‘Kiss All the Time. Disco, Occasionally.’ | Every Single Album: Harry Styles

If you're like us, the kind of people who, when you're at a party, you're in the corner talking to somebody about their messy divorce or how they're talking to their ex again, then the show is for you.

“Welcome to None of my business. I'm Sophia Benoit, a sex and relationships writer, and professional nosy person.”

And I'm Kelsey June Jensen, co-host, comedian, and Sophia's best friend. And each week on None of my business, we'll bring you a person's most intimate stories. And to keep them anonymous, we'll have a guest on to roleplay as the person and tell you their business. We're talking about their ex's and ex, hookups and breakups, and everything that you're not supposed to talk about, but that we all want to hear. None of my business comes out every Monday on the Ringer Podcast Network.

Find us on Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts. Can't do this before, in a shoe, an einfach past. So that I'm still, to the heart, to the heart. Tamara is. This kind of feeling can be used now. Tamara is a man. She's the full-time school for every life moment.

“You find them on Tamara's.com, and on it.”

With the code "Spotify 10", you get 10% of her school on Tamara's.com. Perfect for you. And now, for me. Tamara is. Hello and welcome to every single album. I'm Nora Princeyati.

And as always, I am joined by my friend Nathan Hubbard for a very special episode on a Saturday morning as we record this.

Because kiss all the time, period, disco, comma, occasionally, by Mr. Harry Styles. A.K.A. Cat Doe is upon us. She's a bother you that there's no punctuation. There are two uses of punctuation in this album title. And then you just let it go at the end. I'm actually so glad that this is the first thing that we're discussing.

Does it bother me? I don't know if it bothers me, but it captivates me immensely. I'm thinking about it nearly all the time. Kiss all the time, period, disco, comma, occasionally. What are we supposed to take from that? Is it intentional? Is it, you know,

the, we disco occasionally out into the void and we'll never have these answers.

We'll never have like a clean statement of, of meaning for Mr. Styles. These are the questions that keep me up at night. How do you feel about it? This is the second time that a major European mail act at the peak of their powers has like effectively disappeared into a Berlin disco. And come out with a pretty significant pivot.

You two made the Joshua tree one album of the year. They, they made rattle in the home, but it was kind of like half of an album. They almost break up. They go hang out in Berlin discos and they come back and they deliver octing baby. And 35 years later, Harry's made Harry's house went out, got worshiped on tour.

Been touched and grass in Italy and hitting the German discos. And we got kiss all the time, period, disco, comma, occasionally, no punctuation. Are you in for calling it cat dough? Yeah, let's call it cat dough. Okay, cool, cool, wanted to get on the same page about that.

Yeah, I mean, so like those are reference points that are more meaningful to you than to me. Was that really front and center for you when you consumed this? What was front and center for me was that this is a man who very clearly I think was haunted by the ghosts and the imposter syndrome of winning album of the year. And who was is a seeker as a human being. Yeah, and who to quote you to very clearly still has not found what he's looking for.

“And I think in that context, that's how I sort of absorbed this album was just interested to see how a human being.”

The subject of so much hero worship since he was 16 years old.

Who lives in this space, I think, where and this is reflected in the lyrics, like it feels like he will always have to keep the world at arms length.

Because his whole life is this tension between how he actually feels and behaves and how the world wants him to feel and behave. And I think he still struggles to reconcile those two things, but look, only a Dell has managed to follow up an album of the year when with another one on our next album. Since senatra in 66 and 67, right, a Dell had 21 and then followed up with 25. The CV Wonder had an album in between. Intervisions and songs in the key of life, Paul Simon had two and we'll talk about Paul Simon today I bet.

So this is a hard thing to do and I think his place in history and the weight of those expectations and the bestowing of. A credibility that by the way, he and his management team have so expertly crafted in his solo. Yeah, to get that credibility, but that was very much bestowed as a crown on his head.

“I think in his own mind, I'm not sure we all declared Harry Styles is the greatest of all time with it just because he won the Grammy, but I think that crown.”

Had some weight to it and and so that's the prison through which I process this album. Well, because he this it feels like a watershed moment in his career in the sense that. I think we've known enough to have a sense of those things that you're talking about in terms of how Harry feels about fame and the expectations of fame and the experience of trying to. Keep parts of your life to yourself, but also have an authentic relationship with.

The crowd and the fans, but this does feel like the first time to me that he is that like Harry Styles is writing about being Harry Styles.

In the way that like when we talk about Taylor Taylor Swift has been writing about being capital T capital S Taylor Swift for decades. Yeah, and Harry kind of sneaky hasn't he writes these broad songs about togetherness and love and community. Which I think feel true to him in a vibes-based way, but are hard to glean anything really specific and tangible from. He's written a fair number of songs about you know a specific relationship and. We have done the exercise which he opens up by doing that of okay, who is this what little details are in there, but there's still you know it's it's it's a love song or relationship song.

Yeah, he keeps us at arms like it's hard to. He's like pierced. The piece of paper with a bunch of little pinpricks, so we can get a little bit of an image of him, but we don't get it all.

“So we see it through only those little holes I think this is an interesting.”

New text for him because. He is writing often it sounds like he's writing to himself and he's writing from the perspective of who he is and who he feels like he is. And so often that is about maintaining that privacy and the push and pull of that that it's still not like you're truly getting.

To the innermost innermost layers, but it does feel like something that I've never heard him do before is.

Right so frankly about. The experience of his life in the ways that it is like very few other people's and I was very I was that was the thing that I was most struck by sort of conceptually or content wise. I still feel like the writing. We've had this joke before like.

“Harry Styles is he that deep and I think as.”

A human being he very clearly is, but I still feel that struggle in this album like I don't. He remains very subdued. Lyricly against the backdrop of. From these last two albums anyway, what is delightfully chaotic and complex and unexpected. Musical canvases without sort of giving up the bag a little bit too much.

I really enjoy this album. I think it's it's I think it's pretty special. I don't know that it entirely beats the Harry Styles as a vibes merchant. Right. Right. Like he's so good at creating these things that are their mood boards and they present a set of aesthetic ideas.

And sometimes. Right. No, he is the he is the Pinterest pop star and that can be really fun. And he's really good at it. Sometimes I think that he.

There are parts, especially in the first half of this album where particularly because it was set up as.

