10 min readSombr hates the word famous. “It’s just fucking lame,” he exclaims, his arms flailing in the air. “It’s self-centered to call yourself famous. I don’t even think of it as a positive thing. How can I describe being in the spotlight when I don’t always want to be seen?”
Two days after our interview, though, Sombr is very much in the spotlight, playing to a sold-out Lollapalooza crowd. He enters as any rock star would—chauffeured in a spinning-out, light-blue 1967 Chevrolet Impala. Clad in bug-eyed sunglasses and a black boa, the singer emerges from the car smoking a cigarette and sipping a fruity drink. He has a cocky swagger, one that wasn’t present two days earlier when we talked. Stomping to the microphone, he discards the feathered accessory around his guitarist’s neck. “I’m more myself and more Zen when I’m on the stage,” he says. “I just feel out of place in the regular world and in public.”
It would make sense if Sombr, born Shane Michael Boose, was feeling disoriented, as he has had a vertiginous rise to fame. Just a few years ago, he was a student at Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts in New York training to sing Italian and German arias, and today he can’t go out in public without being recorded or swarmed. His songs “Back to Friends” and “Undressed” from his debut album, I Barely Know Her, have joined the Billions Club on Spotify; he can go viral on TikTok simply by making a piña colada; and he’s about to embark on a massive world tour, even headlining the hallowed Madison Square Garden in his hometown for two consecutive nights. “I’m spending all of the money I’m making on this tour,” he says with a smile. “It’s going to be fucking incredible, and I’m working so hard to make it the best show possible.”
Coat, Saint Laurent by Anthony Vacarello. Shirt, Junk Food Clothing.
Coat, boots, Saint Laurent by Anthony Vacarello. Shirt, Junk Food Clothing.
When we meet at a studio in Los Angeles, Sombr’s eyes are streaked from a performance at Red Rocks Amphitheatre the night before. Instead of the feathers and sheer Valentino you typically see from him on a red carpet, he’s unassuming in a thrifted blue T-shirt, jeans, and beat-up black boots. His energy is also lower than the persona you see onstage. He gives the stressed-out air of the average 21-year-old with a college art history paper to finish and a future to plan, except in his case, Sombr has unfinished music, criticism from online strangers, and the golden cage of fame rattling around in his brain.
The songs he’s recently released, “Homewrecker,” “Potential,” and “My Body Isn’t Ready,” are performing well, but they’re only a glimpse of the very full sonic universe he’s creating with his new material. “It’s definitely a wider range of sounds,” he says. “I don’t really see it as experimenting. I don’t care how a song ends up, whatever is best for the song. I’m down to make it really weird.”
Entertainer Quenlin Blackwell, who starred in Sombr’s “Homewrecker” music video, says this openness is what sets him apart. “He doesn’t look at anything that he does within his career as something that he painstakingly has to do,” she says. “There are so many people who are in the entertainment industry whose work gets redundant after a while. I feel like he is so happy, ready, and willing to explore and create.”
Jacket, Rabanne. Shirt, Junk Food Clothing. Pants, Gucci.
When Sombr plays me a few tracks during our time together, and he watches me take them in and asks me questions after each one. He makes sure that I tell him my favorite and is also quick to let me know they’re not quite finished or need to be mixed again. To me, they sound ready for streaming. While I’m sworn to secrecy about the specific contents of his new music, it does seem likely he’ll avoid the sophomore slump many artists fall into. The work is exceptional, taking the classic Sombr sound to the next level with introspective lyrics, surprising instruments, and, perhaps, some of the best tracks in his catalog.
Sombr, like many singer-songwriters, draws from his own life. His new project is laced with reflections on fame, new relationships, and criticism he’s received, all against disco beats, alternative guitars, and head-banging vocals. Each track feels like a journal entry, tracing the moments since he first inked his record deal with Warner Records at 16. “My first album was the first real body of work I put together,” Sombr says. “This is kind of the reaction to everything that has happened in the past year. You hear it with some of the songs about the way my life has changed and certain new experiences. All of this stuff has really happened since I Barely Know Her.”
Coat, top, Egonlab.
Beauty Tip: For Sombr’s grooming look, try Dior Capture Le Sérum, Capture Soft Creme, and Hydrating Invisible UV Fluid Broad Spectrum SPF 50.
Whenever we talk about the new material, Sombr lights up. Yes, our conversation traverses areas outside of it, but music seems to be his sanctuary. Born in New York City to Andy Boose and Bennah Serfaty, Sombr grew up listening to rock, pop, and alternative. His father was a musician himself before becoming an events producer working with HIV/AIDS organizations, and his mother also works in HIV/AIDS prevention. Oftentimes, songwriting took the place of schoolwork. “I was failing in school, and we would get emails home pretty much three times a week,” Sombr says. “My mom was saying I was spending too much time doing music, because I was flunking and skipping class. You can’t expect your kid to be a pop star.” But when he self-released his song “Caroline” on TikTok in 2022, his inbox was flooded with record labels hoping to sign the young singer. He dropped out of school and signed with Warner Records, he says, because they were the “hungriest” for him.
This social media Cinderella story earned Sombr the label of “industry plant”—the idea being that his father’s celebrity network had somehow boosted him behind the scenes. It’s an accusation he is happy to speak to. “Every time I see an artist blow up, I’m like, ‘Okay, this artist is great. I love them so much. They’re so talented.’ Three months later, somehow they’re a nepo baby,” he says. “I will forever respect my dad and my mom. I’m so fucking proud of them, because to devote your life to something like that is so incredible and important. To think that that could help me get signed or become a big artist because my dad devotes his life to fight AIDS is just incredibly insane.”
