#for a time when Louis was with syco he would party with Louis and his friends around 2016-7 def involved with his stunts

[sunshineandlyrics]

Oli talking to Mike Navarra (I think) at FITFWT Hollywood Bowl, 30 June 2023 via @ wallows4ever

[hlficlibrary]

- HL Fic Library's Halloween Fic Rec -

Remember to leave kudos and a comment on the fics you enjoyed to show your appreciation! You can find our other recs here.

🎃 A Twist of Fate by perfectdagger / @starsweredible [T, 59k]

“Lucky you.” There was a mocking tone in Harry’s voice and Louis couldn’t help but roll his eyes, remembering the whole luck and fate talk he had with his friends earlier in the night.

“Sometimes,” he replied, using more charm than necessary as he placed the bottle on the railing and stepped closer to Harry, actually startling the man as he was drinking from his own water. Louis wanted to laugh as Harry dried the water that had dripped on his chin with the back of his hand, but he figured that would ruin the mood he was trying to set. “But I guess I’d be much luckier tonight if I kissed you.”

“Luck was never on my side, but I guess tonight you could help me change it,” Harry said back, in such low and flirty way Louis almost felt weak at the knees, but held himself by stepping even closer to Harry, breaking the distance between them.

Or a Just My Luck Au in which Louis, who apparently is the luckiest man in the world according to his friends, might have his fate and luck twisted when he crosses path with a handsome and mysterious bloke dressed up as Zorro at Syco Entertainment Press Corp’s Halloween party.

🎃 love is divine by stylinsoncity / @aliensingucci [M, 25k]

Being a witch doesn't help when it comes to unrequited love.

🎃 Spellbound by lovelarry10 / @chloehl10 [T, 22k]

Louis’ a shifter. Harry’s a witch. The only problem is, they’re hiding those things from each other.

Will they be able to keep their secrets hidden at the most spooky time of year?

🎃 Talk Dirty To Me by BriaMaria / @briannamarguerite [E, 13k]

They were both naked. And that seemed, again, like a catastrophically bad idea, but here they were anyway. Naked. In the dark. Only a few feet apart.

It hadn’t even been a discussion. The minute Harry flipped the lights off, they’d both shucked out of their clothes as if they’d been on fire.

“Alright darling,” Louis said, his hand wrapped loosely around his own cock. “Just remember, start slow. Lots of descriptions. Light on the hygiene, heavy on the compliments. You’ve got this.”

As if Harry were about to compete in some kind of athletic game.

Or the one where Harry is absolutely terrible at dirty talk so he asks his best friend to teach him. And the one where Louis knows it's a catastrophically bad idea but agrees anyway.

🎃 taken by the wind by @scrunchyharry [T, 12k]

When he decided to move to London with his sister, Harry thought he would finally get to learn how to control his magic. He couldn't possibly have predicted that he would fall for her neighbour.

Or the one where Harry is a clumsy witch and Louis is making everything worse just by existing.

🎃 Happy HalLouWeen by SunTomato / @sun-tomato [G, 11k]

Harry ends up with a cat. It's wildly stubborn and has bright blue eyes. It's maybe also cute.

🎃 Wasn't Looking by @berzerkshires [M, 10k]

It is well known that the first time soulmates touch they leave a vivid mark on their partner’s skin. Well one morning Louis wakes up with a bright stripe across his cheekbone and no idea what happened.

🎃 i get a little bit nervous around you by @femstyles [T, 8k]

Zayn gives Harry a little sympathetic pout but almost immediately cracks a smile again. "So, basically, Louis Tomlinson is so pretty you lost control of your powers? Isn't that like one of the first lessons we ever took?"

Harry tosses a pillow at Zayn's head with a whine. "I know! It's awful. I just need to avoid him, I think."

Or the one where Harry never had a problem with controlling his magic until Louis walked into his life. AKA the clumsy witch Harry AU no one asked for!

🎃 Just Like You by Rearviewdreamer / @all-these-larrythings [G, 6k]

Harry had been planning his perfect costume and looking forward to wearing it all month. He'd gotten everything he needed to show it off at the big Halloween party, and everything was going so well. That is until he showed up and realized someone else had the same idea.

🎃 Fallen treats by @sweariwouldnt [NR, 6k]

Harry hates both Halloween and Louis Tomlinson. He does, however, love his little sister a lot. Hence why he puts on his ears and his tail and joins her, her friends and their big brother for a round of trick or treating.

🎃 a walk around the edges of your trepidation by docklands / @hershelsue [E, 6k]

Harry and Louis go pumpkin picking in Red Sun, one of the eeriest towns in England. Amidst beautiful photographs, breathtaking love and crisp autumn wind, events accelerate into a much darker perspective.

🎃 no judgement by @solitudeandchaos [E, 6k]

“I hate horror movies. They’re stupid and scary and I never sleep after them, not for weeks.”

or louis hates scary things and harry holds his hand.

🎃 My Arms Are Hungry For You by @afirethatcannotdie [T, 6k]

“Sorry, don’t tell me you’re actually a fan of the Red Devils,” says another voice, and Harry looks beyond Nick to see a guy standing there, taking long sips from a bottle.

“I-I am,” Harry stutters, pulse racing at the sight of him. His face is covered in white makeup, and he’s wearing a well-fitting white shirt, black pants, and a long black cape, a set of fake teeth in his mouth. “Don’t tell me you’re actually a vampire.”

Or the one where Harry and Louis meet at Nick Grimshaw's Halloween party and things go better than anyone could have expected.

🎃 Kings Of the Kill by @fallinglikethis [M, 4k]

A pizza boy delivering a pizza to someone who looks to be in the middle of a satanic ritual.

🎃 Everyone's Waiting for the Next Surprise by crimsontheory / @ireallysawanangel [M, 4k]

"Is that a banana in your pocket or are you just excited to see me?" 

Harry jumps and almost drops the bottle he's holding in his hands and whips around to see Spiderman leaning up against the doorjamb to the kitchen. Harry can't see his face due to his mask, but he knows this guy has got to be deadly attractive if his body is anything to go by. He’s clad head to toe in a skintight spandex suit that hugs him in all the right places. His thighs are so thick, Harry wants to put his face in between them. And what the hell are these shots doing to him?

He stumbles a little when he reaches out to place the bottle back on the counter. And when did he become such a lightweight? He gently strokes along the bottom part of his banana costume that's sticking out between his legs and lowers his voice as best as he can. "I am very excited to see you. Banana's got a thing for men who are also spiders."

Or the one where Harry goes to a Halloween party dressed as a banana and meets Spiderman.

🎃 Let You Lick the Lollipop by @allwaswell16 [E, 4k]

Louis may be throwing a Halloween costume party for a lot of drunk college students, but that doesn’t mean he can’t also hand out candy to trick-or-treaters. He just has to keep people from stealing all the candy--especially the very hot guy in a toga who won’t leave his candy alone.

🎃 David S Pumpkins by LadyLondonderry / @londonfoginacup [NR, 3k]

Louis has a Halloween party to go to, and the perfect outfit to wear. It's a little odd that people in weird clothes keep appearing and disappearing. Skeleton outfits? A three piece suit covered in pumpkins?

Mysterious.

🎃 Messtival by @kingsofeverything [T, 3k]

Harry just wants some good candy for the school's annual fall festival, but someone buys it all before he can get any.

🎃 Cat & Mouse by @jaerie [E, 2k]

It's the one day out of the year that Harry doesn't have to hide and can be himself — at least he thought so. Louis is just a little more observant than he anticipated.

🎃 life's no fun without a good scare by EmmyLouWho [T, 2k]

For the prompt: “I invited a bunch of people over to watch a horror movie and you’re the only one that showed up and it's kind of cute that you hide behind my back every time you hear creepy music”

Halloween fluff ft: the lilac jumper, lots of sweets, and lots of cuddling

🎃 Vintage Suit by @juliusschmidt [M, 666 words]

Louis takes off his Halloween costume.

🎃 Best Couples Costume by @haztobegood [T, 666 words]

“It’s a shame. Halloween is even on Saturday this year,” Liam said. “This was going to be our year! We would’ve won this time.” Harry pouted. “You wish.” Niall teased. “You two haven’t won the best couples costume award yet.”

🎃 A Halloween M(ass)hap by @lululawrence [NR, 666 words]

Harry was never going to forgive Niall. He’d been so distracted by his roommate’s cleaning and fussing while he had been looking for the perfect trousers for Liam’s annual Halloween fancy dress party that he’d not realised the black leather trousers he’d chosen to complete his vampire look were arseless.

Of course there was a no return policy, so he’d done the only thing he could do in order to not waste the money he’d already forked out online for the damn things: he added a cape.

Surely, nothing could go wrong.

[goongiveusnothing]

The thing with Louis is that, he has no radio play. The only times his songs get played are when fans request them. Why is it like that? The bands that support him have radio plays and they are way more Indie than he is, one of them is like proper punk. When his album reached number 1 in the UK, bbc (jack Saunders) made the customary phone call, where louis tells him that he got that without radio support and it is thanks only to his fans. Guess what, they edited this part out before putting it on YouTube. Why would they do that? When his first single was released, and there was no radio play, some of his fans from the UK wrote a written complaint to the officials in BBC and the song was added to the c playlist, which they play at 2am. Even that they wouldn't do for more than a week. There was a q&a he did two weeks ago in London, where he again talked about the lack of radio play.

He cannot reach new audiences without that. He is the only one from ot4 who hasn't played bbc live launge or similar stuff. The next thing he can do is play festivals. Again he himself said that he doesn't get invitations to festivals. It is evident that he can pull in a crowd, then why wouldn't he get booked? He made a festival by himself and even that would hardly get any media coverage.

His number 1 album got four mainstream reviews that qualify for a meta critic score, just four. Out of which one is by an ex larrie, who wants to impregnate harry styles and fuck Zayn. He went private on twitter now. He has been abusing louis on twitter since 2017. Again if there is no review, good or bad, no new audience. Bruce Springsteen's album was released the day louis' album was released. This guy from official charts tweeted about the extreme level of promotion Springsteen has been doing and mentioned Columbia and one direction and BMG. Louis's uk promo was near to non-existent. No Graham norton, no tv performance, nothing. Again no new audience. All of this cannot be a coincidence. I hope Harry is not at least directly complicit in this( but I also hoped he had nothing to do with that whole euphoria mess, which he clearly had) . Sony 100% has involvement in this. Do the Azoffs have? I don't know, there is nothing to implicate them directly. But as you have mentioned they have a clear history of sabotaging artists. Afterall louis and harry share a fanbase. Larries like to tell that all this is happening because he left syco music. That is not true. This has been happening since his second single with bebe Rexa came out. At that time in 2017, there was this twitter conversation between her team and some rj's, where the rj's mention the lack of effort from his label's part as the reason for it not going viral. His next single just like you(which also mentions the Sony- George Michaels clash in the visuals). Was pulled off the radio within a week. And it has been like that ever since.He teased an album and world tour for 2018, instead he became a judge in x-factor. He said that he could not get people to write with him( even though he is the one with the most writing credentials in 1d), he said recently in Zach zang show that he contemplated leaking his album walls because it was going nowhere. He isn't even invited to events or after parties, since 2017. Absolute blacklisting!

Then there are larries, the bane of his existence. They have been writing essays on why he shouldn't be let to grow as an artist for the past many years, especially for the past two months. Spoiler alert: their theory is that louis is forced to make music, his life ambition is to get inside a suitcase and travel alongside harry styles and be a good loving house husband. Apparently he broke his arm, to not promote his album and go visit harry who had the flu. Now a large chunk of them are boycotting him, because he celebrated his birthday with his son. Some of these buffoons are cis white women who are senior citizens.

I am actually quite surprised that he got to make two albums. Honestly didn't expect even that.