Not necessarily a dance record, but a. A record inspired by experiences. Yeah. That I was surprised by how restrained it feels and how how much it feels like he holds back particularly in the first half. And sometimes that does feel like it is because he suffers under the pressure of having like quote unquote good taste.

Have these sort of cool Berlin boy signifiers that it gets in the way of. A feeling which is something that I really associate with. Club music and dance music and music that is supposed to let you let loose in that way.

But I also think that particularly on the second half.

I think that he really gets there.

“And so I just I think that you are really on to something that feels very present throughout this record to me, which is like.”

Is the guy who said that the movie feels like a movie like. Right. How much does that penetrate. And I'm not like Harry Styles is really smart and really like has clear ideas.

But that always does feel like it's that person is somewhere in there and sometimes it's really charming and then sometimes.

“There are a few lines on this that are the movie feels like a movie to me.”

Yes, there are, but this is what I want from our big mail pop stars. This album is it's like reflective of an artist who seems to be hell bent on not duplicating what he's done before and not repeating himself. Like it is a very intriguing album. There are layers to the production that I think you only discover on multiple lessons and they can be you can hone your ear in on the middle layer of percussion. Or some of the accents that are played through synths or nylon string guitars or other decorative aspects to this.

It's a little bit like the sport celebration videos where you know in a big moment like a couple of those videos from the Dodgers world series are like post Super Bowl celebration where you go and you can watch. Any one of 50 people in the frame and each of them is doing something different and it's interesting and collaboratively they made this like moment of a nation.

“That's how I feel about the production and I think kid harpoon gets like a next level of respect for me for this as a result.”

Like it is nothing if not interesting. I don't know that there is a watermelon sugar like smash of the summer on this album and that may be the point because from start to finish. It looks the hardest thing that I will do today is pick what we cut. I think there are some candidates but I but it's hard as as a journey through. Yeah, through from start to finish it it's hard and it works and you can put it on and just go. She has I mean credit where it's due. Harry and kid harpoon and those two together. This is not the only album that they've made together that you can say that about I have been listening to Harry's house a lot.

But it is amazing how just how great of a listen it is top to bottom and how little there is that takes you out of it. And I do think that this is functioning on that level as well. Let's hang on to the idea about whether or not there is something that sort of even approaches the watermelon sugar type of song for the summer. Do you want to ask you one more question just about kind of when you listen how did you recalibrate to what this was in reality versus what you were expecting. Do you hear more live and or acoustic sounding instruments on this and you're expecting to I guess I did.

That's where I go to the production piece because there's like the French horn that shows up and the nylon string guitar break down and ready steady go right.

I hope Harry Styles never makes an album without a horn appearing somewhere.

Yeah that that like it shows up at the end of paint by numbers as the song just sort of like deconstructs almost like the colors running. The thing that he talks about in that song, the end of the song sort of runs across the lines and blib blurs out. There was a lot of stuff on here that that's those is a little Easter eggs that are planted throughout the album. So was I surprised.

Yeah they're done in table. Yeah that feels right to me. I think I had gotten hung up on the. We're in the club of it all and as I started listening through you do hear those piano trails and the horns come in and you know he has an orchestra. It's an orchestra at certain points and there are some really really cool moments with strings and it does it made me think about sort of like what are the foundational pieces of Harry Styles as an artist.

And I do think that he and kid Harpoon will always come back to that and it stands out even more in the context of something that is also leaning on these more electronic.

We have the music this is not a dance record. It's not it really isn't it actually is truth in advertising it discos only occasionally. Correct and there is some fun disco to be sure. But not sure how much it's kissing.

“I think there's a lot of kissing I think there's a whole lot of kissing throughout this I think Harry Styles is a kissing band it.”

But he has not abandoned the from the dining table stuff. I think there's a lot of like ruminating on your place in the world. Harry Styles I mean he's kissing he's kissing. Okay well we can we can debate that further but I think we both agree that that he is just going only occasionally which. You brought up the idea that there isn't a watermelon sugar on this album. I think that is correct but I do wonder.

If there are one or two songs that serve as a reasonable approximation that get say 65% of the way there and it's not very far. But that's a D grade for song of the summer. I don't think there is a song of the summer on this album.

“But I think the question is if we think in terms not necessarily of the quote unquote biggest hit from this album.”

Right but the songs that have a chance to rise up a little bit out of the album as a whole and get heard by people who are not just going to press play at the beginning of this and go all the way through which ones are those. I think there are four. Okay Aperture is obviously one they chose that it's out in the world. I don't think that that like took over the universe. I think people like it. It also there are some folks who didn't adore it American girls is obviously the next one. [Music]

The video is interesting and we should talk about it. Definitely.

I will never get over the fact that there's a counting crow's shell crow song called American Girls.

Which is a really great song but it was put out around the time when auto tune plugins for pro tools were really becoming a thing. And you can hear that they're auto tuning both Adam Dirtz and one of the great voices of her generation Cheryl Crow and it drives me fucking nuts. [Music]

“What I can't tell is is the hook big enough on American girls to make it the song of the summer?”

I think the answer to that is no for what it's like. I don't mind that song. There's actually a lot of it that like now that I've sort of taken in the whole album I like. Right.

The first time that I listened to it, the way that I felt was why is there a second aperture at the top of this album?

Why are there two scenes setters? Yeah, there is a hook but I sort of felt like this song was as close to a one direction song as there is on the album because of the singable American Girls piece. Did you watch a video? Yes. So that video is why I'm afraid of straws.

[Laughs] Will you elaborate on that in case anybody hasn't seen it? Well, he is constantly being passed a beverage with the straw and as the real stunt double does the hard work.

And that's kind of what a straw is.

It's like it's a way out of doing the hard work of cities. It's just mouth trash that is in the way of what you're actually supposed to be doing. It's in a leap way to drink. Because it doesn't mess up your lip gloss. Well, so I don't really have that perspective on it for me.

Or because it's something that people do when they want to save their teeth. I feel safe there teeth. I feel like-- So if you drink iced coffee out of a straw, the coffee makes less contact with your teeth. So it's less.

It's still in your mouth.

Yeah, but it goes down the gullet without making quite as much contact.

Why don't we have one of those things for mashed potatoes or other bits of-- You want to drink mashed potatoes through a straw?

“Do you want to be on a feeding tube like you're in the matrix anyway in this video?”

