Down-to-earth, yet Troye Sivan’s showmanship is out of this world
“I LITERALLY feel like I’m in The Lizzie McGuire Movie or something,” Troye Sivan gasped last night, addressing a barrage of ear-splitting screams. Mass adoration definitely isn’t a new sensation for Sivan: the 23-yearold has commanded huge audiences since his days as a YouTuber.
Having initially fostered a personal connection with fans via his relatable, direct-to-camera monologues, the South Africa-born, Australia-raised singer has only strengthened that relationship with the open-hearted songwriting on his brilliant second album Bloom. None of that intimacy was lost last night, resulting in an atmosphere that Sivan accurately described as being “like a club show on steroids”.
That went for the show’s staging too, which served up slick arena tropes, such as set t r a n s i t i o n s , c o s t u me changes and choreographed soloing without ever feeling soulless.
In one inspired piece of planning, each audience member was allocated a flower-shaped light filter to illuminate with their phone torch during Heaven. Consequently, a hugely personal song about Sivan’s coming-out experience was accompanied by a rainbow of tissue-paper blooms.
Sivan acquitted himself as a hugely charismatic performer, as magnetic a presence sashaying across the stage during a satisfyingly bassy rendition of Bite as he was stationary on a sofa for tender ballad The Good Side.
Outings of collaborations with Lauv, Charli XCX and Ariana Grande still proved crowd-pleasers even without his co-stars’ presence, and superb nonsingles Seventeen and Postcard were welcomed with the same fervour as the hits Youth and My My My!
Whether singing Happy Birthday to an audience member or explaining precisely how many songs he’d play in the forthcoming encore, Sivan continually underscored how much he values the dialogue he has with fans.
He remains a relatable star, even if in terms of influence and talent he’s in another orbit entirely.