Sorry didn't realise it became this long.

it's just that music is a gamble, and sometimes popular musicians don't even get the steam they need, and really talented ones are overlooked entirely. so it's hard to say well it's all because they're being blacklisted or whatever. it's just not a set in stone industry.

i have to say that with radio everybody knows it is a payola industry. it's pay to play. i've always assumed that because louis has real genuine convictions about pay to play and the machinations of the industry, that he's just never been willing to pay to get his music on the air. that he wants the success of his music to be organic and real, not a playlist payola or a radio payola scheme like harry styles.

with the other things like festivals and reviews, i've felt that's because the industry has decided because he's a former one d member, and because harry styles and maybe niall horan are the only ones you're "allowed" to like from one d, that they don't do these things for him. niall does more radio friendly music. louis doesn't and he knows that he doesn't. louis is trying to break into an area of music that is pretty tough because rock/indie music is very gatekeepy, so they don't want former boybanders to show up, as they think it's uncool. we've seen this already in random bands try and make fun of him. he has to really work hard to break into that scene.

we also know how the industry is all about connections. harry has masses of them, and they all cater to him. rolling stone interviews, vogue, another man, auditions to every movie in the world, MET gala, even louis has basically spoken about that. louis could try and spend his time in hollywood trying to schmooze people, but that isn't him. is louis willing to literally become a family member to some random powerful member of the industry just to get a career? do people think louis would be happy like that?

and while i also think showing up to events is something that would boost his profile, again these are things that louis has always said he's not interested in. he's always hated these PR event things, he even hated when in one d. they're very fake and everybody's posing and being full of it, it's exactly where louis would hate to be.

maybe i'm wrong about things. i can think of good promo ideas that don't involve these types of machinations. doing charity work, being seen at local charities or music for like impoverished kids type things, doing low key cheap gigs at small places, learning an instrument or showing how far along on the guitar he is.

personally, i would also change louis's sense of fashion, i think it's just boring to me to see a guy in hoodies onstage. but again, louis thinks wearing that stuff is authentic because it's him. but i personally think it's cool and fun for a musician to have a bit of flair and fun with fashion onstage, of course not clown costumes and maybe he has PTSD from thinking if you dress onstage you gotta dress like a clown like harry, but just something a bit fun. i remember the clash used to talk about how nobody would show up to a gig if you looked like shit, you had to dress cool in a way other dudes want to dress, i do think that does create a coolness and appeal and would be fun.

[mychampagne-mybubbles]

Did Louis point to the sign?

Today I heard again the term “damage control” referring to Elk appearing “from the sudden” after Louis allegedly pointed out at that larry sign my eyes rolling in “oh yeah Simon I was in the band”. I know most people have grown into how this works business-wise, and even those that understand or have became close to fitting in what all these public behaviors mean, we all appreciate when Louis or Harry give us a little hint that speaks our larry language. There might be an intention, as there is one in every other PUBLIC act, right? What I really enjoy about these is that they remind us of the REAL DEAL, that there is still a greater cause going on BTS.

My rational-dreamer mind is here for the big achievements, as the base of my Larry universe; we have witnessed some over the lasts months. With all the blurry mess that we get and the noise around it, I find relevant to remember some of the situations that happened recently:

When you sink but you are not the Titanic: S*mon being kicked off of SONY, SYCO through the back door and cut off from every other business attachment such as Triple String & X-Factor Thank goodness he has now decided to get engaged and focus on this family. Adding also having two random accidents when biking and a robbery in this house when dealing with a trial, make me wonder... maybe this is not his lucky year.

Louis becoming Tripple String's director, switching to BMG, I expect to see more of an impact of this in the future Do I have faith in the future? yeah, maybe I trust this man too much but I do. Breaking records with his Fafhf & announcing his own management company to come. In addition to finally deliver the tour he deserves!

Zayn got dumped by his management in 2020 as fallout from a fight with mother in law & dropped from record label RCA (Sony’s) as a result of his drug abuse consequences in 2021. If the decoration is taken out, breaking connections with his team until the moment.

In 2021 Liam was dropped from management because they were concerned about his excessive partying, however, the man is putting digital performances up and has managed to have an agenda under control (Private shows in Bahamas, LA, etc in 2022… so new management deal?). If you can fill me with knowledge, please do so!

Not to name everything going on with Harry. So many things and rumors around him lately that a separate long post would be needed to try to obtain a fair outcome, but the most obvious one is the strong turn his career took towards Hollywood in 2020.

Updated 26.04.2022: Because of HH’s release Harry publishes an exclusive article in BH&G. He says the following

Confirming the existence of strict consequences to specific acts that would put them at their responsible's mercy, until the point of annulling them and walking into quedtionsble conditions. Despite H’s speech being super studied the allegation are there for the 1st time, while being under the same label as in the 1D days.

Niall has been always "OK", he really is that guy, right? The comfort corner inside this mess, so maybe I am missing drastic changes. His last tour was affected by the pandemic, but opposed to Harry until this day he hasn’t retake it but he is working on future projects. By April 2022 he has started to hint on his next album and showing up publicly a lot, release coming. In the meanwhile (since hiatus) he has been attached to Modest Golf a lot A LOT.

Despite all the distractions, this is the bigger picture. This is how I understand their fight is going and where I recognize change. Despite I appreciate and have fun with every other interaction that brings joy to the Larries, Trust me, feed me as many as you can! this is the REAL DEAL.

[dailytomlinson]

2020 is finally coming to an end, and we can’t say we’re disappointed about it. It sure has been a long way for everyone, yet some artists had a lot on their plate. Take a look at Louis Tomlinson’s year. As complicated as 2020 has been for him, he still unlocked achievements and outdid himself in the best way. So let’s take a look at how Louis Tomlinson made 2020 his year, let’s go!

Louis Tomlinson Released His Debut Solo Album Walls

After four years of anticipation, and a good two years of teasing, Louis released his debut album, Walls, on January 31st. The record received positive critics and fantastic feedback from his loyal Louies. From the party anthem ‘Kill My Mind’ to the emotional ‘Two Of Us’, with a few sweet escapes such as ‘Too Young’, not to mention the punchy ‘Always You’, the album brought the fans everything they had hoped for. In addition to that, Louis stole our hearts with heartfelt and sincere lyrics that only he has the secret of. Magic.

Louis Started His Worldwide Tour And Gave His First Solo Show

Louis started his worldwide tour in March before it got interrupted. Touring was what he had always been looking forward to, ever since he’d decided to start a solo career. Louis had expressed the exciting feeling and positive stress that he feels right before going on stage. Luckily enough, he had the time to perform twice in Spain at the beginning of March. His first whole solo show took place at Razzmatazz, in Barcelona, and reunited around 2000 fans (sold out). An hour and a half of musical bliss, a performer who shares a lot with his fans, and an incredibly talented band. What else?

Walls Went Number #1 In 53 Countries And Worldwide Upon Release

Louis Tomlinson made 2020 his year in the charts too. He always had a dedicated fandom, and that’s no surprise. However, he seemingly wasn’t expecting the global success of his debut album Walls. Indeed, it went number #1 on iTunes in 53 countries upon its release on January 31st, including the United Kingdom and the major part of South America. Not only that, but the album also climbed the iTunes Worldwide Chart to reach #1 in a matter of hours. Legends only.

Louis Released The Music Video for ‘Walls’, And It’s A Masterpiece

January 16th revealed the final single off Walls, the album, which was none other than the title track itself. Louis described it then as his proudest song on the album, with strong influences of Oasis. A few days later, on the 21st, Louis blessed us with the music video, shot in Morocco by Charlie Ligthening. The camera follows Louis through the Sahara desert and traces his path through a ballroom and dancing crowds. Some other scenes show him surrounded by masked people, or behind four silhouettes that he identified as his four former bandmates. The Easter eggs, the quality of the video, and the suit (yes, the suit, don’t you lie) made it a fans’ favorite, for it now counts more than 12 Million views.

Louis Reached 1.4 Billion Streams on Spotify

It looks like the fans’ streaming parties paid off this year. With only one album, four other songs, and remixes or edits, Louis reached the milestone of 1.4 Billion streams on Spotify this year. Additionally, he also made it to 4 Million followers on the platform. The numbers speak for themselves, and the achievement is huge for an artist who only received little promotion for a debut album, stopped on its way due to the pandemic. Here’s to his first billion, and some more soon! Overall, Louis knows he can count on his devoted Louies to increase the number of streams significantly with new challenges, the way they did it in December with #12DaysOfWalls. (Original idea by @miss_always_you).

He Launched Only The Poets Internationally

If you’re a Louie, there are big chances that this name rings a bell. Only The Poets, a band coming from Reading in the UK, literally skyrocketed this year. After their first performance as Louis’ first act on stage at Scala in February 2020, their popularity started increasing. And Louis confirming them as his first European act only made it better for them. They continued their year with live-streams, private Zoom calls, and pre-listening sessions of their singles with fans. They ended it with a social distanced show in Banbury and a Zoom Tour in a few European countries and South America. And the mutual support Louis and these lads give each other is heartwarming.

Louis Decided To Part Ways With Syco

This one is for the fans. After ten years of collaboration with Sony’s label, Syco, Louis decided to part ways with them for a new adventure. He officially announced his decision with a tweet on July 11th that took no time to break the Internet. Soon enough, hashtags related to the news trended around Twitter, other artists, and radios congratulated him on his decision. Louies celebrated with funny memes and GIFs but made sure to surround Louis with love and support through it all. Now we wait (for the new label announcement).

Louis Didn’t Only Postpone His Tour, He Made It Bigger

Another proof that Louis Tomlinson made 2020 better. Not only did Louis pursue his dream and goal to tour, but he also grew it out. After postponing the tour three times, the newly announced European dates include a few more stops, including Reykjavik (Iceland), Warsaw (Poland), Prag (Czech Republic), Vienna (Austria), Zurich (Switzerland), and an additional date in Paris (France)! The shows sold out in less than 40 minutes, making it more than 15,000 tickets purchased. Due to the high demand in Zurich, the venue changed and 500 more tickets went on sale! In Argentina, a wild mobilization of fans on Twitter led him to open the whole Movistar Arena in Buenos Aires. Some additional tickets went on sale for the Chilean show as well. And guess what? They all sold out.

Louis Was Crowned Artist Of The Summer With 13 Million Votes

Still, doubting that Louis Tomlinson made 2020 his year? A radio station from Philadelphia, @965TDY, launched a Twitter award ceremony last summer to crown an artist ‘Artist Of The Summer’. Many polls, 13 Million votes, and 26 Billion points later, Louis was elected and was all over Twitter thanking his fans for their dedication. Louies had acquired the absolute record of 26 Billion points thanks to their votes on the radio station’s website, and thanks to their mass voting parties. Another proof that Louis and his fans are unstoppable altogether. The support is always undeniably strong, and so is the bond between the artist and the fans. Happy days.

Walls Magically Rises On The Itunes Charts In October

Indeed, nine months after its release, a new wave of fans bought the album on iTunes and made it rise in the charts. The magic truly happened after @UpdateHLD (a Twitter update account), reminded new fans to purchase the album if they had not already. Considering Louis gained a certain amount of fans during the global lockdown, the initiative went successful, and soon enough, Walls was climbing the charts just like it did on January 31st. As incredible as it seems, it even received its first #1 on the USA iTunes chart. Louis didn’t miss on thanking his fans for their continuous support, expressing how amazed he was by the chart climb.

Louis Offered An Online Live-Stream Show, #LTLivestream

Early December, Louis announced his first live-stream show from London for December 12th, entitled #LTLivestream. He promised a very special show, hosted by the platform Veeps, and didn’t lie. The general sale for the tickets (of course) crashed the website, making everyone panic. Louis then confirmed that the tickets were unlimited. The show was as incredible as originally announced, with an orchestra, fans participating through a digital wall, and a new haircut that conquered the fans. The numbers later revealed that Louis had sold over 160,000 tickets. #LTLivestream is the most sold live-stream for a male solo artist in 2020. Being the generous philanthropist that Louis is, he has given the $2.8 Million raised to many charities and his touring crew. The charities benefitting from the funds are FareShare UK, StageHand, Crew Nation, and Bluebell Wood. And they wonder why we love him.

