#090522

The shade lol

CL's twitter update

Toward the end of our meeting, Styles told me a story about being at the Grammys in 2021 and observing the emergence of new superstars, like Billie Eilish, who he admires. Watching her—so talented, so buzzy, so new—was a turning point for him, he explained. "She was so much younger than I am, and, when I was in the band, we were always the young guys. When I did my first solo thing, I was still like the young guy," he said. "I'm not like an old man now, but she's just a different generation." It made him reflective, he said: A former self could identify with what she was going through—the sudden rush of admiration, the clamoring—and he felt proud of her, happy for her, but, simultaneously, oddly distinct, hardened even. He realized that fighting to always be "the thing," always the hot new name, would not only be miserable but unsustainable. He realized that that need for validation, for relevance, for competition, is what had caused countless breakdowns, countless bad choices, even bad songs in the history of music."You can't win music. It's not like Formula One," he said. "I was like, in my lifetime, there will be 10 more people who burst onto the scene in that way, and I'm only going to get further away from being the young thing. So, get comfortable with finding something else that makes you happy. I just found that so liberating."