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Charli XCX and Troye Sivan Dazzle in Los Angeles: Concert Review

Published

2 months ago

October 16, 2024

Nothing major has truly changed about the nature of Charli XCX’s live show over the past decade-plus years, only the context. At the heart her performances are raw, unencumbered manifestations of her songs — the zoom of fast cars, the nervous sweat of the party, the assured confidence of controlling the aux — that have recently transformed her from a pop singer who creates on her own terms to a star that inhabits the near-impossible qualities it demands.

All of which was on full display at the first of two Los Angeles stops at the Kia Forum on the Sweat tour, which kicked off last month in Detroit. For Charli, and her co-billed headliner Troye Sivan, the scope has shifted. After all these years, Charli has elevated from in-the-know silo star to pop elite, as though her ambition has finally caught up with her. Sivan, meanwhile, has only plumbed deeper, exploring his queerness by leaning into sexuality and the erotic charge of masculine and feminine tropes.

Ironically, for Charli, her trajectory over the past four months has buoyed her to the exact level of pop stardom she’s consistently satirized. “Brat,” her sixth studio album, arrived in June with unexpected fervor. Never before had one of her records reached the cultural inflection point she’s tirelessly pursued, with “brat summer” becoming a sort of way of life for fans both old and new. “Brat” meant being a 365 party girl, someone who’s so everywhere she’s so Julia (Fox, in case you didn’t get that). It was quickly adopted as an ethos, or even a mantra. The slime green of the album cover went from a coarse aesthetic to a fashion do. “Kamala is brat,” tweeted Charli when the Vice President took over as the Democratic candidate in the upcoming election. The header on Harris’ campaign headquarters X account quickly turned brat green.

With that, the Sweat tour became one of the hottest tickets on the market. Throughout the two-hour show, the pair cashed in on all the attention with a breathless, rave-invoking performance threaded by mini-sets — three Charli songs here, two Sivan ones there — that leaned heavily on their latest albums.

For Charli, that would be “Brat” — not necessarily the remix album that arrived last week, though she did bring out Kesha for the freshly unwrapped version of “Spring Breakers” and a run-through of her signature hit “Tik Tok.” Her performance was bare and pointed. As she has throughout her career, she thrust her fists in the air, writhed across the stage and played off the audience, tossing in a few catalog staples here and there as a periodic reminder, if you will, that her career does have roots (she played “Vroom Vroom,” “Track 10,” even Icona Pop’s “I Love It”). There was nothing shockingly new to her live set – it’s usually just Charli, the mic and the crowd — but the scope has shifted, and at the Forum show, the moment appeared to have met her.

Sivan took a more concerted approach to showcasing songs from his latest album “Something to Give Each Other,” corralling a crew of ripped backup dancers to embody what we’d traditionally expect from a headliner. Pop star lore would have you anticipate full-on choreography, and Sivan delivered, revisiting the linked arms, swinging kicks and lascivious lap dance of his “Rush” and “One of Your Girls” music videos. He trotted out Tate McRae for a quick-hit version of their collab “You” with Regard, and stretched his arms towards a web of LED ropes at the end of “Rager Teenager!”

There was crossover, of course. They reimagined “1999,” their first-ever collaboration, with less of the plucky piano hits and a more industrial tint, and they closed the show together, singing their remix to Charli’s “Talk Talk.” The crowd’s reaction wasn’t as foundation-rattling as reports coming out of their New York City shows would have you expect, but chalk that up to the too-cool remove of a Los Angeles crowd and you can understand why.

The venues may have changed — Madison Square Garden and the Kia Forum are new territories for Charli and Sivan, at least as headliners (at one point, Sivan recalled that he last graced the same stage opening for Robyn) — but the party ambitions haven’t, and they both seemed at home in the more intimate Forum Club where Spotify threw the tour after party. It was an assault on the senses: Charli manned the DJ decks alongside her fiancé George Daniel and Zoe Glitter, and everywhere you turned was a familiar face. In one corner was Fergie, Blackpink’s Jennie, Halsey, Lily-Rose Depp and Barbie Ferreira; sprinkled throughout the crowd were Kaia Gerber, Kate Berlant, Dom Dolla, Benny Blanco and more.

It wasn’t just that Charli and Troye’s stock has gone up — sure, it’s helped — but also that they’ve captured the zeitgeist in a way that they always suggested they could. Audiences, and celebrities it seems, are attracted to that nonchalance, that intangible quality that demands your attention. At the Sweat tour, that much became clear for two pop stars who have only continued to grow, pulling fans into their orbits along the way.