On a balmy evening last weekend in Barcelona, the main stage at Primavera Sound—the blockbuster music festival previously referred to as “Europe’s Coachella”—fell to a hush as smoke began billowing from behind a set of metal scaffolding. The silence didn’t last long. Moments later, six backing dancers began strutting onstage, closely followed by Troye Sivan, in a custom Helmut Lang deconstructed tank top, all delivering high-octane choreography to Sivan’s single “Got Me Started”—and accompanied by a deafening chorus of screams.
“I feel a little overwhelmed, to be honest,” Sivan says of the effusive reception to the show. “It felt like a really big moment for us, and I’m so happy with how it went.”
That performance, however, was just the beginning. For the rest of the year, Sivan will be touring his third album, Something to Give Each Other—one of last year’s most stylish, self-assured, and sexiest pop releases—throughout Europe and the US, first solo, and then as part of the collaborative Sweat Tour with Charli XCX in the fall. “Not to get too big-picture about it, or to sound too wanky, but personally, this has truly been a lifelong dream,” Sivan adds. “This is the show I’ve always wanted to put on.”