That's very clear that the constant presence of the straw is an indication of how dainty and, you know, above all of the hard-- like how white collar versus blue collar. Right? There are those sort of positions of imagery and constantly, you know, as if he's working hard and needing to drink out of the straw.

It's just ridiculous. Anyway, it's why I hate straws. The whole video-- I actually really enjoyed the video, but the straw parts, they gave me the wheelies. What is that song about to you?

I don't know. [laughs] I mean, I think it is about-- I think it actually seems to me to be about-- he's got a bunch of friends who are all getting married and there's alone.

Right. It's kind of like-- I wondered if it was sort of about the Peter Pan syndrome, almost of being a touring pop star where he has these fans who feel like they've grown up with him and have this consistency with which they've developed the relationship, and he feels like all the real relationships in his life only exist in these little stages and segments.

“But then I was trying to figure out if that's what it is,”

then if what he's saying is that all of his friends are settling down with American girls, he brings up the state of Anglo-U.S. relations according to Harry Styles, that I have tried to make sense of in the lyrics throughout the record, and I can't quite figure it out because it would suggest for that that to him, American girls represents the kind of like the more stable version of life

and being able to settle down. And then in taste back, there's a lot of references to a woman being in Europe and being European, and it's a little bit more of a booty call thing. [music] It's been an Italy for--

You're right. I just can't quite feel where he figured out where he is on this. Even last night, I mean there's the leave America inside joke with the fan base from as it was. Right. Where everybody screams leave America as loudly as possible, and last night he did it again.

So you're right, his view of Anglo. This is not California girls, like this is not celebrating the beauty of women in America.

Sound like it is at first, and then it kind of feels like it actually might be.

But I can't-- like this is where-- this is one of those-- the movie feels like a movie. To me, I'm not necessarily upset about it, but I am like, Harry, I don't know what you're saying, man. I mean, her sweet eyes, your temptations don't deny her frustrations. Just spend your life with those American girls. He's a kissing bandit. I'm sorry.

“But isn't this kind of about how he doesn't want to be a kissing bandit?”

Like, don't you hear this is like a longing for something a little bit more stable than being a kissing bandit? Yeah, there aren't a lot of words about longing in this. I think there are some words about longing elsewhere in the album. But-- Okay, so you don't feel like he is envious of his friends in the song.

I do. I do. I do. But I don't-- I've seen it in stages all over the world. My friends are in love with American girls. I've known you for ages, it's all that I've heard. My friends are in love with American girls. Okay.

What else?

Harry is a bit of a character.

So we get these little vignettes, right? The little vignettes, the little pinprix through the index card. Like, we're looking at, you know, the lunar eclipse or the solar eclipse indirectly. And it feels like so much of our interaction with him and what he really feels is indirect. And I don't blame a 32-year-old man who's been famous for 16 years being incredibly guarded about who he is. While he himself is trying still to figure that out.

And has he matured? Yes.

“Has he discovered and gotten completely in touch with who he is?”

No. Is he a thinker? Sure. Is he a sort of abstract philosopher? Maybe. Does he know who Harry Styles is? No, and I think it makes him incredibly uncomfortable because almost every other person on the planet believes they do. Sure.

That to me is the struggle of Harry Styles. And that, and that as a whole picture when you have a whole album to kind of find the different ways that you could come up with a thesis about that is really engaging to me. On this one song, there is just a slipperyness to it. And I like the song. I agree with you that it does have that little hook and that's cool.

I just, I was surprised that this was the second single.

Well, I'm interested to hear what you think are the other songs that you would have gone with. For me to finish the thought on what I was the four are. To me, it's pop and dance no more. Yeah.

“I'm pretty surprised that they didn't go with either of those two because I think they must be holding back one of those two for song or the summer.”

Like dance no more feels pretty big to me. It's silly and it's free. But holy shit is it fun. It's really, really fun. And I think pop is really, really fun too.

And I believe that this is purely anecdotal. And I'm sure that it is my algorithm plays a part in this as much as what they're trying to do. And I don't really know how this stuff works, but just just my own personal experience. When I finish the album and it starts playing something else. My Spotify really wants to play pop.

It really wants to go Carlos song ends and then it really wants me to hear pop again. Yeah, I mean, it is a pretty big chorus. And I have to say this synths in the background and the chord progressions give pretty strong Kanye's stronger vibes. I mean, great song. Great song.

It's really undeniable.

“But but this is super fun. I think the chatter online about this.”

And this is the funniest, you know, easter egging thing is like, what is this actually about? Like, he can't help but feed the lyrics every now and then. Yeah, pop does. It's nice to mix to flavors. It's nice to mix to flavor is that.

About his current relationship for most recent situation ship is that about gay sex. Is that about an or got like anybody can paste what they want onto this, which is why it should be a single. Yeah, because it's pretty universal and it's super fun. So that stretch to me coming up roses pop dance no more is the knockout punch of the album. And I agree, I I would start that one song earlier than that, but that to me is absolutely the knockout stretch of the album coming up roses for what it's worth.

If you listen to if you look at the streaming number so far and obviously it is very early days. The number of plays on all of these songs pretty much just mirrors the track list with the exception. There is a bump for coming up roses. Of course there is. People love the Harry ballad.

You're either all in or you're all out on this song. It is magic. And it's C minor F major B flat major E flat major Walts.

Nothing new, but the strings are powerful.

Now, talk your ear out for about why it's safe.

“Is that fumble my words and forefed on my face to the truth?”

It's kind of reminiscent of a lot of other Harry songs, but the vocal is forward. The simplicity in the song is sort of masked a bit by the gorgeous string arrangement. And it like I don't know the way it holds that step below at the end. And then resolves the whole thing. Yeah.

You think maybe he's going to end it on that sort of. Yeah, like feminist note and then it resolves and then it resolves beautifully. Like it's. And it's part of like I've seen some shadow where people like, "Oh, why are these ballads on the album?"

But that's exactly it. It's this whole album keeps you on your toes. You cannot, it pivots constantly. It may not have the hook that floors you.

But man, you are never bored.

Well, and it also is, it is a Harry Styles album. Like it's funny because there's so much lyrically that does seem to be preoccupied with searching for meaning. And who does he feel like he is? And who does he feel like he's expected to be?

“And how are those two things in tension with each other?”