Louis Surprised His Fans With A New Song Called ‘Copy Of A Copy Of A Copy’

Last but not least, after spending a year on a rollercoaster, Louis revealed a brand new song during #LTLivestream. He had been hinting at it through a teaser for the live-stream and via a cryptic tweet that made everyone think he was referring to ‘Copy Of A’ by Nine Inch Nails. However, he proved everyone wrong during the show with a brand new song. ‘Copy Of A Copy Of A Copy’ reminds us of the general sound of ‘Walls’ (the single), and stole everyone’s heart and soul once again. Immediately after the show, the fans asked Louis when the single would be out, to which he replied that he wasn’t sure about it being one. The disappointment faded away when he said it remained an option and would put it on the second album. We’ll take that.

And that, folks, is how Louis Tomlinson made 2020 his year for us! We have so many memories of Louis this year and can’t pick a favorite! What would be yours? And what do you think is yet to come from Louis next year? 

[1ddiscourseoftheday]

Sat 6 March ‘21

Weekends slow for news? Not on Louis’ watch!! He apparently got up this Saturday and was like it is time to make some fucking waves, let’s GO. “I always dreamed of having my own label,” he tweeted, “having an imprint never really worked for me because I still had to have someone else's blessing to sign people. People I believed in massively but unfortunately didn't fit the traditional pop role hence never doing the deals.... So I've decided to put it out there in the world today. I'm going to start my own music management company to help develop new artists. Watch this space. I just wanted to take the first step of actualising the idea but at this stage that's all this is. An idea!” Louis we are literally always watching this space and this is why, you truly never fail to exceed our hopes at every turn. “P.s. a management company not a label,” he adds, tuned in to the discourse as always, “sometimes action is needed first to encourage the motivation and belief” (about where he’s at in the process), and he’s quick to reassure that his own touring and music won’t be affected-- “no.”

He is really thinking about what he dealt with and seeing other people still dealing with it and taking steps to do something about it while using and building on his experience and strengths (to say nothing of his connections and well earned clout)! God knows with his experience he’s more qualified than 90% of the people who start these things, with his decade of being steeped in the industry and having the background under his belt of both being the point person wrangling on behalf of the biggest band in the literal world and of seeing firsthand the barriers standing in the way of less established artists, as he’s spoken about on multiple occasions; including last year when he talked about the imprint he tried to start many years ago but wasn’t able to get off the ground due to Syco’s lack of cooperation, saying “The kind of artists I was interested in developing- because I genuinely feel that through my experience in 1D, you know, one of the biggest fucking bands, I feel like I’ve learned a lot about the industry- they weren’t ready made. I had a lot of artists I took through the door that were rough and ready, but major labels want to see something that works straight away. I found that a little demotivating.” But maybe the most recent time he talked about it was when he played Copy of a Copy of a Copy for us? If management companies had theme songs, that should certainly be this one’s! I can’t think of one single person I’d rather have on my side as a young artist than Louis, anyone he signs will be so lucky both in the support they get and to get access to the built in audience he brings to anything he touches (that’s us!)-- and there’s no one I’d rather have out there finding new artists for me to listen to, he’s got SUCH a good ear for both what’s truly good and what will sell.

So who will these lucky signees be? I mean first of all it’s clearly wildly premature to speculate about that, but I do see people speculating about two folks in particular--  1) Liam and 2) Louis himself. I gotta tell you I don’t think either of these is at all likely (or desirable?). Aside from the fact that I don’t think the kind of music Liam makes is at all what Louis is looking to do with his company (nor the fact that Liam is already an established artist) surely it would be really weird and kind of inappropriate for either of them to be the other’s boss? I mean is Liam fine with just handing over control of the business side of his things, yes, but I just don’t think this idea is at all plausible. And as for Louis being his own client-- that’s just not really what management is? I suppose there are ways he could build his company to serve himself but I very much doubt that’s what he means by this at this time; it seems pretty clear to me that he wants to do what he has always wanted to do, to use his loyal fanbase as a way to lift up small indie bands and artists he discovers who have the kind of Brit rock sound he loves.

In any case, if he’s looking for support from high places for his project (not that there was any chance of it being lacking, people KNOW Louis and are always looking to see what he’s doing) being able to point at a half million notes on a casual announcement tweet is a good way to start eh? Indeed, the hype (articles all over and industry people posting about it and commenting) and people posting that they’d love to get involved are already pouring in! I wonder if he talked with Niall about his experience of starting a management company while thinking about this, and whether Louis will also bring in a partner who already works in that field like Niall did.

Meanwhile someone posted a video of a girl blowing out candles on a One Direction cake while arm in arm with a life size Louis cutout and... Zayn’s mom?? Apparently the girl’s mom is friends with Trisha Malik and she and Zayn’s sisters (and neice Zaneyeh!) were at the party-- later they got Zayn on the phone and he facetimed with the starstruck newly 14 year old girl. Louis followed another spon-con account, Charlie Lightening posted a really cute pic of him from DLIBYH video filming, Louis also said oh yeah I’m still working on new merch I’ll let you know about that, though with so little conviction he didn’t even finish the sentence, and Liam’s sister posted about looking forward to sharing their postponed Christmas with him.

[1ddotdhq]

🎹Mon 14 Dec ‘20🎤

Zayn is back! Possibly for real this time! Yolanda Hadid posted a picture of him and Gigi from a year ago at their gender reveal party (spoiler: it’s a girl!!!), and following that Zayn uploaded a picture of himself in a studio with some lovely R&B synth style music floating around. This came on the two year anniversary of the Icarus Falls release, and it set twitter ablaze, immediately trending “Z3isComing” and “Zayn is Coming”. Alex Oriet (of #pizza and Saltwives fame) posted a snippet of Zayn’s new song and said, “What kind of Christmas Present do you want to get?”. Uh, if you’re taking recommendations, I would like to see THE NEW ALBUM - preferably before the end of the year! Anyways, here’s hoping this comeback sticks because OH MY GOD I need that album! 

Louis has spent the day raking in the compliments (as he should!), including an piece in the Independent! He's quoted from a pre show press release, saying, “performing for a live crowd is the most important thing to me, this live stream is a step back into that world and is something I can’t wait to film,” and “I want to put on a real show for the fans, with scale and production, creating something special to end 2020 on a positive, upbeat note and raise money for charities that are especially close to my heart. I also want to give my touring crew work, and raise some vital money for them, as without my crew the show literally couldn’t go on”. ThePulpConversation, CelebMix, and IHeart had similar praises, including calling Walls his “chart topping debut album” (*cough*) and calling  ‘Copy’ “one of the highlights”of the show, saying, “If this signals the way [he’s] moving forward musically for his second album then we think he’s gonna make one heck of an impact”. THANK YOU!! THIS IS WHAT WE’VE BEEN SAYING!! Notably silent about the whole affair: Arista, who we last heard from in October when Walls jumped all those charts, raising the question of whether he's still with them. As they were his label for the US only due to him being tied to Syco in the UK, and with Syco out of the picture, it is plausible that he is choosing to move forward with a single deal rather than one fragmented by region. That’s fine though, the rest of us are celebrating enough as it is, and whoever gets him for that deal (or already did) sure will be too! Charlie Lightening, Krystal, and Helene all put up BTS pictures, as did the camera team, who were the same ones who shot Niall's RAH show, and Helene added a heartfelt congratulations, saying, “The voice needs time to build strength, flexibility, and all things magical..Great Singers start way in advance before hitting the mic...I am happy to say we managed on Zoom...to prepare a big ass show vocally.. Where there’s a will, there’s a way and that… *mic emoji* *heart emoji*”.  Welsh production company Krupa welcomed their new followers and also confirmed the MASSIVE amount of money that Louis had raised! Charlie Lightning's pictures are, well, lightning in a bottle and I look forward to seeing them in moodboards here for years to come, and Krystal (Louis’ makeup artist) gave us a fun close up of Louis laughing backstage while she tries to fix his (recently trimmed?) hair. God, he’s beautiful. Alex Oriet is EVERYWHERE these days, because he took a break from hanging with Zayn to ask us all what we thought of ‘Copy’ - uh, AMAZING! 

Liam is back(ish)! He did a few promos for Naughty List and went on Roman Kemp’s show to talk about his upcoming Capital Up Close show, joking that he might be dressing up as the Grinch. Roman, of course, took that as his cue to do the voice (“eight o’clock, wallow in self pity, can’t cancel that again”), to which Liam burst out laughing and said, “I’ve been on the phone with about 12 people, I just can’t handle it”. ‘Tis the season, huh?  And their advent alarm today included...more terrible jokes! “What do you get when you eat Christmas decorations? Tinselitis!”.Also Maya posted a pic taken at Liam's place showing the framed pic of Liam and Louis from gogglebox in the background, still in its place of pride on the mantle. Quite right, I would do the same with a pic of me and Louis! For some belated Fine Line celebrations, Mitch Rowland posted some behind the scenes content, (and WHERE’S THE REST OF IT?), and Fine Line has officially been on Billboards Top 200 for A FULL YEAR NOW, AND it’s been in the top 25 THE WHOLE TIME! Iconic!  Harry had a late night on Instagram, which could totally be due to the fact that he was celebrating yesterday, but he followed another artist that’s signed to FullStop (Roddy Rich) and liked King Princess’ new music video announcement, who’s caption read (among other things), “working with your partner on a video is like having a best friend on set who you KNOW WILL MAKE U LOOK GOOD lmao”. #relatable. Not to me, but probably to him! Meanwhile, Niall promoted an Irish livestream taking place at the Guinness Storehouse. Find me a more Irish event, I DARE you. 

[queensgaybeach1d]

Hi, do you think H chooses his career over Louis? Also why do people think so and what is a Houie? Is Haryy really a fame hungry guy? What about Harry thanking Rob Stringer he hates Louis? X

Hello love,

No I don’t think so at all. Let me start from the beginning. A few Larries turned into houies and solo louies, because they think that Harry is trying to sabotage Louis’ career or that Louis is the one who is taking the bullet for Harry; therefore accepting the abuse while Harry has a good career. To me that is not true at all and I will explain why, in a bit. I just want to add that these are my thoughts and in no way do I want to bring anyone down.

1.Waltzing Harry

So, the first problem is that a few people think Harry is waltzing over the rest of One Direction, because he gets magnificent promo. This is not something I think people should base their Houie thoughts on, because of the following; Harry has ALWAYS been the front man of One Direction, from day 1. He has always been the one with the most fans or the one every interviewer would try to impress. That was not his choice, we all know that all of the boys were given certain images. From history we also know that ONE member of a boyband always goes solo and has the most succes and becomes a ‘break out star’ ; beyonce, Paul MCcartney, Justin Timberlake and Robbie Williams, for example. This is also not different from One Direction. What I am trying to say is that there is a patterns and it is not just a coincidence that these things happen to 99% of the boybands out there. It is a strategy. We all know Harry brought/brings up the most money out of 1D, because since day 1 he was the ‘popular’ one. Simon Cowell and the losers at Sony are hungry money wolf, so who will they invest most in? Exactly; Harry Styles. Before anyone says that 1D is not signed under Sony anymore, they are STILL signed to Sony as a band.

 2. Harry hates One Direction.

Loads of people tend to spread rumors that Harry hates One Direction, because he wanted to be free and all. I believe that is all to tarnish Harry’s boy band image and rise the solo Harry image. Harry himself called One Direction ‘’my wonderful friends’’ and he even said he loves them. I don’t understand why some then automatically start believing the written headlines. We know from experiences that those headlines want one thing: attention. The people Harry hangs out with are also anti-1D such as Roman Kemp (sometimes) and Bunny Kinney. James Cordon and other major shows such as the Late Late Show always aim for Harry first too, because they know he will bring a lot of viewers with him. HSHQ also want nothing to do with 1D. I don’t understand why those Houies don’t believe the headlines of Louis being a father, but they do believe it when 1000 articles say that Harry hates 1D, even though he stated differently. 

