark, when the sound of “Le Boy” shifts again. This time to something that feels almost like a tonal mash-up of Blood Orange and *NSYNC as Sivan continues his witchy (but make it warlock) manifesting with, “I was born in love with you/Love sure fresh out the womb/And rest assured, you’re coming home soon.” As for the *NSYNC comparison, it’s fairly obvious that Sivan is meant to be a one-man boy band for the modern era, with his aesthetic and choreo being the closest the 2020s have really gotten to that late 90s/early 00s boy band flair (if one chooses to exclude certain South Koreans from the selection).
And, talking of that period in time, Sivan, in another part of his Lowe interview, cites Amy Winehouse as the one who “really made me wanna write songs,” with Lily Allen getting a nod as well. This emphasizing how he seemed to understand early on just how much women—whether directly or indirectly—were a positive force in his life. With “Sex Star,” one can see the Winehouse/Allen influence in the candidness of the lyrics, some of which were co-written by Finneas. Among some of the cheekier/more direct lines being, “Don’t you thank me/It’s a pleasure for you.” But it’s the opening, “Got a fake tan/And a trainer/Got a six pack/And a trainer/I’m an actor/Entertainer/If you like that/Kind of thing,” that conveys a kind of Lily Allen-esque brutal honesty while still keeping things humorous. “Smiling through the pain,” if you will (or, to quote Allen, “And then I just smile, I go ahead and smile”).
To that point, “Troye Meets World” (which feels like it could be an album title as well) is also part of Sivan’s bid to smile through the lonelier aspects of his lifestyle (no, not being gay—being famous). Or, if not full-on smile, at least see the pros of what comes with fame and the according parasocial relationships. This with the understanding that, as he also mentioned to Billboard News, “…in the kind of moments when I do feel empowered by the way that I kind of, like, get to travel and see the world and meet all of these people and it’s, like, I think that, again, you know, the sort of, like, bringing together of people through music [a.k.a. “Music makes the people come together”] and everything—that is something that I still feel so often and I’m really, really lucky…it’s just not the whole story, I think.”
“Troye Meets World” is “an important bridging song almost on the album” for that reason, bringing Sivan’s traveling exploits into it, and also “because it has the feeling of both sides of [She’s the Best]. Like, I really wanted something that I felt like I could shake ass to it, but I also really wanted to incorporate some of the, like, organic instrumentation. I was like, ‘Okay, shake ass but with flutes.’” And one supposes that, somehow, Jack Antonoff was once again the man for the job, co-producing that sound with Styalz Fuego as Sivan opens with a warped-sounding version of his voice as it sings the chorus, “Music meet body, body meet music/Something about your body makes me wanna lose it/Boy meet universe, Troye meets world/I just wanna play, any boy, any girl.” As for that latter line, it applies to Sivan wanting to take the stage and “give himself” to the world, getting in return the kind of high that can also make the lows feel so much more intense.
Bringing it slightly back to the “She’s the Best” theme (for a few seconds at least), there’s another verse in the song that goes, “And who would’ve thought I like a good time, baby?/Get it from Mom, she passed me down her crazy/Tess in the car, we got her flashing headlights/Get her a bag and she’ll be going all night” (the same, of course, also goes for Charli XCX). Perhaps at some point while tooling around in that car is when Sivan can see “strangers way up high/With their curtains open wide/ We should join ‘em/We should knock/That apartment’s looking hot.”
But, clearly, what looks even hotter to Sivan is being boo’d up…fucking forever. Or “FF,” as he abbreviates that term for the purposes of once more trying to manifest this Prince Charming. In doing so, Sivan romanticizes the quotidian scenarios that many couples might already be taking for granted (including Charli and George Daniel, the latter of whom, sweetly enough, helped co-write this, along with “She’s the Best” and “Cowboy”). And to romanticize it to the best of his ability, Sivan brings back his Lily Allen-inspired songwriting style in describing the things he imagines would happen if he were with this person (think of it as his take on Allen’s “Who’d Have Known” or “Chinese” from It’s Not Me, It’s You): “Put petrol in the car/Let it drip on my sleeve ‘cause you say it smells sweet/Grab the neck of your guitar/In a way that makes me jealous, better play it for me.” It even has that talk-singing way about it that Allen perfected long ago. And, like Allen, Sivan tries not to make things too mushy by using the word “fucking” in it. Nonetheless, Sivan is quite serious when he sings about wanting a love that will be “fucking forever,” further manifesting it with the accompanying video that features him and Felix Mayr romping around in none other than the “gay mecca” that is Fire Island.