And once you’re signed, Sombr points out, no one’s parent can make an artist’s music pop—it has to connect with listeners. He learned this lesson firsthand: Post “Caroline,” Sombr put out a string of tracks that got little to no play. At one point, he even thought he might get dropped from his record label.
Then, around Christmas in 2024, after smoking a cigarette on his balcony, he sat at the piano with a new tactic. Sombr plunked out a few bass notes, wrote “Back to Friends,” and released it. Since it was wedged in those last few mostly work-free days of December, he didn’t expect the song to take off. “No one was still really paying attention, honestly, because why should they have been?” he says with a chuckle. “Then it came out, and it was my biggest debut on Spotify yet.”
Top, pants, Gucci. Jacket, Rabanne. Sautoir, Piaget.
Coat, top, pants, Egonlab.
As the song continued to rise, so did his star power: bigger venues, an appearance on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, and collaborations with Blackwell (who mentions a “Homewrecker” video group chat), Addison Rae, and Inde Navarrette (who calls Sombr “a wonderful friend and a great person to have in this industry”). There was even a close encounter with Paul McCartney at an event. (“In the 50 years I’ve known Paul, he’s never come up to a young artist and said it was his honor to meet them,” one director told Sombr after he witnessed the interaction.) In November 2025, he nabbed a Grammy nomination for Best New Artist.
Another cosign came from Taylor Swift, who has called him “the future.” (“Just waking up to hearing she name-dropped me on the radio, I was like, ‘Huh, is this AI?’ ” he says.) Earlier this year, she hand-selected Sombr to honor her at the Songwriters Hall of Fame ceremony, where he performed “Cardigan” and “Dear John,” two of his favorite Swift tracks. “‘Dear John’ is a song that she wrote all by herself when she was around the age that I was when I got signed and started doing that,” Sombr says. “When I listened to the lyrics, it really struck me: ‘Don’t you think I was too young to be messed with?’ I just think of where she was at that time and where I was at that time, and I’m like, yeah, that’s real.”
Coat, Jean Paul Gaultier. Shirt, Valentino.
His rapid rise has brought scrutiny and narrowed his social circle to mostly his team and peers. When not on the road, he spends most days at home. The silver barricades between the rock star and his fans don’t only exist during a performance.
Whatever his qualms about fame—the word and the experience—Sombr is quick to find the positive. “I love it so much,” he begins, “but it’s a mindfuck to have the highs and lows—the fact that I was onstage in front of 10,000 people last night and then I woke up in my bedroom in LA….I don’t really go out in public anymore, because I have anxiety attacks with people coming up to me. I just get so scared that I didn’t perform well or act well for them.” He says mentors have told him to focus on the art and shut out the noise. “One of the best pieces of advice the legend has given me—”
“Taylor, right?” I ask.
“The person I look up to most has given me. The amazing pop star. Is that if these hate comments go away, maybe you’re not at your peak anymore. I think it’s a privilege to be receiving these and rise above it. Ever since she gave me that advice, it’s really changed my perspective and has helped.”
Coat, Dior. Pants, Gucci.
Jacket, Rabanne. Shirt, Junk Food Clothing. Pants, Gucci.
A moment of particular hate came last year, after a video criticizing him for inappropriate behavior in front of fans at one of his early shows went viral. Sombr then responded on TikTok, saying that he’s “never uttered a serious word in his life,” among other defenses. “I wouldn’t respond now,” he says. “I think responding only makes it worse. I was a teenager when I was kind of just pushed into the spotlight. All of a sudden, this is one of my first instances of being hated on a larger scale. I thought I needed to defend myself.
“I want people of all ages, sexualities, and races, everyone at my show,” he continues. “I’m an awkward kid. I don’t know what to do in weird moments. That video kind of woke me up. I was like, ‘Wait, yeah, that is weird.’ If you still choose to look at me in a type of way because of that, so be it, but just know that that doesn’t represent me as a human. I plan to never say or do something that would even make someone uncomfortable again.”
Sombr has also seen the many posts about his body. He towers over me, well above six feet, and he is thin. Earlier this year, the online swirl prompted him to finish and release the song “My Body Isn’t Ready,” which he had started around the time he wrote “Undressed.” The track details his difficulties with his own body image, both as a way to address criticism and to serve as an anthem for those who struggle with similar issues. “Women get the worst of it. So who am I to complain? But no, it’s real. People fucking body-shame me,” he says. “They make fun of how skinny I am, which is why I’m in the fucking gym now. I feel like it’s so important to have this message for the kid who’s growing up and going through this. Everything you see on the internet is these sexy people with perfect bodies. I want there to be a song for the kid who is growing up and doesn’t always love the way he looks, and I want him to know that Sombr feels the same thing.”
ELLE editor-in-chief Nina Garcia with Sombr.
The musician has always embraced the magnitude of his emotions, from high school to now. Yes, his stage name is created from his initials, Shane Michael Boose, but it also came from all of those big feels, many of which are more intense than ever. “It was just like teenage angst and rejection, being a pothead, skipping class, being pissed off at the world,” he says. “Recently, more than ever, I’ve fallen into a deep, deep depression when I’m on my own. Just being completely honest, I’ve seen darker points than I’ve ever seen. I’ve definitely had some of my darkest thoughts about my life, and I’ve hit a point lately where I can’t see a future. I can only see the past and present,” Sombr says. “It’s what I signed up for. I’m never going to be an artist who complains about that, because if I wanted to disappear from the spotlight, I would. I’m just somber, man.”
Lead Image: Jacket, Rabanne. Shirt, Junk Food Clothing. Pants, Gucci.
Hair by Ward at Bryant Artists; makeup by Dick Page at MA+ Group; manicure by Honey for P. Shine; produced by Travis Kiewel at ThatOneProduction.
This story appears in the October 2026 issue of ELLE.