 3. Harry steals Louis’ thunder.

A few people are also mad that Harry, for example, tweeted about WS two days before WMI came out, but what they don’t see is Harry promoting Louis’ song Two Of Us by putting it at the end of his video Sweet Creature. They are also mad at Harry having a beer with Liam Gallagher, a person Louis loves, when Louis has been to Liam’s launch party recently. I hope you notice how horrible and toxic it sounds that people get mad at Harry because he met one of Louis’ biggest idols. What about the fact that Harry had a 10 year long pause when Louis’ solo came up? Was Harry mocking his voice? NO.

 4. Harry staying signed to Sony.

Long story short; a lot of Houies think Louis and Harry signed to Sony as solo artists, because Louis was there to enhance solo Harry. I do agree with the fact that Louis, compared to Harry, hardly gets any promo from Sony, but I don’t think their careers are linked or whatsoever. Let me begin by saying that all members of 1D were signed, as a band, to Sony and Syco. They STILL are signed to Sony as a band. So Sony still hasn’t lost its power over the boys, even solo wise their contract as a band STILL remains valid. You have to imagine Sony as a big tree, and Columbia, Syco, Epic and RCA etc, are its branches. This means that 1D is a part of Sony anyways. They are still tied to Sony by their 1D contract AND their solo contracts.  So when people say ‘’Harry and Louis signed to Sony because they wanted to’’ you know it is wrong. They had no actual choice. That is also why I don’t understand Houies. Compared to Harry, every solo artist of 1D is getting trashy promo, not Louis only. Zayn gets nothing and neither does Liam. From the beginning Harry has always been the CENTER of 1D, that was not his choice, it was his image, so why is this different from all those 1D years? If anything, it makes the most sense.

 5. harry thanking Rob and Jeff and Sony etc.

In multiple interviews, according to Houies, Harry has stated that he loves his label and that Rob is so good to him etc. now, there are lots of Houies jumping to conclusions and saying that Harry is okay with those people killing Louis’ career and rising Harry up instead. I believe there was a Houie who said that Louis has been sabotaged and that Harry bears some responsibility in that, all because Harry thanked his label. On how many occasions did Liam have to thank Simon Cowell, Modest Management and Sony? Exactly, every single time they had won an award. I don’t see how this is different at all. We know how ALL the 1D men hate Simon, Syco, Sony and Modest etc. yet Liam thanked them anyway? Does that mean Liam liked the abuse and closeting etc? Absolutely not. Those situations are the exact same thing.

You are absolutely allowed to draw your own conclusions, but this fandom is getting toxic by day. First we have Harries hating on Louis and saying Louis bullied Harry, and then we have Louies saying Harry is a fame hungry demon who smashed his heart. The same thing is happening again. First, in 2012, people were convinced Louis fell in love with Eleanor and broke Harry’s heart and now people believe Harry fell in love with his career and broke Louis’ heart.

Of course you should decide whatever you feel is right, and perhaps I am missing the point Houies are making, feel free to ask me about it. It is just so strange how this fandom is divided.

 Have a nice day, anon an please remain safe!

[gothgovernment]

In Bed With Geo (Louis Tomlinson One Shot)

December 2015

"Hi friends and welcome back to in bed with Geo. As you can see, today I'm in bed by myself. This video has been a long time coming, which makes filming it right now absolutely terrifying..." I trail off with a nervous laugh. "Because I was so nervous, I spent three hours getting ready just to avoid this for as long as possible." I smile into the camera before taking a moment to collect my thoughts.

"As I'm sure you've all heard, One Direction announced their hiatus today. I've known this was coming for a few weeks now and it breaks my heart to see this all come to an end. These guys are the reason I have a career. These guys are some of my best friends. These guys are the reason I'm still here. And I am so proud of them for doing what's right and taking a break now before they all burn out..." I start to tear up. Fuck this video is going to be a rough one to edit.

"So, this is my story of how One Direction, and one member in particular, impacted my life in the best way possible."

September 2011

"Welcome Mr Tanaka," the petite lady at the door said as she let my father and I into the party. It was packed with important looking people wearing their nicest suits and dresses. One Direction signs littered the walls as everyone celebrated the release of the boy bands first single 'What Makes You Beautiful'. My dad is a musician with Syco. He helped write and record the guitar for One Directions upcoming debut album. I've always admired his work and I am so proud of him for helping aspiring musicians to realize their dreams.

Dad turned to me and smiled while throwing his tattooed arm around me, "you look so beautiful tonight, honey." He always knew how to ease my nerves. I tucked a piece of hair behind my ear as I responded with a soft thanks. "I've got to go congratulate the boys, want to come meet them?"

"Of course! I've only been asking you to introduce me since your first session with them," I giggled as Dad stuck his tongue out at me. I quickly grabbed a glass of champagne from a tray a waitress was carrying before following dad in the direction of 5 young lads. As we approached them, beautiful blue eyes locked with mine. I smiled politely at the handsome boy as Dad and I came to a stop in front of the group. He returned the smile and stuck his hand out for me to shake.

"Ahh so you're Geo. Izuki here has not shut up about you! I'm Louis," he said cheekily, giving my dad a playful nudge on the shoulder after our hands parted.

"Oh really? What has he said about me? All good things I assume," I bite back a smile as I see Dad rolling his eyes at us. Dad has told me a lot about the boys, but especially Louis. He seems to think we are destined to be friends.

"Alright, give it a rest," my Dad huffed with a smirk, "Boys!" My dad called to grab the attention of the remaining four band members. "This is my daughter Geo. Geo, this is Zayn, Harry, Liam and Niall." They all took turns shaking my hand with Harry even giving me a hug. "Right well, I'm leaving Geo with you while I go and talk business." Dad quickly turned and walked away, leaving me with these strangers. I watched Dad walk away before slowly turning back to the boys, immediately locking eyes with Louis again.

I spent the next 3 hours being dragged around the party by Louis, being introduced to countless important people. Something about this boys carefree and almost childish nature made me feel instantly attached to him. He is just so unapologetically himself all the time, it's almost contagious.

We had just finished raiding the food table when Louis asked me, "so, Geo... what are your plans for the future? Izuki has mentioned you're an incredible drummer." I should have known my Dad would talk about my drumming. It is, after all, his greatest achievement in me. Instilling me with a passion for music is the reason we are so close to each other. After my mother suddenly passed away, connecting through music has gotten us through our grief.

"Well right now my dream is to work as a drum tech but I also have an idea for a YouTube channel where I interview musicians, in my bed, pyjamas on, and ask them real questions. I want to talk to people about how their lives have influenced their music. How being in the industry impacts them. I want to know about their families, their hopes and dreams. I want to talk to artists like real people. Get to know why they are in this industry and if it's worth it. If the pros outweigh the cons... But that's just a fantasy. I would have no idea where to even start. I mean, the only musicians I really know are my dad and now you." I fiddle with the ring on my middle finger, realizing I just gave a much longer than necessary answer. Louis' silence causes me to look away from my ring and toward him. He is looking at me, mouth agape. His face suddenly splits into a smile which instantly helps to ease my slowly growing anxiety.

"You're a very interesting girl, Geo. Very interesting indeed..." He trails off as he quickly pulls out his phone, texting someone rapidly.

~

It's now close to midnight and Dad has decided to call it a night. As I bid farewell to the boys in the form of hugs, I reach Louis last.

"So..." I made eye contact with the Doncaster boy. "is there any chance I could grab your number? Ya know, in case you ever feel like making that dream a reality?" The cheeky glint in his eye makes me nervous.

"What? You want to come on my imaginary show?" Surely he was just being polite. No way would he actually want to waste his time on an interview that would maybe get 6 views.

"I text the lads about it earlier and we're all on board. It sounds like a brilliant idea. I fully believe in you, love." Okay wow, this feels like a dream. THE X Factor boy band One Direction want to be interviewed by me?

"If you're trying to make me swoon, you've achieved your goal," I giggle, pulling my phone out of my purse and handing it to him. When he returns my phone I see that he had text himself 'sup u sexy fuck'. I burst out laughing before giving him a long hug, whispering a goodbye in his ear.

December 2015

"I met One Direction in 2011 at the single launch for 'What Makes You Beautiful'. My dad was the guitarist for all of the recording and writing of Up All Night. All the boys instantly accepted me into their lives. Especially my now best friend Louis Tomlinson. After talking to Lou about wanting to start this channel, he immediately encouraged me and we set up the first ever 'In Bed With... One Direction'. That video gained 400,000 views within six months and affectively created my career. My whole life as I know it is owed to Lou. If it wasn't for his complete and utter faith in me, I don't think I would be here today." I start to cry, reminiscing on beautiful memories. I take a sip of my tea and think for a moment. I really wish L was here right now, but I know we would both be blubbering messes. I need to do this alone. For once, I need to do something without relying on him.

"Since my first interview with One Direction my channel has blown up. It has afforded me this house, my friends, the opportunity to meet some of my biggest idols and most importantly it has moulded me into the strong and powerful woman I am today. So I want to take this opportunity to thank you boys. Louis, Harry, Zayn, Niall and Liam. I love each of you more than I can put into words."

My phone buzzes beside me and I pick it up. 'Big Louser' sent me a text.

baby g, you okay? youve

not text me in a week :(

I sighed as I put the phone back down. I should have known he'd pick up on me semi-ghosting him. I have been so nervous around him ever since he and Eleanor split up about 9 months ago. It's like, I finally have my chance to tell him how I feel but I am so scared of losing the best part of my life. That's why, when he called me about a month ago to say the band had finally come to the conclusion of going on an extended break, I knew I had to make this video. So that the world can know and remember how important Louis and the rest of the lads are. And so that Lou can finally know how I feel. I pick my phone back up, knowing I should reply.

I'm sorry L. I promise

I'll make it up to you.

I'm filming a new video

right now that will be up

later tonight. I'll send

you the link when it's up!

Love you x

I turn my phone onto do not disturb and return my focus to the camera. "I want to talk a little bit about each of the boys from a friends perspective. Firstly, I would like to talk about Zayn. Z, you are one of the gentlest, kindest people I have ever met. You have dealt with so much during and after your time with the band. The constant racist and Islamophobic tweets and comments really wore you down a lot more than you'd let on. But Z, you would always rise above them, knowing that your culture made you into the incredible person you are today." I pause, hesitant about what I am going to say next. I would hate to overstep any boundaries here.

Choosing my words carefully, I continue. "Leaving the band must have been the toughest decision anyone could make. I remember you texting me about two months after you left to ask if I thought you'd made the right choice leaving behind your friends, your brothers. Your concern wasn't about if this would affect your future career, it was if it affected your friends. That's the epitome of the Zayn I love." I knew I would edit in a few videos I have of Z and I over the years throughout this mini speech.

I have a video of Zayn and I napping together on the couch in the green room before their show in Sydney in February of this year. He'd been really anxious about the first show of the tour and the nerves wore him out. We were originally sat together, talking about how huge this tour was going to be when he drifted off to sleep with me in his arms. I soon followed after and we napped for two hours before he was woken up to get his hair done. Who would have known that just a few weeks later he would crumble under the pressure and quit. I wish I noticed the warning signs.

"Liam 'good game' Payne, where do I begin? You are my brother, my teammate, my friend. You have always been my favourite person to play Fifa with. I remember a week after my Dad died, I heard the doorbell ring and when I opened it, you were standing there with a dozen of my favourite red velvet cupcakes and your PS4 controller. We played together in silence for hours. Once I was finally ready to talk, you stayed awake with me until 6am, sharing stories about my Dad, our lives and talking about our futures. I will always cherish you, no matter how frustrating you can be." Again, I know exactly what videos to edit in of Liam and I. One of them is him, wearing a crop top and skirt voguing after I did a full glam makeup look on him. He's going to hate me for posting it.

"Haz. My love. My guiding star. I would be a complete disaster without you. Although you are the worlds worst replier and you never answer when I call, you always seem to text me or show up at my house right when I feel like I'm falling apart. It's like the universe has linked you to me. You're my crisis line, and I am yours. I cannot even begin to count all the nights we have lied on the couch together just crying. Happy crying, sad crying, angry crying... It would almost have to be as many nights that we have spent laughing together. H, you were destined to be a rockstar. I can't think of any other job you could be more suited to. I know this is just the beginning for you, and I honestly can't wait to see you grow." I still cannot believe that my baby H is only 21 yet has achieved more than most people do in their entire lifetime. "I love you almost as much as I love apple pie." I am full on crying now. That last sentence really broke me. He and I have an inside joke that nothing in this world is better than a homemade apple pie. We would often text each other about incredible/rare/unique moments and rate them on an apple pie scale.