Yeah. As an artist, like as a person who puts out a product, which is these albums. Yeah. Harry knows how to make a Harry Styles album, even when he's doing a pivot like this.

Because there is always a fuckboy ass ballad. Yeah. And even if we're spending a lot of time at least thinking about the club, if not specifically at the club, he's still going to do it. Yeah.

Like he's still, he he he. Well, he should because he's awesome at it. Like he's at it. No, I think it's really really nice to ask with his voice. And it is nice to hear it further forward in the mix.

A couple of times because there are like they do some cool stuff with how he sounds and how he's singing and how it's it's produced and presented. But it is nice to have a couple of moments where you hear him singing very clearly. Yeah. This song feels like it plays the role that Sherry does in fine line.

Yeah. And kind of, I mean, is it kind of the boyfriends? Yeah. Yeah.

“But it this one stopped me in my tracks and I think it is my.”

I don't know. I think it's my favorite on the album, only because I know that I'm going to go back to it. Because it's the one that I went back to multiple times on listening. I think pop and dance some more are pretty close. Pop dance no more.

Yeah. Yeah.

You'll humor me on dance no more if we can talk about it for a second.

Please. Because it finally gives me a chance to talk about Peter Gabriel so. Which we will do again, as you know, when you. Okay, just just keeping track, you've brought up YouTube and Peter Gabriel so. So like this is really a preview episode for what's to come in Nathan take over May.

(laughs) It is. Don't unsubscribe from this podcast. We'll figure it out. Hang in there everybody.

It's going to be okay. No, there are there are a lot of wonderful little snippets of 80 stuff all over this record. But this song, there is a very clear through line between this song to Peter Gabriel's song Big Time. (music) It's that 80 synth and the bass line, Tony Levin like this great bass player played on that song.

He's one of the all times, but it's a fucking groove and this song will crush live. It will absolutely crush live and you could see it even last night on stage and Manchester. Well, you could see it last night on stage in Manchester and this is a thought that I had when we were talking about, you know, what has the potential to try to be a song of the summer. I think it's actually less about that and more about what are the songs that are going to be really fun high energy moments for the tour.

And both of these songs that we're talking about pop and dance, no more. You're already anticipating the moment in the set list when everybody gets to let loose and dance to those. And I think that for what he's doing, like that is probably actually more important than are those songs that are going to be particularly listenable and therefore rack up.

Is a big deal and that works.

“It's the point, right? He spoke about how.”

He started to understand his place in the world when he went to the radio head concert and saw. The way that people were interacting and the, you know, random strangers like. Random moments of empathy towards one another and all of the things that happened in a crowd, he got to actually be in the crowd probably not totally anonymously. But he was there and be like, oh right, my job is to facilitate this for others. And that seemed to that seemed to be a way for him to reconcile his place in the world because it is about him being in service of others.

And I think that feels good. Instead of the, I'm just mopping up ad, adulation and collecting tons of money from these people in front of me, which feels greedy. There's a way for him to position himself as more saintly than devilish by sort of thinking of it as being in service of others. What do you think about season two way loss? Well, it sounds like you love it, so I'm going to let you go.

I mean, it's my favorite song. It's really, it's my favorite song. It was, it's my favorite song right now as we're talking.

It was my favorite song the first time I listened to the album.

I was enjoying myself through the waiting game, which is the song that comes before it. But I was like, the first time I listened to this, I was driving. I'm just like, oh, I'll turn this on, I'll put Harry Styles on the car. And I'm going along and I'm like, okay, this is, yeah, this is good. This is cool. There's some cool moments with this, you know, piano trail here, like, oh, interesting ideas.

Ready steady go to some cool stuff. I was a little bit like, where's level two? Like, when are we kicking into a different gear?

And for me, when this song comes on, it is the beginning of the second half of the album.

“And not everything, I think there are some high moments that come before.”

But most things kick up a notch to me at this point. There's a very cool story. Kid Harpoon didn't interview with the times where he talked. Just a lot about, like, experiences that he's had as a producer and as a musician that seemed to kind of mirror. At a smaller scale, but like mirror, some of what Harry seems to be preoccupied by right now.

In terms of, like, once you've kind of gotten to the top, where do you go from there and do you feel a certain type of burnout from, focusing on, like, maintaining that instead of following more authentic creative impulses and sort of how, you know, he started going to therapy and found ways back to that. And one manifestation of that is just all these crazy synths that he bought. Like, there's a very funny quote where he's like, well, I got to a point in my career where people around me started buying stocks.

And I didn't know what to do, so I just bought all these synths. That's, like, the Jack Antonov problem. Yeah, but he has a little bit more restraint with how many he uses that one individual type. But anyway, there's just a lot of very charming anecdotes about how he's just messed around with these things and had fun having them in his house in a studio. And he had made a piece. And again, this is where the, like, guy who goes to Berlin vibes do kind of take over.

But he made this piece for a friend of his who's also a friend of Harry's, the sculptor Nickleihoss. So, like, again, we've got Kid Harpoon in his studio messing around with these modular synths to make a birthday present for this cool sculptor. And it's those kind of funky sounds that you hear at the beginning. And he thought that it was, you know, one, it was a gift for somebody, but also that it was too weird to be a song. But he played it for Harry and he started singing over it.

“And it was like, no, I think that this would work.”

And I do think that, like, first of all, I just think that that's a very charming story.

But it does, like, this, this song introduced a new texture to the entire album for me. Like, I just, it just made me sit up a little bit. And you heard the cheekbones on this song. Totally.

But I still do find a lot of the melodic elements incredibly catchy. It just feels light and alive. In spite of the fact that if this is one that, like, again, if you really start digging into the lyrics, it's pretty sad.

Like, there's, it's pretty bogged down by a feeling of having all of these accomplishments and basically coming to the conclusion that it's pretty empty.

Which is not the type of tonal. It's not something that tonally you expect from Harry Styles. Like, Harry Styles is a pretty upbeat, optimistic figure. He described this as, like, the mission statement for the album, and that this was him coming back as, like, a strong version of myself.

I mean, I do think that musically I buy that.

Like, that I experienced the album that way.

Yeah.

“I think that is a little bit of a window into what he and his main collaborator are spending a lot of time thinking about right now.”