And in that visual, there’s a lot of “Love So Big It Hurts” vibes expressed. For Sivan does seem to have so much love to give to another person (instead of, as is the pop star way, giving that love to many other people). Someone he can spend his “off-duty” time with and just be his “true” self—or whatever the closest version to that is when one feels safe enough in a romantic relationship. Without the artifice that tends to go hand in hand with being a Pop Star. Part of what makes this penultimate track feel more standout from the rest isn’t just Sivan singing some of his most vulnerable lyrics of the album (e.g., “Doctor’s suite, pay the fee/Just to buy more time/And I can’t sleep/I’m feeling just like a kid at night…/And I can’t tell you why/I’m all choked up, pull myself together/Baby, that’s alright”). It’s also the fact that, aside from “Le Boy,” it’s the only song on the record that’s produced by one person—in both instances, Oscar Görres. Lending a more noticeable sonic cohesion instead of being, let’s say, a polyglot’s playground.
As for the sound on “Love So Big It Hurts,” it’s awash in the kind of acoustic guitar instrumentation that reminds one of 90s hits like Natalie Imbruglia’s (a fellow Aussie) “Torn” (with just a pinch of The Cranberries’ “Linger” because of the string arrangements layered on as well). And yes, it has the same kind of earnestness as the latter, with Sivan insisting, “If there’s some truth in all that you’re telling me/Love so big it hurts/The biggest that there is on Earth/Try kiss me and I’ll kiss you first.”
The thread of yearning that’s been consistently weaving together the true overarching theme of She’s the Best reaches another peak on the album’s closer, “Lost Time” featuring Lily-Rose Depp. As for that particular feature choice, Sivan commented to Lowe that his only association with The Idol is positive (despite the series’ overwhelmingly negative reviews), because from it stemmed what he calls two “lifelong” friends in the form of Depp and Rachel Sennott. And since the latter isn’t known for singing, Sivan settled for Depp peppering in some of her French phrases throughout “Lost Time” for an effect that, to once more bring Blood Orange in as a comparison, reminds one of his 2013 song “Chosen,” which features an interspersed spoken-word portion from Caroline Polachek doing a French-accented thing of her own as one of her ostensible alter egos, Dossier Brochette.
Sivan’s “trick” here with a female vocal to help him conclude is in service of insisting that the record is all about loving women when, in truth, it seems like he’s biding his time with them until he can find a man to “play house” with. But as Charli once unwittingly said about becoming domestic, “I think I’m gonna die in this house.” Nonetheless, Sivan keeps manifesting and daydreaming with lyrics such as, “Being busy is overrated/Just wanna stay at home and be creative/Just me and my baby making up for lost time, lost time” and “You’re somewhere out there in the ether/And someday soon I wanna meet ya.”
And so, in a sense there is a kind of slap in the face to calling the album She’s the Best while mostly talking about wanting to find a guy that will love him as much as all the women in his life do. But then, that’s the point in its way, innit? ‘Cause even if Sivan doesn’t find “Le Boy,” he’s still got an army of women to “fall into.” Women who will love and support him no matter how lonely it can all seem. Of course, that might not be much comfort to a gay man looking for an ass to call home. But then, maybe Sivan treating love like it should be a fairy tale is the most overt sign that he’s spent much of his time in the orbit of women. Or maybe just too much time watching Sex and the City. For it’s Carrie Bradshaw who declares during the series finale, “I am someone who is looking for love. Real love. Ridiculous, inconvenient, consuming, can’t-live-without-each-other love.” So, too, is Troye Sivan. And She’s the Best is his equivalent of a “Bat-Signal” for that. Or “Troye-Signal,” if you prefer.
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