"Horan. I don't really have much I can say here because 90% of our conversations are inside jokes but I will say this; you have changed my life in such a unique way. I know we've had our differences, but I wouldn't change any of it. You're the one person who can make me laugh no matter what mood I'm in. You are such a light to this world. Without you in this band, I think the boys would've collapsed under the pressure a long time ago. Without you, this industry would've swallowed up every bit of joy they have. You have kept all of us sane with your stupid, loud laughter and irritatingly optimistic attitude. Please never, ever change for anyone you precious wanker." I know that I might seem a bit harsh towards Niall, but this is how we speak to each other. We've always been way too honest and, at times, cynical with only each other. He truly is one of a kind. Niall and I haven't shared as many moments together as I have with the other boys, but the moments we've had are definitely special.

"And last but certainly not least, Louis 'dumb fuck' Tomlinson. I don't even know if I can put into words how you have changed my life. You are my favourite person in this entire universe. Without you, there's a good chance I wouldn't be alive today. You are the reason I have so much self-worth, confidence and happiness within myself. You have single-handedly gotten me through some of my deepest depressions. I can't imagine my life without you. I've been trying to think about what story best represents how you're truly an incredible friend. I decided that although everything you do is a testament to how amazing you are, I would tell the one that made me cry the most.

"The year was 2013, I was 20 years old and I experienced my first heartbreak. My girlfriend of 2 years cheated on me with multiple people. I called you up, crying so hard I couldn't form a sentence. You sat patiently on the phone with me for an hour, never knowing what was wrong, just waiting for me to calm down. When I finally just hung up because I couldn't string two words together you text me that you love me. Six hours later and you walked into my bedroom, pulled me into your arms and laid with me for two days. You flew home early from your press tour without any idea of what was wrong with me. You just knew I was upset and you pushed everything aside to be there for me. When I finally told you what had happened, you hugged me tighter, looked me in the eyes and said, "you are the most perfect person in the world and you deserve to be with someone who recognises that." I think it was then that I realised that I'm completely and utterly in love with you. But you were with Eleanor, whom I adore still to this day. I would never have wanted to ruin what you two had. Because all I've ever wanted since I met you is for you to be happy. And El always made you happy." A sob escapes my mouth as I think of how broken hearted I have felt over the last few years, knowing that my true love would never be mine.

I decide to talk some time to cool down, so I walk to my kitchen to make another cup of tea. While I wait for the jug to boil, I rub my finger over my tiny teacup tattoo. Lou and I got matching tattoos not long after the boys finished recording 'Little Things'. He showed me the song and I fell in love with his verse, so we went out that afternoon and got our tattoos together, his shout. I walk back into the bedroom, press record on the camera again and get comfortable.

"When you called me up crying because you and Eleanor split up, I came straight over and returned the favour. I lived at your house for a week, doing anything I could to make you happy again. And then you went back on tour, and I returned home, and I've never felt so alone. After that week of us spending every second of every day together I realised that you're my soulmate. There's no one I want to be around more than you. And I know you're going to be so mad that I'm posting this video instead of texting you back but I want the whole world to know that you are perfect."

I finished the video with a few happier stories about my time with the boys, then wrapped it up. This was going to be an emotional afternoon.

~

Pressing public on that video was strange. I almost felt numb after all the emotions I had poured out while filming and editing it. I immediately text the link to all 5 boys and went to have a shower. The video was about 20 minutes long so I expected their responses would be a little while away. What I didn't expect was to walk out of the shower and into my bedroom to see Louis sitting on the end of my bed, tears streaming down his face.

We made eye contact once he realized I had entered the room. Frozen in my spot, Louis took the initiative of standing up and walking towards me. "Why didn't you tell me sooner?" His voice broke as he spoke, tears threatening to spill. I tried to form words but I was too scared of the impending rejection. "Geo. We're best friends. Why didn't you talk to me? I thought that... I..." His words trailed off as the tears streamed down his face. He looked down at his feet, he always gets embarrassed when he cries. I gently grab his right hand, causing him to make eye contact again.

"I am so, so, so sorry Lou. I didn't know what to say or how to say it. I guess I thought saying it indirectly would make this easier but it's so much harder than I ever could have imagined." I look away from his bloodshot, blue eyes and focus on my hand in his. "I'm in love with you. I think I always have been... And I'm sorry that this will make our friendship weird now. I don't expect you to ever want to talk to me again to be honest."

"How fucking dare you think that. If you think I could live without you, you're insane." Louis swiftly pulled me towards him with his free hand, kissing me with all the love he could possibly give.

[bciwasinlove]

Since you larries care so much about Louis' music why did you decide to ditch project defenceless? Because rads created it? Because hldaily decided that 2 days of focusing on louis' music was enough and it was time to go back streaming only Harry?

This is the last anon I'm answering from your group bc there pointless but no one ditched streaming it? A lot of my mutrals including @fearlessmoon09 have Defenseless as their top streamed song of the last month. We are larrie accs we made them to talk about larry with other larries but that doesn't mean we aren't streaming or telling people we know irl to stream it to. There is only so much we can do as fans for promo in the end we are just that FANS. We the fans shouldn't be having to fight just to hear Louis songs on the radio once in a blue moon that is suppose to be done by his label which if any of your group bothered to pay attention and stopped blaming H for things or getting pissed at larries for stanning both Louis and Harry you would know it was Syco/Cowbell who purposly sabotaged Louis music career for years giving him no promo out of pure hatred and them fearing what Louis is capable of if he is not controlled!

Promo is not OUR job and him getting no promo is NOT our fault this is there's get off your high horse and stop trying to put the blame on us or say we aren't "stanning Louis" as much as your group when half of your group spends most of their time talking about US and Harry. No one not larries or @hldailyupdate "stopped streaming" bc of who started the streaming party if that was the case the UA wouldn't have gotten involved at all which they wouldn't do bc they are one of the nicest and more respectful UA. But something your group doesn't seem to understand is that the L in their url stans for Louis the H stans for Harry meaning they stan, stream and update on BOTH. They are at the end of the day just fans they can only do so much. It's funny though Henries claim HLDaily doesn't actually stan Harry and you Rads claim they don't actually stan Louis [same goes for saying that to us larries] lmao if that's the case then who is it they and we stan if we don't stan either?

Your group also doesn't seem to understand people stan more than one person. Half my twitter mutrals including @fangirlingintheprocess also stan Taylor Swift who just came out with some of her re-recorded music so of course they are also thinking about and listening to that. Stanning more than one person doesn't mean we don't care about Louis we give af about Louis more than anyone will ever know. My mutrals and I have been stanning him since suspenders and toms day, ALWAYS speaking out about the shit he was put through so don't you fuckin dare say we "gave up" or don't care about him! So many larries have emailed, called and talk to their local radio stations to try and get them to play Louis music but of course for quite a long time the answer was they would like to but aren't allowed to bc hello Syco has always hated and wanted to bring Louis down so he was sabotaged by them for years. At the end of the day as I said we as FANS can only do so much.

Louis not getting any solos on the Xfactor, Louis not being able to sing more parts on songs he wrote during 1D, Louis not being allowed to put out his debut solo album and go on his first solo tour back in 2018 when he wanted to due to a shitty label who hated him should be where you focus your negative energy on vs larries a Louis and Harry UA or any of the other 1D boys [if you talk about them badly.] I've spent a ton of money, time and energy over the last decade on Louis so it's laughable anyone wants to try and tell ME I "gave up" or [in the past] tell me I don't care much about him bc I'm a larrie.

[hypbaest]

this is about how the industry is fucked (but u already knew that right?)

like i rmr seeing photos of harry at parties, on the red carpet, between studios, after 1d fizzled out and yet i was still in onedirectionland and...there was a point where i just Realized how fucking run under the bus he looked. and how cracked up he was. and how this lil tiny bab i loved so and projected so much onto was actually...being fucked big time by the System...the entire time i actively and vocally loved him. and i was complicit in that system. and i was A CHILD when i was. and it was really just because that was my Ideal Boy at the time and bops are bops. directioners were cannibals man. the shit i went thru was CRAZYYYYY. i dont even like to think abt it. i could put twt kpopies to shame SERIOUSLY and i was on the lighter side of things honestly!!! and a CHILD!!! EYE was exploited by the system too. fucking syco.... talk about parasocial...talk abt delusion...i wrote the book in real time...and i bet a lot of yall former directioners did too. esp if this was ur hellscape.

i see photos of harry and i cant even look him in the eye. i cant even listen to his music. always in my heart, really but damn. i know he’s seen the ugliest shit. and in part...because of the animal machine i partook in. yeah...yeah.......i dont feel good about that.

the reason i was hesitant abt kpop was because of the suicides. i couldnt understand how people could go on when that happens. i still cant wrap my head around it totally. what do yall honestly feel with jonghyun on the dash??? i couldnt do it yall. i cant judge. i know nothing. but i.....that moves something visceral in me...and it aint good, thats all i’ll say. it woulda been all bets off, if it had been my kpop boy. i would have never forgave MYSELF. thats all ill say.

and got7 uhhhh renewals or whatever r coming up. and its not life or death (OR IS IT???) and everyones like support the boys! kpop aint that real! everything is ok!! myself included!!!! and i cant help but think abt harry. and how i clown and mock and try to forget louis and niall and liam. and how zayn was long gone before i could even have a deep thought abt it. and no one ever brings him up...and no one talks about the entrapment and mismanagement of syco. or how larry was real in the minds of so many (and the strain that put on the whole group, LET ALONE harry and louis) and how stuck and stifled and CONTROLLED they were from all sides. and if u think that aint kpop...bro...when ppl literally DYING out here. wake up. (the difference i see btwn all kpop groups and 1d is how their companies are proactive towards fans’ crazy delusions and syco let everything spiral out of control)

it was on weekly idol, this past one, when somebody said something to jaebeom and he misheard. something like “you’re getting your pay” - and the way jb’s WHOLE DEMEANOR CHANGED IN THAT MOMENT OF MISUNDERSTANDING??? kind and hardworking and earnest and weird im jaebeom??? only child idol jaybee??? lil farm child porch sitting dreams bboy??? and it struck me. why the fuck would he just. break open like that. and maybe acting is good. maybe im a fool. but praytell: what fucking pay? and if you’re getting it, and that’s the reaction, then where has it been? and why?

among other things...

all things come and go. everyone gets their 15 minutes. capital is capital, right? negotiations are fought and won right? things can get better right? with hardwork right? you signed after u checked and double checked right? and thats only if ur own lovers dont eat you alive right? if you dont decay from the inside right? come on now.

and i always wonder....jay park left. this american. this leader. this TRIPLE THREAT. i always wonder why kpop hates him, why kpoppies scorn him...i wonder because as far as short kings go hes really a gem. he’s a good man. and it was jyp he left. yeah.

yall this is a business that eats people alive from every angle. it certainly is that serious. it is that real. whats a contract if you dont own your intellectual property? whats a agency if they get the final word? whats hardwork if you aint seein the money? what are you if you dont (or CANT) exist without them?

it aint just a parasitic relationship from the public side yall...come on

[transparenttriumphzombie]

Harry Styles On Vogue

Source:

 https://www.vogue.com/article/harry-styles-cover-december-2020/amp?__twitter_impression=true

From Vogue MAGAZINE

Playtime With Harry Styles

THE MEN’S BATHING POND in London’s Hampstead Heath at daybreak on a gloomy September morning seemed such an unlikely locale for my first meeting with Harry Styles, music’s legendarily charm-heavy style czar, that I wondered perhaps if something had been lost in translation.