Which is kind of this, like, is this all there is? Yeah. That maybe signals something about why he would feel like that's the Rosetta zone to all of this, but like, I do particularly musically just feel like this is a moment where it lifts off. Well, it's different. There's nothing about Harry's house on that, right?

And that, that to me was part of it because I, I don't think it's inconsistent with the way that I look at this album, which is that the two of them were very, very concerned about following up the album of the year and not repeating themselves. And you don't listen to this record into it to this song and go, oh, this is Harry's house 2.0, you go, wow, they really did something different. They really did something different, but it also, like, even relative to what it just has energy.

“And I think that, you know, I, the songs that I agree with you that it's hard to figure out what you would cut, but I would say that the hardest, this is a short stretch.”

But the only stretch of this album where I have kind of a hard time is taste back in the waiting game. Like, I, I, I feel a little bogged down by those songs. [Music] I got stuck in the part on waiting game that feels like it borrows straight out of Pixie's Where's My Mind, that little high whale. [Music]

I just get drawn back to that song every time I listened to waiting game.

Sure, I, I thought that maybe I would shoot one waiting game, but I, the chords in the second verse are different.

It kind of evolves through the course of the song from something ordinary and familiar into something extraordinary and unfamiliar. I also like, there are a couple lines on waiting game that I actually have really strong.

“I think right about it with the details while skimming off the top is a very interesting lyric for Harry Styles to kind of admit that like.”

He doesn't, he likes to play things close to the vest and he shares in a way that's a little bit strategic. It's definitely an example where he's writing kind of to himself and that's really cool. I just, just feels a little dull. Like if it, this is the part of the album where I feel like he is bogged down by being by being like Mr. Cool Pinterest board guy. Like where everything has to be in such good taste that it gets in the way of it having any real pathos.

Well, did, did you think that taste back was about anything other than like a booty call or like, and when, what's he really asking? I got it on this one of my notes on this song is literally unclear. Like, yeah, was it like coven era like got your taste back or was it like your taste for me? I've, that's the, got your taste for me is the closest that that would be my best guess. Yeah, like it's a, it seems to be a booty call song.

It seems to be about reconnecting with someone who you don't have, you know, maybe a particularly deep relationship with.

Yes, it is. And, and Ellie Rouselform from Wolf Alice is singing on it. And that's very fun and I'm happy for them. But it just, do you, do you experience any of what I'm talking about, we're like,

it kind of begs for this moment of letting go that never comes.

Yeah, I don't, I don't just agree with you.

“I, I felt a little the same way through ready steady go and are you listening yet?”

Like, I wanted those to be transcendent. I, I like them. Like, I thought, like, he played ready steady go pretty hard last night. He was, he was going at it. Like, that starts with that sort of almost like white stripes, seven nation army baseline. But then you've got that nylon string guitar breakdown.

So I'm interested. There isn't anything melodically about that song that captures me. And I, that was where I started to go. Okay, right. This is going to be a dance record and it's about the vibes.

And then are you listening yet?

I don't know. Like, the, the vocal pattern has that every tear drop is a waterfall cold play. Like, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the one's into like in excess need you tonight kind of thing. And they had a baby on this song or something.

But the back outro, the back outro of that song steals,

“I think they literally lifted the noise from, oh, and this gives me more 80s from police's”

synchronicity too. Like, there's like a boo. But then goes into that outro. At by the end of it, you go, okay, this is the most LCD sound system song on the record.

But it does seem just lift little bits.

I was into it. I just didn't feel like, wow, I'm going to definitely go back to that. And so I'm going to be by the time you run with it, right? Yeah, by the time you round the corner to weight loss, you're like, huh. And then it shifts into gear right there.

And then coming up roses shifts tonally, but it's really strong. Then pop dance no more, you're just like absolutely having a blast. Yeah. Day by number. I'm interested to get your thoughts on this.

Because for me, there's some people who are like, oh, the ballads kind of pull you out of this album. And I'm like, by the time you've gone through pop and dance no more, it's like, Paint by numbers is like sitting in the lobby of the club or the place where you're leaving. And like your friend is in the bathroom and you're just like catching your breath. And so paint by numbers is this sort of welcome.

It starts with some landslide sounding cords and then it's off into its own thing. I don't love the song, but I like the intrigue and the speculation around it. How do you feel about paint by numbers?

“Yeah, I think some of the, I mean, I don't, I'm sure I could look this up.”

I have been, but some of this album was recorded at Abbey Road. And if it just feels like this one must have been. Um, I mean, it's, it's too less than two and a half minutes. Yeah. Is this about Olivia Wilde?

So I don't know. And I think you're talking about the line where he says holding the weight of the American children who's hearts you break. For sure. Was it a tragedy when you told her you're not even 33 as if to say like,

I've got more to explore in the world. Yeah. And 33 and like I'm not ready to be totally settled down is, is the vibe. I can see that I just, that the, and a song can be about multiple things at once, right? There are other passages here where he talks about they put an image in your head and now you're stuck with it.

It's a little bit complicated when you put an image in your head and now you stuck with it. That to me felt so much about his relationship with his audience. Hmm. And because the thread of him still coming to terms with who he became to people when he was very young in a boy band. Yeah, but that's the depth that I wanted from American girls.

Right. Right. I guess we're drawing these particular distinctions about who's American and who's not. And that that I was very fascinated by that and couldn't totally come up with something that felt consistently true about the way that he's using those descriptions.

If you want to say that it's an Olivia Wilde easter egg, the was it a tragedy when you told her I'm not even 33.

That really feels like it points there.

“This song broke my heart for him a little bit just because I think it's hard.”

I mean, I know the sounds silly, but like it's a bit of the Taylor Swift conundrum. Like it's impossible for him to have a normal relationship with someone. Like every person that he meets already knows who he is as a celebrity and probably thinks they know who he is as a human being. And it's just a very difficult launching off point to build a relationship. I think about like, you know, John mayor is almost 50 years old and has not been able to settle down.

And now maybe that's because he's restless and all those things, but like Harry. Harry's been famous since he's 16 years old and he's, you know, he's 32 and then he's got plenty of life in front of him and there's all kinds of it. It is, it is just inherently hard for him to be in a normal relationship.

“I don't think he will ever know what that is, right?”

