Right next to you

‘PILLOWTALK’ is completely gender neutral

The song is about forbidden love and fighting for love(’fighting on’, ‘warzone’, ‘enemies’ etc.)—in short, ‘wanting what you can’t have’

The terms used in the song could be a reference to being queer and closeted: prisoners, enemy vs. ally, only being free in the bedroom etc.

Compare ‘Wouldn’t It Be Nice’ by Beach Boys (A.K.A the official Larry song) and PILLOWTALK: ‘ Wouldn’t it be nice if we could wake up/In the morning when the day is new?/And after having spent the day together/Hold each other close the whole night through’ vs. ‘ I’d love to hold you close, tonight and always/I’d love to wake up next to you’

‘We’ll piss off the neighbours’ is about doing it on the tour bus.

Or, alternatively, annoyed Louis witnessing Ziam moments

(See more of annoyed Louis here)

I LOVED Gigi in the video. But remember the recent interview with Zayn? When asked about being in a relationship, Zayn answered ‘erm, we’re good friends, yeah’. In the words of Louis…. 

It’s entirely possible that the portrayal of love between Zayn and Gigi in the music video is just that, acting. Gigi has portrayed a love interest in many music videos, for instance,  ‘How Deep Is Your Love’ (Calvin Harris), ‘Surfboard’ and ‘Flower’ (Cody Simpson) and ‘Simplethings’ (Miguel).Wikipedia tells me that she has only been in a relationship with Cody Simpson out of these men, meaning that she can act as a love interest for men she is not in a relationship with.

In Beats 1 he made it a point of saying that it’s not that he needs to abandon the 1D songs or adapt them to his solo career.  I think what he was trying to get across is that being 1D and being solo are separate things.  One isn’t worse or better than the other; they’re just different.  

In the R1 interview the interviewer was very intent on the idea that Zayn was relieved to be singing songs he liked, but Zayn made sure to clarify that it’s not that he doesn’t like 1D songs or didn’t like performing them. He said that he just didn’t feel as comfortable and confident singing in a genre that’s not his preferred one.

In the Kiss interview, he clarified that #realmusic is about music that’s real to him, meaning music where he has a personal memory and connection to the meaning of every song.  This is a soft rebuttal of the idea that #realmusic is a diss towards 1D’s music.

Of course I personally believe Zayn will be rejoining 1D when they come back from hiatus and so he’ll have the opportunity to be with the band and also release solo music.  

Even if that didn’t turn out to be the case, though, the fact that he’s working so hard at rebuffing the assumptions that he hates or looks down on 1D’s music or that he didn’t enjoy being in the band doesn’t change.  No matter what you think the ending is, it’s clear that Zayn is doing his all to express his love for the band and it’s so, so important.

This is the difference between print and hearing things from Zayn’s mouth. While there are times that he won’t be telling the complete truth because of the image he needs to portray, you will always find him supporting the band and you will never find him dissing them when it’s him speaking.

All the boys do this and this is why I love 1D.  Sometimes they’re restricted in what they can do, but they always do everything they can.  They do everything they can to stay true to themselves, to fight, to not lie, to get the truth out there, to soften the blows, to show their bond with each other, and to reassure the fans.