But then there is Styles, cheerily gung ho, hidden behind a festive yellow bandana mask and a sweatshirt of his own design, surprisingly printed with three portraits of his intellectual pinup, the author Alain de Botton. “I love his writing,” says Styles. “I just think he’s brilliant. I saw him give a talk about the keys to happiness, and how one of the keys is living among friends, and how real friendship stems from being vulnerable with someone.”

In turn, de Botton’s 2016 novel The Course of Love taught Styles that “when it comes to relationships, you just expect yourself to be good at it…[but] being in a real relationship with someone is a skill,” one that Styles himself has often had to hone in the unforgiving klieg light of public attention, and in the company of such high-profile paramours as Taylor Swift and—well, Styles is too much of a gentleman to name names.

That sweatshirt and the Columbia Records tracksuit bottoms are removed in the quaint wooden open-air changing room, with its Swallows and Amazons vibe. A handful of intrepid fellow patrons in various states of undress are blissfully unaware of the 26-year-old supernova in their midst, although I must admit I’m finding it rather difficult to take my eyes off him, try as I might. Styles has been on a six-day juice cleanse in readiness for Vogue’s photographer Tyler Mitchell. He practices Pilates (“I’ve got very tight hamstrings—trying to get those open”) and meditates twice a day. “It has changed my life,” he avers, “but it’s so subtle. It’s helped me just be more present. I feel like I’m able to enjoy the things that are happening right in front of me, even if it’s food or it’s coffee or it’s being with a friend—or a swim in a really cold pond!” Styles also feels that his meditation practices have helped him through the tumult of 2020: “Meditation just brings a stillness that has been really beneficial, I think, for my mental health.”

Styles has been a pescatarian for three years, inspired by the vegan food that several members of his current band prepared on tour. “My body definitely feels better for it,” he says. His shapely torso is prettily inscribed with the tattoos of a Victorian sailor—a rose, a galleon, a mermaid, an anchor, and a palm tree among them, and, straddling his clavicle, the dates 1967 and 1957 (the respective birth years of his mother and father). Frankly, I rather wish I’d packed a beach muumuu.

We take the piratical gangplank that juts into the water and dive in. Let me tell you, this is not the Aegean. The glacial water is a cloudy phlegm green beneath the surface, and clammy reeds slap one’s ankles. Styles, who admits he will try any fad, has recently had a couple of cryotherapy sessions and is evidently less susceptible to the cold. By the time we have swum a full circuit, however, body temperatures have adjusted, and the ice, you might say, has been broken. Duly invigorated, we are ready to face the day. Styles has thoughtfully brought a canister of coffee and some bottles of water in his backpack, and we sit at either end of a park bench for a socially distanced chat.

It seems that he has had a productive year. At the onset of lockdown, Styles found himself in his second home, in the canyons of Los Angeles. After a few days on his own, however, he moved in with a pod of three friends (and subsequently with two band members, Mitch Rowland and Sarah Jones). They “would put names in a hat and plan the week out,” Styles explains. “If you were Monday, you would choose the movie, dinner, and the activity for that day. I like to make soups, and there was a big array of movies; we went all over the board,” from Goodfellas to Clueless. The experience, says Styles, “has been a really good lesson in what makes me happy now. It’s such a good example of living in the moment. I honestly just like being around my friends,” he adds. “That’s been my biggest takeaway. Just being on my own the whole time, I would have been miserable.”

Styles is big on friendship groups and considers his former and legendarily hysteria-inducing boy band, One Direction, to have been one of them. “I think the typical thing is to come out of a band like that and almost feel like you have to apologize for being in it,” says Styles. “But I loved my time in it. It was all new to me, and I was trying to learn as much as I could. I wanted to soak it in…. I think that’s probably why I like traveling now—soaking stuff up.” In a post-COVID future, he is contemplating a temporary move to Tokyo, explaining that “there’s a respect and a stillness, a quietness that I really loved every time I’ve been there.”

In the music he has been working on in 2020, Styles wants to capture the experimental spirit that informed his second album, last year’s Fine Line. With his debut album, “I was very much finding out what my sound was as a solo artist,” he says. “I can see all the places where it almost felt like I was bowling with the bumpers up. I think with the second album I let go of the fear of getting it wrong and…it was really joyous and really free. I think with music it’s so important to evolve—and that extends to clothes and videos and all that stuff. That’s why you look back at David Bowie with Ziggy Stardust or the Beatles and their different eras—that fearlessness is super inspiring.”

The seismic changes of 2020—including the Black Lives Matter uprising around racial justice—has also provided Styles with an opportunity for personal growth. “I think it’s a time for opening up and learning and listening,” he says. “I’ve been trying to read and educate myself so that in 20 years I’m still doing the right things and taking the right steps. I believe in karma, and I think it’s just a time right now where we could use a little more kindness and empathy and patience with people, be a little more prepared to listen and grow.”

Meanwhile, Styles’s euphoric single “Watermelon Sugar” became something of an escapist anthem for this dystopian summer of 2020. The video, featuring Styles (dressed in ’70s-­flavored Gucci and Bode) cavorting with a pack of beach-babe girls and boys, was shot in January, before lockdown rules came into play. By the time it was ready to be released in May, a poignant epigraph had been added: “This video is dedicated to touching.”

Styles is looking forward to touring again, when “it’s safe for everyone,” because, as he notes, “being up against people is part of the whole thing. You can’t really re-create it in any way.” But it hasn’t always been so. Early in his career, Styles was so stricken with stage fright that he regularly threw up preperformance. “I just always thought I was going to mess up or something,” he remembers. “But I’ve felt really lucky to have a group of incredibly generous fans. They’re generous emotionally—and when they come to the show, they give so much that it creates this atmosphere that I’ve always found so loving and accepting.”

THIS SUMMER, when it was safe enough to travel, Styles returned to his London home, which is where he suggests we head now, setting off in his modish Primrose Yellow ’73 Jaguar that smells of gasoline and leatherette. “Me and my dad have always bonded over cars,” Styles explains. “I never thought I’d be someone who just went out for a leisurely drive, purely for enjoyment.” On sleepless jet-lagged nights he’ll drive through London’s quiet streets, seeing neighborhoods in a new way. “I find it quite relaxing,” he says.

Over the summer Styles took a road trip with his artist friend Tomo Campbell through France and Italy, setting off at four in the morning and spending the night in Geneva, where they jumped in the lake “to wake ourselves up.” (I see a pattern emerging.) At the end of the trip Styles drove home alone, accompanied by an upbeat playlist that included “Aretha Franklin, Parliament, and a lot of Stevie Wonder. It was really fun for me,” he says. “I don’t travel like that a lot. I’m usually in such a rush, but there was a stillness to it. I love the feeling of nobody knowing where I am, that kind of escape...and freedom.”

GROWING UP in a village in the North of England, Styles thought of London as a world apart: “It truly felt like a different country.” At a wide-eyed 16, he came down to the teeming metropolis after his mother entered him on the U.K. talent-search show The X Factor. “I went to the audition to find out if I could sing,” Styles recalls, “or if my mum was just being nice to me.” Styles was eliminated but subsequently brought back with other contestants—Niall Horan, Liam Payne, Louis Tomlinson, and Zayn Malik—to form a boy band that was named (on Styles’s suggestion) One Direction. The wily X Factor creator and judge, Simon Cowell, soon signed them to his label Syco Records, and the rest is history: 1D’s first four albums, supported by four world tours from 2011 to 2015, debuted at number one on the U.S. Billboard charts, and the band has sold 70 million records to date. At 18, Styles bought the London house he now calls home. “I was going to do two weeks’ work to it,” he remembers, “but when I came back there was no second floor,” so he moved in with adult friends who lived nearby till the renovation was complete. “Eighteen months,” he deadpans. “I’ve always seen that period as pretty pivotal for me, as there’s that moment at the party where it’s getting late, and half of the people would go upstairs to do drugs, and the other people go home. I was like, ‘I don’t really know this friend’s wife, so I’m not going to get all messy and then go home.’ I had to behave a bit, at a time where everything else about my life felt I didn’t have to behave really. I’ve been lucky to always feel I have this family unit somewhere.”

When Styles’s London renovation was finally done, “I went in for the first time and I cried,” he recalls. “Because I just felt like I had somewhere. L.A. feels like holiday, but this feels like home.”

“There’s so much joy to be had in playing with clothes. I’ve never thought too much about what it means—it just becomes this extended part of creating something”

Behind its pink door, Styles’s house has all the trappings of rock stardom—there’s a man cave filled with guitars, a Sex Pistols Never Mind the Bollocks poster (a moving-in gift from his decorator), a Stevie Nicks album cover. Fleetwood Mac’s “Dreams” was one of the first songs he knew the words to—“My parents were big fans”—and he and Nicks have formed something of a mutual-admiration society. At the beginning of lockdown, Nicks tweeted to her fans that she was taking inspiration from Fine Line: “Way to go, H,” she wrote. “It is your Rumours.” “She’s always there for you,” said Styles when he inducted Nicks into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2019. “She knows what you need—advice, a little wisdom, a blouse, a shawl; she’s got you covered.”

Styles makes us some tea in the light-filled kitchen and then wanders into the convivial living room, where he strikes an insouciant pose on the chesterfield sofa, upholstered in a turquoise velvet that perhaps not entirely coincidentally sets off his eyes. Styles admits that his lockdown lewk was “sweatpants, constantly,” and he is relishing the opportunity to dress up again. He doesn’t have to wait long: The following day, under the eaves of a Victorian mansion in Notting Hill, I arrive in the middle of fittings for Vogue’s shoot and discover Styles in his Y-fronts, patiently waiting to try on looks for fashion editor Camilla Nickerson and photographer Tyler Mitchell. Styles’s personal stylist, Harry Lambert, wearing a pearl necklace and his nails colored in various shades of green varnish, à la Sally Bowles, is providing helpful backup (Britain’s Rule of Six hasn’t yet been imposed).

Styles, who has thoughtfully brought me a copy of de Botton’s 2006 book The Architecture of Happiness, is instinctively and almost quaintly polite, in an old-fashioned, holding-open-doors and not-mentioning-lovers-by-name sort of way. He is astounded to discover that the Atlanta-born Mitchell has yet to experience a traditional British Sunday roast dinner. Assuring him that “it’s basically like Thanksgiving every Sunday,” Styles gives Mitchell the details of his favorite London restaurants in which to enjoy one. “It’s a good thing to be nice,” Mitchell tells me after a morning in Styles’s company.

MITCHELL has Lionel Wendt’s languorously homoerotic 1930s portraits of young Sri Lankan men on his mood board. Nickerson is thinking of Irving Penn’s legendary fall 1950 Paris haute couture collections sitting, where he photographed midcentury supermodels, including his wife, Lisa Fonssagrives, in high-style Dior and Balenciaga creations. Styles is up for all of it, and so, it would seem, is the menswear landscape of 2020: Jonathan Anderson has produced a trapeze coat anchored with a chunky gold martingale; John Galliano at Maison Margiela has fashioned a khaki trench with a portrait neckline in layers of colored tulle; and Harris Reed—a Saint Martins fashion student sleuthed by Lambert who ended up making some looks for Styles’s last tour—has spent a week making a broad-shouldered Smoking jacket with high-waisted, wide-leg pants that have become a Styles signature since he posed for Tim Walker for the cover of Fine Line wearing a Gucci pair—a silhouette that was repeated in the tour wardrobe. (“I liked the idea of having that uniform,” says Styles.) Reed’s version is worn with a hoopskirt draped in festoons of hot-pink satin that somehow suggests Deborah Kerr asking Yul Brynner’s King of Siam, “Shall we dance?”

Styles introduces me to the writer and eyewear designer Gemma Styles, “my sister from the same womb,” he says. She is also here for the fitting: The siblings plan to surprise their mother with the double portrait on these pages.

I ask her whether her brother had always been interested in clothes.

“My mum loved to dress us up,” she remembers. “I always hated it, and Harry was always quite into it. She did some really elaborate papier-mâché outfits: She made a giant mug and then painted an atlas on it, and that was Harry being ‘The World Cup.’ Harry also had a little dalmatian-dog outfit,” she adds, “a hand-me-down from our closest family friends. He would just spend an inordinate amount of time wearing that outfit. But then Mum dressed me up as Cruella de Vil. She was always looking for any opportunity!”

