It’s official: Pride Month has come early. Troye Sivan’s third studio album, Something To Give Each Other is out now, and it’s another masterful exploration of the highs and lows of the queer experience.

The Australian singer broke into the music scene in 2012 with his EP June Haverly before releasing his debut album, Blue Neighbourhood, in 2015. He followed that with his sophomore album Bloom in 2018. 

Each album delves further into Sivan’s relationship with his sexuality and the queer community, examining the complexities that come with loving differently than the world around you. This year marks a decade since Sivan came out publicly in a YouTube video simply titled “Coming Out.”

Sivan has marked this anniversary with his most mature album yet, a 10-track ode to the struggles and joys of queer adulthood. Each of Sivan’s previous albums has marked a significant moment in his journey — Blue Neighbourhood examined the loneliness inherent in growing up gay, while Bloom navigated the world of queer adolescence.

[Quarters of Change deliver an electric set at Baltimore’s Ottobar]

Something To Give Each Other begins with “Rush,” which is also the album’s lead single. The song, which has amassed more than 137 million listens on Spotify, evokes the sounds of iconic queer club music, combining heavy percussion and digital manipulation. The pulsing vocals and suggestive lyrics pull the listener into Sivan’s world of dirty dance floors, sweaty bodies and empty popper bottles.

The album follows up the house anthem with two soulful pop tunes, “What’s The Time Where You Are?” and “One Of Your Girls.” Each contains hypnotic dance melodies intermixed with deeper lyricism. Sivan begs for a love that escapes him, whether it’s because of distance or gender. That longing feeling permeates much of the album and upgrades the two songs’ already impressive production. 

From there, the album mellows out, following its high-energy opening with a collaboration between Sivan and Spanish artist Guitarricadelafuente on the song “In My Room.” The song intercuts Sivan’s English with Guitarricadelafuente’s Spanish to create a truly unique track in Sivan’s discography, merging the two young artists’ voices in another study of queer desire.

[BearHandsBracelets: from passion project to UMD Farmers Market Vendor]

“Still Got It” and “Can’t Go Back, Baby” are the album’s most sentimental tracks, swooning about love and lust and delving into the regret of relationships that have passed Sivan by. Placed in the album’s center, these songs provide the listener with a much-needed breather to digest the work’s powerful first half and prepare for the rest of the album. 

“Got Me Started,” the album’s second single, leads the album’s back end. The song opens with a distortion of Bag Raiders’ 2009 viral hit “Shooting Stars,” marking the first time the band let an artist sample the work. The erotic pop anthem brings the album back to the club-worthy roots of its opening as Sivan sings about the compulsive obsessions of sex, love and dance.

The album’s penultimate duo, “Silly” and “Honey,” are two of the project’s most fun songs, bringing a light energy to the album’s final stretch. “Silly” further examines queer club experiences, while “Honey” tackles the queer community’s reliance on hookup culture. 

Something To Give Each Other concludes with “How To Stay With You,” which is unfortunately the album’s weakest. It reruns the album’s most potent themes but fails to say anything new or groundbreaking about them. It’s a fine song, but not a showstopping album-ender. Sivan’s third album is a carefully constructed breakdown of the queer community’s best and worst aspects, celebrating and critiquing its relationship with sex, drugs and love in equal measure while doing so with a mature understanding of the subject. Sivan has developed into a fully realized artist, and Something To Give Each Other is a masterclass in queer visibility.