And Taylor being able to, as she called it in quotes, go athlete. Right. Was a way for her to actually find somebody who understood what her world was like. But in a different vertical that she actually didn't understand and where she could take her intellectual curiosity and throw it into something new and learn and be able to kind of be a fan of somebody else, right?

And for Harry, I mean, it's just, it is the curse of his existence is that it just seems very hard to be able to just be in something more than a situation ship

because there is so much pre-existing false context that comes in to the first smooch that he ever has with any human being on the planet.

I get those ideas from this for sure. I do.

“I honestly like, maybe this is what she thinks because I really want it to be true.”

I think Harry seems okay. Like, I think that a lot of what it seems like. I think he is okay, but it's hard still. I think it's hard, but I also think that he hasn't been, I think it's sense that you get from him less so in the album, but more so in the press that he's done is just a reminder of how consistently and intensely he was working for a very long period of time. And that after Harry's house and between Harry's house and this album, he did really take a step back and like for someone who does seem like it is really important to him to live.

Something that at least bears resemblance to a normal grass touching life that he like went and did it. And that sort of feels like the jumping off point from which Harry could even, of course, just speculating and projecting, but like even try to have the right relationship for him. So in that sense, like he hasn't really been at it for that long. Yeah. So I think that they're I think he's going to be okay. And he talks he talks a lot about how. That experience and saying yes to things.

Yeah, that he hadn't before allowed him to meet new people and make new friends and just sort of trusting that the universe is going to guide him in the right way by doing things and showing up in different places and I get you know running marathons and. So so that that feels to me to be an intentional choice from him to put himself out as a normal person into situations in which he probably to break the ice. It's awkward because holy fuck that's Harry styles, but it seems like he's made these friends Katie, whoever that is Carla on and on where he's he's experiencing life by putting himself out there in spite of his celebrity.

Yeah, well, and he just I don't know it he he to me passes this melt test when he's when he's doing interviews when he's in public when he's just sort of like talking about his life.

There's something about it where and maybe is all of the side and he's just incredible at it, but I watch that person and I go I buy this like I think that you are telling.

There may be a lot of strategy of what you're sharing and what you're not like I think that I don't think that this is a performance I think that Harry styles to. The full extent of what is reasonable for someone as public a figure is he is is being himself in public, which like.

He just said well, what you're saying right now reminds me of Liam and he just paused and looked at Harry and just gave him the floor.

“And Harry's response was very telling to that question or to that sort of invitation in that he put up for us that tension of what he was actually feeling and what the world wanted him to feel.”

Yeah, what he did say and what the world wanted him to say.

And just when it felt like the emotion was sort of coming up through his throat he stopped and he just said it said.

Which I'm I'm chuckling only because the the wall went up right yeah he wasn't going to cry on camera he wasn't going to give you everything that was going on for him and he gave you what was sort of a pithy. An interesting final punctuation. But also, yeah, but also no enormous that true enormously true, but it was just that was and he just sort of let it hang out there there's so much more that he was feeling that he could say about it, right, but we had gotten to the border and and the fence was there and he was not going to cross.

And it is a different mode of, you know, he is the most prominent male pop star of being of navigating emotion as a man who is also famous and who's in the public eye.

“I don't know, I think that there is a charm to watching someone who seems determined to take care of themselves. And I think you get that from him.”

And I've even if it means that he doesn't always like given given give. I think that it's very appealing to see someone be in that space and navigate that space in a way where it seems like they are kind of hell bent on keeping their head on straight. Yeah, he's one of the very few historical male celebrities who is just always effortlessly cool. Like I think we can draw a lot of parallels to him and Timberlake at the peak of his powers, but like Timberlake had constantly had moments of cringe. And some that I mean, one need only see the like, you know, all denim outfits from the 90s, but like, or the 2000s and much less, lots of things that have followed, but Harry hasn't had that like that anecdote from the Britney Spears memoir where he's talking to genuine and saying, "Fosh is all."

Exactly. So there's just a place where there's a, in hindsight, there was a lot of tryhard from Timberlake, though he was in his sort of apex like smoothest coolest like and the music was legit. He's an incredible musician, right? But there's been a lot of conversation as Harry's come back. We've been making the point here for a while that even even as we first talked about the possibility of a Harry record in 2026, you know what we said is he sort of vacated, he didn't really, he vacated the scene, but he didn't vacate the throne and that they were a number of people who tried to come at him, right?

The role models of the world, bunny maybe got pretty close in some way, but he is like, he sort of has effortlessly pivoted musically from album to album, and that to me is what separates him from almost any other mail star that we have. There have been tryhard moments from Ed Sheeran, the last album, for example, right? Like now, in fairness, this is only Harry's fourth solo record. So he's got, you know, talked to me when he's, you know, in Taylor's vision kind of used.

“Yeah, when he's trying to do something like Taylor was with last of the show, or yeah, with showgirls. So I think, but so forth.”

He's given himself a more time. I think by design greatly to his benefit. Yeah, and art. But he seems to be on the leading edge of culture, not chasing it. And that rolls through his personality and the way that he presents himself. He just, he has that sort of effortlessly cool. It's a bit clony as maybe I don't know what it is, but I don't want to, I don't want to fuck up the point with the wrong comparison.

It is his superpower, though, and I'm with you. He is just always believable, even if he's not giving you access to his depth.

It's always believable, and that cascades through the music. I'm with him on this pivot. I believe it. It's interesting. It keeps me on the edge of my seat, even though if, even though he hasn't fully taught us who he is as a 32 year old man yet.

I would like to talk about running in a second, but where he finds these spaces and these things that he gets really excited and passionate about and he does kind of adopt them.

And so he can see that he's not on the cutting edge, maybe, but it doesn't feel like he's trailing or chasing. Well, it seems like he is genuinely enjoying, and therefore it doesn't feel overwrought in terms of, you know, that he's not a part of for his own raw material. I think that there are some, you know, I think you could say that, like, in a way, you could say that since COVID, there's been a fairly persistent run of pop albums that have leaned on disco influences.

“I think you could say that since Beyonce's Renaissance, especially a lot of the musical touch points that he's using here have been in Vogue.”

So I, like, sometimes there are parts of this where I feel like he's trailing a little bit, but it, but it just, it doesn't feel like he's doing it because he wants to be part of a trend.

It feels like he's doing it because he actually has experienced something and wants to share it in his own way. I love post Malone, but this is not post Malone's country record. Yes. No, he's not, it doesn't feel like a costume.

