Heart of Gold and Boots to Match

In the city that’s been his base for 13 years, in a venue just down the road from where One Direction first formed, seeing him perform feels especially momentous. “Honey, I’m home!” he sing-songs as he settles centre-stage, his own gleeful way of letting the audience know that not only is he exactly where he belongs in this moment, so are they. This place is a safe space, where – as he requests of the crowd at every show he performs – you can “feel free to be whoever it is you’ve always wanted to be.”

His fans welcome that invitation and run with it. There’s sequins and glitter a-plenty, feathers and rhinestones galore. Giant fruit costumes? There’s so many. It’s emboldened, it’s expressive, and it’s full of joy – and really, isn’t that what live music is all about?

From the moment he first bounds across the stage to the swaggering melodies of ‘Daydreaming’, almost falling onto a podium elevating one of his bandmates in the process, Harry holds the 90,000-strong audience in the palm of his hand. “Okay,” he beams sunnily in response to their sung-along request to ‘Adore You’, “but just tonight.”

For two hours, he treats his audience to a career-spanning set that leaves no era forgotten. ‘Little Freak’ and ‘Matilda’ are made heart-achingly tender in front of a crowd, while ‘Music For A Sushi Restaurant’ becomes a literal jamboree. Teasing the chorus of One Direction’s ‘Best Song Ever’ before launching into ‘What Makes You Beautiful’ prompts an all-out dance party that feels practically euphoric, and a moment of stillness as he drinks in the sight of fireworks exploding during ‘Sign Of The Times’ is enough to have the whole venue swooning where they stand.

Strutting across the stage as he gives ‘Medicine’ an irregular outing (sir, we thank you for your service) before holding out his microphone as the crowd sing along to every word of the unreleased fan favourite, Harry is a godlike figure in custom Gucci, commanding and exalting his audience every step of the way.

He treats them with the same reverence as they treat him. Pausing between songs to check in, asking “are we all feeling emotionally stable?” he takes it in stride when the answer is an emphatic “NO!” After a shower of flowers is thrown towards the stage during ‘Grapejuice’, before he leaves, he shares his flowers out among the crowd. “I know how important it is to be here tonight, what it means to me to be here tonight,” he tells the room in a moment of unguarded sincerity. “It makes it feel like it’s supposed to be something all unto itself.”

“It gets really scary that it might never live up to what I think it’s gonna be,” he continues, expressing gratitude to his band, his crew, the staff, the room, every person in front of and behind him. “I want to thank you, because every single time I come here you give me these memories that I know I’m gonna be thinking about for the rest of my life.”

He’s not the only one that’ll carry tonight with them. Gathering at the edge of the arena to practice the boot scoot dance routine between bands, joining up in a conga line during ‘Treat People With Kindness’, swaying arm-in-arm with friends and strangers during ‘Matilda’, lying down to look at the stars during ‘Fine Line’, his fans jump heart first into every moment not just with him, but with each other.

Those albums aren’t just important because they are musical triumphs, they’re important because they had a profound impact on the industry and influenced cultural movements that impacted society as a whole.

Without the Beatles there is no Pixies, Nirvana or Oasis. Without The Smiths there is no Stone Roses, Radiohead or The Libertines. But what those bands did for women’s liberation, gay liberation, environmentalism and working class movements is equally profound. Both are bands whose popularity was supplanted by their artistry, giving them a unique position in the annals of music history.

For me, ever since the X Factor aired on our screens, fronted by Simon Cowell with his pearly white teeth, pristine T and Twickers jeans and shoes combination, it has been the absolute antithesis of all that.

The public flogging of people out to chase their dreams has seen huge audiences flock to the show over the years as they crown acts who manage to not butcher classic covers. As Michael Rosenberg (AKA Passenger) once put it, the show “murdered music” at the altar of a few “money-grabbing pricks”. It robbed us of an original Christmas Number 1 for decades until a countermovement propelled Rage Against The Machine to the top spot. And quite right, too.

But the show has, quite miraculously, given birth to a musician who, in my view, belongs in the same category as The Beatles, The Smiths and, pertainantly, David Bowie in status.

Harry Styles, formerly of One Direction fame, is quite obviously a popular bloke. He is about to perform in front of 90,000 people at Wembley for the fourth night after completing the highest selling Scottish stadium tour ever. He has 48.9 million followers on Instagram and his 2022 hit ‘As It Was’ was the most streamed Spotify song that year.

But his popularity should not be confused with his artistry.

Styles is more than just the hoards of screaming teenage fans and strings of celebrity endorsements we’ve come to know him for. He’s actually an icon both in music and in style, and increasingly an icon in modern movements of inclusiveness and self-worth.

During a concert in Houston, Texas, in 2018, he interacted with a ten-year-old boy in the crowd who had become overcome with emotion. Styles assured the young boy, “Crying is very manly. Being vulnerable is manly”. That is fucking classy, man.

His debut album artwork, which depicts the least tattooed area of his naked body half-submerged in a pastel pink bath, similarly conveys vulnerability, femininity, reflection, and intimacy, all of which are buzzwords for new youth movements that will only grow in acceptance and popularity.

When I look at his Love on Tour show I don’t see a teenage heartthrob. I see the Beatles. I look at his fashion and I see Bowie. I look at the messages he’s sending out to kids and I see Jack Kerouac and the Beat Generation. And I see the fact that nobody is talking about him in those terms as proof that he is actually woefully underrated.