“As a kid I definitely liked fancy dress,” Styles says. There were school plays, the first of which cast him as Barney, a church mouse. “I was really young, and I wore tights for that,” he recalls. “I remember it was crazy to me that I was wearing a pair of tights. And that was maybe where it all kicked off!”

Acting has also remained a fundamental form of expression for Styles. His sister recalls that even on the eve of his life-changing X Factor audition, Styles could sing in public only in an assumed voice. “He used to do quite a good sort of Elvis warble,” she remembers. During the rehearsals in the family home, “he would sing in the bathroom because if it was him singing as himself, he just couldn’t have anyone looking at him! I love his voice now,” she adds. “I’m so glad that he makes music that I actually enjoy listening to.”

Styles’s role-playing continued soon after 1D went on permanent hiatus in 2016, and he was cast in Christopher Nolan’s Dunkirk, beating out dozens of professional actors for the role. “The good part was my character was a young soldier who didn’t really know what he was doing,” says Styles modestly. “The scale of the movie was so big that I was a tiny piece of the puzzle. It was definitely humbling. I just loved being outside of my comfort zone.”

His performance caught the eye of Olivia Wilde, who remembers that it “blew me away—the openness and commitment.” In turn, Styles loved Wilde’s directorial debut, Booksmart, and is “very honored” that she cast him in a leading role for her second feature, a thriller titled Don’t Worry Darling, which went into production this fall. Styles will play the husband to Florence Pugh in what Styles describes as “a 1950s utopia in the California desert.”

Wilde’s movie is costumed by Academy Award nominee Arianne Phillips. “She and I did a little victory dance when we heard that we officially had Harry in the film,” notes Wilde, “because we knew that he has a real appreciation for fashion and style. And this movie is incredibly stylistic. It’s very heightened and opulent, and I’m really grateful that he is so enthusiastic about that element of the process—some actors just don’t care.”

“I like playing dress-up in general,” Styles concurs, in a masterpiece of understatement: This is the man, after all, who cohosted the Met’s 2019 “Notes on Camp” gala attired in a nipple-freeing black organza blouse with a lace jabot, and pants so high-waisted that they cupped his pectorals. The ensemble, accessorized with the pearl-drop earring of a dandified Elizabethan courtier, was created for Styles by Gucci’s Alessandro Michele, whom he befriended in 2014. Styles, who has subsequently personified the brand as the face of the Gucci fragrance, finds Michele “fearless with his work and his imagination. It’s really inspiring to be around someone who works like that.”

The two first met in London over a cappuccino. “It was just a kind of PR appointment,” says Michele, “but something magical happened, and Harry is now a friend. He has the aura of an English rock-and-roll star—like a young Greek god with the attitude of James Dean and a little bit of Mick Jagger—but no one is sweeter. He is the image of a new era, of the way that a man can look.”

Styles credits his style trans­formation—from Jack Wills tracksuit-clad boy-band heartthrob to nonpareil fashionisto—to his meeting the droll young stylist Harry Lambert seven years ago. They hit it off at once and have conspired ever since, enjoying a playfully campy rapport and calling each other Sue and Susan as they parse the niceties of the scarlet lace Gucci man-bra that Michele has made for Vogue’s shoot, for instance, or a pair of Bode pants hand-painted with biographical images (Styles sent Emily Adams Bode images of his family, and a photograph he had found of David Hockney and Joni Mitchell. “The idea of those two being friends, to me, was really beautiful,” Styles explains).

“He just has fun with clothing, and that’s kind of where I’ve got it from,” says Styles of Lambert. “He doesn’t take it too seriously, which means I don’t take it too seriously.” The process has been evolutionary. At his first meeting with Lambert, the stylist proposed “a pair of flares, and I was like, ‘Flares? That’s fucking crazy,’  ” Styles remembers. Now he declares that “you can never be overdressed. There’s no such thing. The people that I looked up to in music—Prince and David Bowie and Elvis and Freddie Mercury and Elton John—they’re such showmen. As a kid it was completely mind-blowing. Now I’ll put on something that feels really flamboyant, and I don’t feel crazy wearing it. I think if you get something that you feel amazing in, it’s like a superhero outfit. Clothes are there to have fun with and experiment with and play with. What’s really exciting is that all of these lines are just kind of crumbling away. When you take away ‘There’s clothes for men and there’s clothes for women,’ once you remove any barriers, obviously you open up the arena in which you can play. I’ll go in shops sometimes, and I just find myself looking at the women’s clothes thinking they’re amazing. It’s like anything—anytime you’re putting barriers up in your own life, you’re just limiting yourself. There’s so much joy to be had in playing with clothes. I’ve never really thought too much about what it means—it just becomes this extended part of creating something.”

“He’s up for it,” confirms Lambert, who earlier this year, for instance, found a JW Anderson cardigan with the look of a Rubik’s Cube (“on sale at matchesfashion.com!”). Styles wore it, accessorized with his own pearl necklace, for a Today rehearsal in February and it went viral: His fans were soon knitting their own versions and posting the results on TikTok. Jonathan Anderson declared himself “so impressed and incredibly humbled by this trend” that he nimbly made the pattern available (complete with a YouTube tutorial) so that Styles’s fans could copy it for free. Meanwhile, London’s storied Victoria & Albert Museum has requested Styles’s original: an emblematic document of how people got creative during the COVID era. “It’s going to be in their permanent collection,” says Lambert exultantly. “Is that not sick? Is that not the most epic thing?”

“It’s pretty powerful and kind of extraordinary to see someone in his position redefining what it can mean to be a man with confidence,” says Olivia Wilde

“To me, he’s very modern,” says Wilde of Styles, “and I hope that this brand of confidence as a male that Harry has—truly devoid of any traces of toxic masculinity—is indicative of his generation and therefore the future of the world. I think he is in many ways championing that, spearheading that. It’s pretty powerful and kind of extraordinary to see someone in his position redefining what it can mean to be a man with confidence.”

“He’s really in touch with his feminine side because it’s something natural,” notes Michele. “And he’s a big inspiration to a younger generation—about how you can be in a totally free playground when you feel comfortable. I think that he’s a revolutionary.”

STYLES’S confidence is on full display the day after the fitting, which finds us all on the beautiful Sussex dales. Over the summit of the hill, with its trees blown horizontal by the fierce winds, lies the English Channel. Even though it’s a two-hour drive from London, the fresh-faced Styles, who went to bed at 9 p.m., has arrived on set early: He is famously early for everything. The team is installed in a traditional flint-stone barn. The giant doors have been replaced by glass and frame a bucolic view of distant grazing sheep. “Look at that field!” says Styles. “How lucky are we? This is our office! Smell the roses!” Lambert starts to sing “Kumbaya, my Lord.”

Hairdresser Malcolm Edwards is setting Styles’s hair in a Victory roll with silver clips, and until it is combed out he resembles Kathryn Grayson with stubble. His fingers are freighted with rings, and “he has a new army of mini purses,” says Lambert, gesturing to an accessory table heaving with examples including a mini sky-blue Gucci Jackie bag discreetly monogrammed HS. Michele has also made Styles a dress for the shoot that Tissot might have liked to paint—acres of ice-blue ruffles, black Valenciennes lace, and suivez-moi, jeune homme ribbons. Erelong, Styles is gamely racing up a hill in it, dodging sheep scat, thistles, and shards of chalk, and striking a pose for Mitchell that manages to make ruffles a compelling new masculine proposition, just as Mr. Fish’s frothy white cotton dress—equal parts Romantic poet and Greek presidential guard—did for Mick Jagger when he wore it for The Rolling Stones’ free performance in Hyde Park in 1969, or as the suburban-mom floral housedress did for Kurt Cobain as he defined the iconoclastic grunge aesthetic. Styles is mischievously singing ABBA’s “Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (A Man After Midnight)” to himself when Mitchell calls him outside to jump up and down on a trampoline in a Comme des Garçons buttoned wool kilt. “How did it look?” asks his sister when he comes in from the cold. “Divine,” says her brother in playful Lambert-speak.

As the wide sky is washed in pink, orange, and gray, like a Turner sunset, and Mitchell calls it a successful day, Styles is playing “Cherry” from Fine Line on his Fender acoustic on the hilltop. “He does his own stunts,” says his sister, laughing. The impromptu set is greeted with applause. “Thank you, Antwerp!” says Styles playfully, bowing to the crowd. “Thank you, fashion!”

[ocean-sailor]

What kind of damages did Zayn have to pay for leaving the band, did Liam and Niall have to pay forever for signing with sony's competition, why is not Harry tied in any way to RBB/SBB legally so he is completely free living the life and co-owning businesses with Azoffs, investing in arenas and heading for Hollywood movie career? Why is Louis the exception to every contract law &why are not the other 4 guys, one is out, 2 with competition and one with muz biz "royalty"? Can the lawyer explain?

I’m not a lawyer but I do work with contracts so here’s my (sorry it’s long!) opinion about the 1D situation:  

The short answer is:  A contract is just a piece of paper, until one of the parties in the contract enforces the terms of the agreement.  

Music industry contracts don’t favour the artist.  The label has the power to offer a music career to the artist and the artist is expected to comply with whatever terms are laid out or they don’t get signed to the label.  1D were 16 - 18 years old when they signed up for xfuk.  They had big dreams and loads of talent but no life experience let alone legal/contract/music industry knowledge and Syco/Sony took full advantage of that.

I believe Zayn left 1D because his mental health was suffering - he just couldn’t work/live at that pace anymore.  It was an insane schedule - they were all overworked and that level of stress affects people differently.  I think he made his choice when he didn’t care about the consequences.  Then, when he wanted to make music as a solo artist, he had to deal with Sony. He doesn’t have good label support/promo but has good fan support and other artists want to work with him.  His music style/genre is the biggest trend in pop music right now so he should be huge - like Drake/The Weekend for example … but he’s doing well all considered and most importantly seems happy.

Niall and Liam did get to leave Sony but I think that’s because Sony didn’t realize that all the 1D members were going to have successful solo careers.  They’re the first ‘boyband’ to do this in a big, global way.  Sony had put a lot of money into Harry for years as they thought he would be THE ONLY ONE and they signed him as a solo artist at the beginning of 2016. That likely cost them a lot of $$$ and they may not have had the resources to compete for Liam and Niall as all the big labels wanted a piece of 1D - the biggest band in the world at the time.

Harry’s solo music career was planned by Sony quite early on - they wanted him to be the breakout star post 1D.  Ironically, they made him the most famous member which also gave him more negotiating power for his solo career.  Harry also smartly added the Azoffs - a powerful force in the music industry - and Harry’s solo contract was signed from a position of strength with eyes wide open compared to his 1D contracts.  However, I don’t think he is ‘completely free’ - no artist is - but I think he is working within his contracts and as long as he does, Sony is giving him their support.  It looks very good for Sony if Harry is wildly successful and he is making them a ton of money.

Louis’ solo career is complex and you’re right - there seems to be more/different issues holding him back.  There’s a lot of history - I think he was always the leader of 1D and has rocked the boat at the label and management for years.  He fought for all the boys against the power of Syco/Sony and they’ve been trying to control him ever since.  I also think they wanted to keep him behind the scenes because they recognized how his leadership fuelled the success of 1D and were hoping he’d do that over and over for them with other new artists - making them big $$$.  There’s a lot of talented, new artists out there but someone with Louis’ skill set and experience is rare.  

So we have Louis choosing to be an indie rock artist - a singer, a songwriter, and a musician that wants his own music career vs. Syco/Sony doing everything they can to hold him back - no label support, no promo, annoying af stunts that divide and damage his fanbase, and large periods of time where he is mia.  All in hopes that he gives in and follows their plan for him or they’ll shut him down completely so he’s not able to be an artist.  However, Louis isn’t giving up and it didn’t look like Sony was either.  But he was able to leave Syco as it was sinking and Arista hasn’t posted about him since he left Syco.  Sony definitely wouldn’t want him to go and be successful somewhere else, becoming their direct competition, but on my most optimistic days, I hope he’s been able to leave Sony.

