A new month is upon us, and in pop in 2025 that means one thing: New sensitive dude just dropped. His name, unfortunately, is sombr. His aesthetic is part indie sleaze, part Timothée Chalamet lookalike contest. Despite his stage name, his music is not really somber; it’s jaunty radio bait that, if not fully rock, is certainly rock-coded. His lyrics aren’t quite somber either, but they’re definitely pained: His album, I Barely Know Her, presents 10 angles on the girl who broke his heart. Unsurprisingly, he gets mobbed by girls both on stage — see last weekend’s VMA PDA — and in person; one imagines that at least some of his fast-growing fanbase was drawn by the seductive pull of “I can fix him.”
