Harry Styles

Harry Styles has a new album out, and I have had a listen this week.

The standout track is Aperture by a longshot, a song I went in on cold today, but had seen the Brits highlight reels for sure. I feel like there’s two melodies inside the song: is that on purpose? The chorus sounds like a distant bunch of people singing in a hall; I absolutely love this.

I noticed a week ago Harry Styles had also appeared on the cover of Runner’s World and started to think this guy was ok. I read the article and saw him as a lonely pop star in his early 30s, running as a way of keeping his distance. Watching him on stage at the Brits, the same again, an isolated guy. Not exactly going through the motions as he seemed and seems really invested in what he’s doing, but also - not connected to what he was doing, as if he was at work, the Chanel suit capturing this so well.

I’ve had a terrible week as dad would have been 90 on Wednesday and there really is no point celebrating birthdays of dead people. But he should have been 90. He should have been having a cake and seen how his grandkids had grown up to be taller than their mum. I hated Wednesday. This morning I did a school run and ended up in traffic so bad that I was 30 minutes late for work, but in that time I played most of Harry Styles’ new album.

At lunchtime I went to Real Groovy, got distracted and bought a deftones t-shirt (White Pony, maybe bootleg?). The guy at the counter displayed open distain; I was half expecting him to ask me to name a deftones song, which I would have, but I didn’t want to say Sextape out loud. Sextape is also a lovely song, and Harry Styles is no deftones, but I would now consider seeing him live, should he land on these here shores in 2026.