“But that's what it felt like for, yeah, this doesn't feel like a costume.”

Yeah, I, I, I, I'm interested in your thoughts on Carlos song.

Because that's the only song we haven't talked about on this record and very clearly inspired by seeing a woman. It's a bit of a plate of allegory of the cave, right? You don't know what you're looking at until you actually see it and she sees or hears more cutely Simon and Garfunkel's bridge over trouble, trouble water, and this song is ostensibly about her letting the light in, if you will, as he talks about an aperture, to open the album to close the album, he's watching somebody else sort of see light for the first time.

It's a, it's a beautiful closer. I also think, and this is probably related to what I'm saying about how he can trail some of those disco influences without it feeling like he's chasing a trend. He loves music, like Harry Styles loves music, and you can tell that it is not because it has made him rich in famous, like he really, this MF or love songs, and that's a really winning quality, and you get that from it, like you get how much it has meant to him to just sort of have these experiences and be in these spaces where he's surrounded by music that he's really interested in, and that that sentiment.

“As the album closer, I think is really, really nice. I think the piano, in particular on the song again, is like one of those moments where I thought that we were going to the club basement, but actually there's some more acoustic sounding.”

So it's a beautiful. Got, yeah, like in that in that second verse. The here come the synths. We're doing both. We're doing very much like it, it, it, it sounds very similar to me to the the code a section of Billie Eilish's Lamor to my V, it feels like heavy influence in that second verse, which. I wanted this song to be transcendent. Well, it contains, I think this single most inscrutable lyric on this entire album, which is what you've been a baby sleeping upon a candy bar. Harry, what? Yeah. What are you talking about, dear? It's all been right there for you. You just didn't know you hadn't discovered what it's like to taste sugar.

And I'm like, it was right in front of you. What I suddenly understand the song is that what's going on here, because I have no idea what that is supposed to mean. I think you suddenly think there was a baby chasing you with the giant candy bar or a giant baby chasing you. Yeah, of course, that would be my experience.

And I thought it ended up just being okay. I, it, it wasn't as moving for me as some of the others. I'll say that.

So, okay.

“And then I think that's no more as your second favorite.”

I, it's pop or dance no more. If I have to go to a desert island, those are the three I'm taking for sure. And I probably, if I'm stuck on the island would let go of coming up roses because it would bum me out about my circumstances. And I'd rather have pop or dance no more. Where would you go after that if you were doing a ring? Wow.

I think I'm probably in, this is where, to me, there's a little bit of like a grab bag in that, you know, post aperture 40% of the album, like I kind of rotate any of that stuff in or out.

And, and that brings up an interesting question. Like, how much are you going to revisit this? I think that I will, I think that I will revisit this album as an album. The album feels like an album in circumstances when I really want to listen to it. Yeah. Like a great road trip record. Really great road trip record.

Great dinner party record for dinner party record. Fuck yeah.

Totally great. Great night hanging with friends like pop it out on glass of wine album. Yeah. Well, you know what they say about Martinez. Great. I don't drink Martinez. I don't know. You taught me that. I also don't drink Martinez, but I still knew that.

Great. To keep like for me, doing chores at home album.

“And then I think that I will put, let's see, I will put pop, dance no more.”

Yeah. And season two weight loss. I think those are going on playlists for many of those I will have in rotation as songs. Yeah. I think that. So ready study go and are you listening yet. Those could go on workout playlists for me. One thing that was my peak. Harry. That is something that I really want to talk about here. He's doing runners world or whatever interview he's doing runners world, but also like this album is for runners. This is there's so many of these like I'm I'm having all of these songs I listened to this album about how there are some moments of

explosion and euphoria and release that I sort of thought we're going to be there that are fewer and further between than I was expecting. But you know what it is. It's a great album to run to it's a case car it's a paste car of an album. This dude is so into running right now. Who could blame him. Meditation. Yeah. He's got his wired headphones running through the back country of Italy. Preparing sales made his own marathon playlist. Well, stead Serando's was the most ridiculous marathon name. It's so funny. It's

me because it's like such a thinly veiled like come on man. You could have chosen a name that wasn't clearly fake. Like you might as well have just said Harry Styles people were going to figure out stead Serando's.

“I knew what I think he wanted to do it for the bit. Well, it worked. It was really funny.”

What do you think about next album? I think it's a really interesting question. I think it's probably going to be a while because he's going to go do all of this touring. Yeah. And what I love now is it's going to be different. Again, this is one of the best managed transition solo careers that you're ever going to see. And he's going to do something different. He's not going to repeat himself. And I think maybe maybe he's going to wait for culture to shift and then jump into that. Again, I don't think he's going to

chase and trail. It's not going to feel like it's a year or two late. But it's going to be different.

aperture, we weren't blown away by the song. But there's something so comforting about this guy's voice.

“Yes. It is Sinatra asking that way. And there are parts of this album where that voice is”

relegated to the background. And that's okay. Because of the texture of a lot of these songs,

it's intended to be about the vibes. I would love for HS5 to have, first of all, the coming

up roses is the only song that's record that he wrote by himself. So yes, Harry. Lean into that. And something that gets back, not even back to that that moves forward into a melodic front hook. He just is a, I don't know, there's just something very soothing about listening to this guy saying. And I value and appreciate this record. I will go back to it in the ways that you and I talked about it. I don't know that it has a home run song. And, you know,

“steal my girl. I think he's still got a steal my girl or two. So I have dinner.”

Oh, that's a great song. Yeah, it's stood out to me how many of the more quote unquote real instruments pop out of here in ways that feel really special. And I think that there is something in this person who no matter what he's making and even when he is making an album that discos occasionally, he wants to be in a room or in a studio with a choir or a band or an orchestra. Yeah. And there's a lot of charm to that for me.

