Pomegranate Seeds: 5/10
Five years after his last album, Troye Sivan is finally back with Something To Give Each Other. With 10 new tracks, Sivan isn’t giving us much new material, so it was exciting to see how good this album would be. Here are my thoughts on Something To Give Each Other.
The album starts with “Rush” which began with a fun beat that made me excited to hear the rest of the song. The lyrics are fun and carefree and everything from the beat to the instrumentation gives this song a lot of energy. “Rush” had great energy and was fun to listen to and is definitely the best song on the album. Track two, “What’s The Time Where You Are?”, is slower than the first track but has a good rhythm. The instrumentation has a lot of electronic inspiration and is what stands out the most about this song. Sivan doesn’t give much energy or emotion in his singing, and he is overshadowed by the other elements of the song.
Track three, “One Of Your Girls”, has similar instrumentation to the last track but is slower and has a chiller energy. The lyrics are fun and well-written, and the chorus is easily the best part of the song. “In My Room” featuring Guitarricadelafuente is one of the best songs on the album. The song has a quick beat and more energetic instrumentation, and it doesn’t sound similar to the last few tracks. This song has a great feature as Sivan and Guitarricadelafuente sound great together. The instrumentation didn’t change much over the course of the song and by the end, it felt flat, which made the song feel too long.
Track five, “Still Got It”, focuses on the vocals and lyricism of Sivan as the instrumentation stays bare throughout the song. The song’s focus is clearly on the personal content of the lyrics rather than the sound of the instrumentation. But, it’s still a very good track and shows off good lyrics and production. “Can’t Go Back, Baby” sounds similar to the last track and has very mellow instrumentation. The chorus blended into the rest of the song and the track felt too long as there wasn’t much change when it came to the lyrics, singing, or rhythm.
Track seven, “Got Me Started”, is one of the best songs on the album. After several slow songs, this track brings some energy to the album. The song has a quick beat and rhythm and the instrumentation feels very fun. But, it did feel very similar to “Rush” and the best parts of the song are when Sivan isn’t singing and the instrumentation gets to shine. “Silly” has a quicker intro that immediately tells you this is an upbeat song. The bridge and chorus are great and this is when the song gains the most energy. Sivan’s singing feels very monotone and the song is similar to other tracks. It is too long and a lack of change in instrumentation or singing makes it repetitive.
“Honey” has a good beat and cool lyrics but lacks the energy that I hoped for in this song. The song has good rhythm and speed, and the instrumentation, once again, has a lot of electronic inspiration. The album ends on “How To Stay With You”. It’s a good ending to the album in that it has the flaws of most of the songs on the album; the energy is low, the instrumentation is unchanging, and the singing is monotone. The lyrics are well-written, but the track feels similar to other tracks on the album. This song fades out of my mind, just like the rest of the album.
Something To Give Each Other is, overall, a disappointment. The lyrics are good and the entire album has great production, but the songs were repetitive and unenergetic. Sivan never brings any energy or emotion into his singing and he sounds the same on every single track. The best song on the album (“Rush”) was released as a single which led to the rest of the album being a let-down. It’s tiring when an artist releases the best song as a single and the rest of the album is just filler. Overall, Something To Give Each Other is well-made but has several flaws, earning it 5/10 pomegranate seeds. I wouldn’t recommend this album to any pop fans.