I think between him and kid harpoon, they really know how to use that and how to weave it in with the sense and with all the things that they're doing in moments to his vocal, which like,

I agree. That's not what I want from Harry Styles forever more. But I do think that we will always

hear him reflecting the experience of being in a room with other musicians playing kind of no matter what type of album he's making and the fact that that was present on this album, which was marketed as something that came out of different types of spaces where you hear different types of instruments was instructive to me about kind of how he charts his course. Yeah. I mean, if he waits another four years to put out an album, he will be 36, which will be the age at which Taylor put out

life of a showgirl for her 12th album. So my hope is that the way that he has decided to tour, which he has remarked in part is to give him some more normalcy in his life and make the impact of touring less on him. I hope that that in turn allows him to continue to make art and that maybe the next thing that we get won't be four years in the future and will be a little bit sooner if only because I'm really interested in what he creates and it's not just me being impatient, but it's

also that at this stage in his life before he gets too deep into, you know, a part in his mid to late 30s until he's 40 years old. Like, there just is a people still make interesting art at that point, but like there is this phase of lots of great artists life where they are at their most productive and prolific. And so I hope that the touring schedule will allow him to continue to

make. Here's one more thing about the tour. We never talked about his performance at the Brits last week.

Is he? What was your take? Is he going to dance on this tour? Is Harry Styles going to do like choreography? I don't know. He didn't really last night. Yeah. I mean, he did Harry stuff. Yeah, right, which is a different thing. The running around and being

“better by a man is a different category. I think he's going to do more Fred again, standing at the”

DJ console. Like, will he run around from it? Yeah, but I think that's that's what it seemed like

that performance as off putting as I think some people did. I just again, like his stick works on

me. I do think that Harry, you know, such a selling point of one direction was this idea that they were this kind of new version of a boy band that didn't dance. And they didn't have choreographed moves. They were just sort of these rambunctious boys who happened to be on stage together. Like kind of

“was messing around on each other. At the police. I think he was dancing more hands in the air.”

He did some head moves. But he had, he had some like kickball change moments that I don't think they normally see from Harry Styles on stage. And you know what, maybe that was just an

experiment. And he went to go do it. I agree with you that that the stuff that he did in Manchester

last night looked a little bit more like what I was expecting him to do and a mode that I think he seems more comfortable with. It's like he's going to be more Fred again than Fred Astaire. Yes, yes. That's a really good way of putting it. Do you have a favorite lyric? I signed up for "Oh, what a gift it is to be noticed, but it's nothing to do with me."

“I think he actually, by the time he puts this out, probably doesn't even believe that.”

And that he now understands that there is this symbiotic relationship between him and the audience. That again, he seems more comfortable with by framing it as being in service of those people and helping to facilitate these moments between strangers and a moment in time in which there's lots of conflict between strangers. And that him being the the chef of harmony between people is a legacy he's comfortable with.

Sure. Sure. Would you thank? So I had to, I had, and I know that I said that I would be more inclined to cut this song than most of the others. But I do think that that right about it with the details while skimming off the top line from the waiting game has really stuck in my head. The other one that we didn't talk about so much is from are you listening yet, where he says it's like you're taking up arms, but the message is wet. It sounds inviting, but you don't believe in it yet.

And that to me seemed like it was about this idea that he is up on stage kind of taking people to this really optimistic version of church and that he has this internal struggle of whether he feels like it's true for him to embody that. And I that there's like word economy there.

“I think it's a really interesting idea. I think it's one of the most revealing things that he”

shares. And for someone who typically doesn't share a lot to kind of admit that he's up there being a salesman some of the time like feels there's something that feels kind of dangerous about saying that that I think is really like it just it's rattling around in my brain. And I'll keep thinking about it. I wonder if it was like another sort of throw away light touch sexual reference. Just because the message is wet. Yeah, well, I mean, it feels like

the song is again about an intimate sex. Yeah, I think it can be about a number of things, but I just think that he like I think that it has this idea of Harry kind of preaching to acquire but himself feeling like maybe this is maybe there's like a falsehood here. And I think you could also apply that to an intimate or intimate relationship between two people. But like it it I got a lot of these lyrics is like Harry talking to Harry. And I did too. I did too. That's cool. Like that that is a

way that I don't I can't think of another song where he's written like that. And so I was I'm I'm I'll

keep mulling those and for all of his talents. Harry Styles doesn't always write songs where I'm

like what is right? Poor over that for days and days. Well, and that may be what the next album is like as he continues on his journey as the seeker and maybe he'll always be that like he's just

just sort of like disappearing into the force as he meditates. But maybe maybe what's next will be

something with a bit more lyrical intimacy. That's not a criticism. It's just I still think the thing for Harry is he's got to keep the world away from him a bit while he figures out who he actually is because the rest of the world has already made that judgment. And that's a I don't know journey that he's on. I think his superpower is that he can he can connect in a way that's real without sharing in a way that's necessarily holistic I guess. And because he's an easy

canvas for yeah yeah but that's a talent and like I kind of don't want him to change that. I like that there's ambiguity to him. Yeah the mystery is the point because it allows a broad swath of people to pour themselves and to project their own thoughts into the canvas.

“And that's why there's no punctuation at the end of the album title.”

That's the mystery. That's the place where you project disco occasionally and then what Harry

and then what they'll never tell us. How did you grade this thing? I gave it an A minus.

Okay. And honestly like there were moments when I thought about giving it a B plus. It's not like this is a low-ish A minus for me. That's right. I landed a D plus. Okay. Okay. I landed a B plus. Yes. It is. I think this is all I could have wanted. I'm not disappointed in this album in any way shape or form. I think it is different from Harry's house and that it doesn't have the ubiquitous

“earworm smash, which is which I miss from this. And to me that's really the only thing that”

keeps it from getting into the A territory. For someone who was wearing a lot of the weight of the responsibility of having an album of the year trophy and his closet or whatever, I think he has done admirably well here. Me too. I can't wait to go to the tour. I think it's going to be an absolute blast and I'm excited to hear these songs live and I think that a lot of this is designed with that as the like that's the chief product and it makes sense and I think it's going to be great.

This has been every single album. As always, I'm Norm Princeyati. He's Nathan Hubbard. Thank you

to Olivia Creary for producing this episode. Thank you as always to Kyemick Mullin. And to you for listening, we will talk to you next week.

“Do you know what I'm talking about? Do you know what I'm talking about?”

Do you know what I'm talking about? Do you know what I'm talking about? Do you know what I'm talking about? Do you know what I'm talking about? Do you know what I'm talking about? Do you know what I'm talking about? Do you know what I'm talking about? Do you know what I'm talking about? Do you know what I'm talking about? Do you know what I'm talking about?

Do you know what I'm talking about? Do you know what I'm talking about? Do you know what I'm talking about?