Back to contracts - all the 1D boys are likely subject to several contracts with multiple terms from when they started in the band on xfuk, to their labels Syco/Columbia/Sony, and possibly even Modest Mgmt.  It’s not that Sony doesn’t have control over all of them to some extent, but they seem to be choosing to enforce the terms of Louis’ contracts more harshly as they are trying to control him and make him do what they want.  

But like Louis says - Faith In The Future !!  

[hlupdate]

Louis’ Interview with 1883 Magazine

Everybody knows One Direction - the band which was formed through The X-Factor in 2010 and went on to become the world’s biggest and most acclaimed boy band. Sold out tours, millions of international fans, and high-charting albums - Niall Horan, Liam Payne, Harry Styles, Zayn Malik and Louis Tomlinson created history.

However, in 2016 it was announced that One Direction will be on hiatus until further notice, which then led to each member launching their solo careers. Yet, they maintained strong from their loyal fanbase throughout the break-up and their individual journeys. 1883 Magazine sat down with Louis Tomlinson, the member who always saw himself as the outcast of the band - even though his fanbase is growing as strong as ever! 

Having released collaborative singles with the likes of Steve Aoki and Bebe Rexha to being on the judging panel of The X-Factor - ever single laughing his solo career, Louis has been actively working on being the greatest version of himself to date. The past three years he has spent a lot of time in the studio working on his debut album, and recently released a taste of what we can expect from it sound-wise - his brand new single ‘Two of Us’ is a beautiful yet heartbreaking ode to his late mother and represents Louis’s unique, raw style of songwriting. During our interview at Beach Blanket Babylon in London’s Notting Hill, he spoke more about the meaning behind the single, a One Direction reunion tour and being robbed in LA.

Interviewer: I’ve had a listen to your brand new single ‘Two of Us’. What a heartfelt song about your mum! It must have been so emotional to write it.

Louis: I’ll be honest, I kinda needed to get this song off my chest really and I knew going into these sessions and writing about different things I knew I wouldn’t feel complete. So I got it off my chest. But I wasn’t ready to write that song because in my head I wanted to be four, five years into my songwriting because it is such an important song to me. Then a few writers got in touch and I went to a session with them and told them my idea, and straight away it felt perfect. I haven’t felt the confidence to write this song by myself from scratch but they gave me the confidence I needed. And then the next hours we delved into it, changed things and now the end result is something I am really proud of. 

I: So you were only able to do it alongside the other songwriters? 

L: Yeah, they heard the song and asked what had happened. It just made so much sense with them. It evolved and I told them the background story. And then it just kind of came together and I managed to deliver the message that I wanted to deliver. I don’t want people to be exhausted after listening to it, I don’t want people to feel weighed down. I want them to be hopeful, just like the collaborative song I did with Steve Aoki. Just getting that message across felt really liberating.

I: I really like the song; I think you delivered the message very well. Generally, do you prefer writing alone or with other songwriters? 

L: Both, really. Obviously, sometimes on my own but I think where I’m at, in terms of my songwriting stage, I don’t consider myself as a proper professional yet. When I’m in these circles, it helps to be around that experience. 

I: Why don’t you see yourself as a professional?

L: Because as a songwriter I am quite unique, some of these pop sessions have more structure and I am less precise in my writing. I like to not have too many limitations of what a song should be, do you know what I mean? Especially a song like ‘Two of Us’, which is biographical.

I: Do you ever have to deal with any overly obsessive fans, as in groupies?

L: I mean, there are fans everywhere I go. But you kind of start recognizing faces. In London, for example ,there are about 20 individuals who are always somehow there when I’m doing something. And they don’t know how much confidence that gives me. Like, when I do a TV show - and I’m scared of that - and the minute I see a familiar face of my fans, I feel like what I do is important. My side stuff felt like a leap of faith to me and it’s all driven by the belief of the fans who keep me going.

I: So without fans, you wouldn’t have done a solo career?

L: Oh, no! When I was in the band, everything went so amazingly. It’s very hard to have a relative way of an example of where you stand in the industry. So the fans constantly gave me reinforcement. 

I: If there hadn’t been that incredible support, where would you have seen yourself after the band’s hiatus decision?

L: In my head, I would have just gotten better at songwriting, and write for other people. I hadn’t given it too much thought because us as a band didn’t have too much time to think about what we were going to do. But honestly, it sounds so generic, I wouldn't have had confidence without my fans. Now I feel empowered and it’s giving me strength. You find yourself in these do-or-die situations, and it’s been amazing so far.

I: do you think there’ll be an end to One Direction’s hiatus? Like a reunion tour or something else?

L: There’s gotta be! One hundred perfect. As far as I’m concerned, we are all good at doing our individual stuff right now and it’s great for yourself as an individual but the day we do get back together will be a magical day for all of us. I think everyone is in the same boat when it comes to this; it’s inevitable and the question is just when are we going to do it. Now that we are on this break, I can look back and say it was massive but looking from the other side you can see the influence and important. That’s really cool, just seeing our positive influence. we were such a powerhouse. It’s a no-brainer, I’m the first to sign the sheets to get back together. 

I: Let’s hope so! Do you still keep in touch with the others?

L: Yeah, we’ve been through so much. Obviously some speak more than others but that’s normal. Without it sounding condescending, I was always the oldest and still feel like a duty of care. I constantly check in with all of them. We always had each other when there was stress in the band, and we don’t have that anymore because we are doing solo careers.

I: On another note, how was your X-Factor experience, and why did you decide to be on the panel?

L: Well, obviously we came from the show and it kind of feels like home. Although I didn’t have experience on that side of TV. I felt confidence because I knew what it was like. What I wasn’t prepared for, though, was how emotionally invested I would be. I felt a bit of guilt as well because there were contestants who’d participated the same year we did, and I remembered them from boot camp. So that was a weird dynamic. It was humbling, definitely.

I: What were the biggest challenges?

L: The first day of audition I was terrified, to be honest.I was proper nervous but once I had done a couple I knew I didn’t have to become this character, this TV version of myself. I realized I could just go on and look after the contestants. It’s given me great experience that I wouldn’t have had elsewhere.

I: What was it like being part of the winning team?

L: The winner stood out clearly, from the first live show he had everyone say that he is going to be a winner, and there was a lot of pressure. 

I: Would you ever do it again?

L: Maybe, I loved the experience. I never say never! I’m so determined to prove a point with my music so if it interrupted that process it would be a very hard decision, to be honest. Music comes first every time for me. Maybe one day!

I: You said you are all about developing new artists, would you ever mentor one?

L: I have an imprint at Syco and I think I’ve got good music taste. I’ve always been interested in finding new bands because that seems kinda cool to me, and I had a list of a couple of bands I really liked. And since then I had that imprint deal, I’m constantly on the lookout.

I: Where do you usually lookout for these new bands? 

L: BBC Introducing is great. Other than that, it’s just these tedious ways of using Soundcloud and YouTube. I think in terms of what I’m looking for is a little bit of rock, defiance, and everything instead of this clean-cut we’ve got a lot of. 

I: Nothing wrong with Rock, which are your favorite Rock acts? 

L: I love Oasis, I love Liam Gallagher to be honest! He’s unique and different, love him or hate him. He is a breath of fresh air. As I was growing up, and that is the reason I struggled to place myself on the radio, it was the time where guitar-driven pop really got big on the airwaves. You know, bands like The Kooks, Oasis, Two Door Cinema Club. Now, Hip Hop and R&B are taking that spot and it’s hard to relate to that. I don’t want to be too pretentious, I’m [well] aware of where I come from but I have a mission where I want to be. 

I: So how would you classify your genre?

L: Oh, that’s a big question. Wow, that’s hard. In terms of what I’m looking for from a production point of view I want things to sound organic and live. Not too many programmed instruments. I want it to feel authentic. From a lyric perspective, almost like indie-pop, very conversational. All these sexy metaphors people put in their music? I ain’t got time for that. I like it straight to the point. It’s hard to classify it as a particular genre. 

I: After your album release, would you go on tour again?

L: Definitely! Hopefully, I will get some dates locked in before the end of the year because I haven’t been on the road for a good three years. I miss the routine, it’s the Rock ‘n’ Roll lifestyle. You wake up at 3pm, do the show on a high, go to bed and do it all over again. It’s definitely super fun. 

I: Would you ever consider performing at a festival?

L: Yeah! I did Ultra Festival with Steve Aoki in Miami. It was so good. It was a proper performance and hoped for the the best but I loved it. EDM fans are proper fanatical, they party hard! I don’t remember too much, but I came off buzzing. Those moments, going out on your one which is a different experience, just move you.

So one day, being on a festival bill would be really amazing, but I have to make that transition music-wise before approaching festivals.

I: You are also constantly jetting between Los Angeles and London, do you have plans to settle down in one of those cities one day?

L: I’m kind of used to traveling, a lot of sesions make me travel between those countries anyway...I’m just used to it now. I actually got robbed in LA, though. 

I: What, how did you find out?

L: I saw it on CCTV, these f*ckers. They didn’t take anything sentimental. I haven’t actually been robbed since I was 10 years old.

I: Wow. But do you refer LA or London? I suppose LA due to the better weather?

L: I much prefer London. I feel like I’m a very British character so when I’m in LA for too long I feel too different. There are a lo tof people there who are f*ke as fuck, and they’re cold. But the locals are the cool ones, it’s the ones from the outside who try to snake you.

I: One a different note, what are you watching on Netflix right now?

L: This may sound creepy but I’m proper into Psychology so I watch sinister, dark stuff. Lots of murder mystery on Netflix, and I watch many documentaries, such as David Attenborough’s stuff. What I don’t like is Stranger Things. I can’t get into it. 

I: How did you deal with the additional grief over the past few months? 

L: I’m so grateful for all of my fans worldwide for their love and support, but especially over the last few months. They are always there for me and I appreciate every single one of them.

I: Are you still planning to release your album this year or have you got an other projects coming up?

L: I’m really looking forward to releasing more music in the next few months with my album coming early next year. I’m really excited to get this record out and getting back on the road too. It’s been a long process, but I’ve finally got everything into a place which I’m really happy with. I’m going to feel so relieved and proud when the fans get to hear the album! 

I: Are there going to be any features on the album? I don’t think so. I think it’s important that people can see and hear a body of work and try to see who I am as an artist.

Single ‘Two of Us’ is out now.

[louistomlinsoncouk]

He became a bona-fide teen pop superstar as part of One Direction, then suffered unthinkable personal loss. Louis Tomlinson talks to Guy Kelly about fame, family and what comes next.

Louis Tomlinson took part in an online video recently, in which he was tasked with answering the internet’s most-searched questions about him. It was fairly tame, as you might expect of a pop quiz thrown at a pop star. ‘How do you pronounce Louis Tomlinson?’ the first read. There’s an interesting answer to that, actually, but we’ll come to it. ‘How old is Louis Tomlinson?’ was the second. He’s 28. And then came the third. ‘How is Louis Tomlinson?’

In the video, the man himself looks a little bewildered, dismissing the query as ‘random’ before moving on. But underneath, in the YouTube comments – one of the few nooks of the internet where love and goodwill still thrives – a fan repeated it. ‘“How is Louis Tomlinson,”’ they wrote, ‘the only question that matters.’ More than 7,000 people ‘liked’ it.

Given all Tomlinson’s been through in the past four years, it seems reasonable to ask. In 2016, the band he’d been in man and boy, One Direction, went on an indefinite hiatus after six years. Since being welded together by Simon Cowell on The X Factor in 2010, ‘1D’ had enjoyed perhaps the most stratospheric rise in music (five platinum albums, four world tours) since The Beatles. It hadn’t been Tomlinson’s decision to break up the band, and he wasn’t – still isn’t – particularly happy about it.

In December of that year, his beloved mother, Johannah Deakin, died a few months after being diagnosed with leukaemia. She was 43. Tomlinson pressed on with his nascent solo career, but unimaginable tragedy struck again. In March 2019, his 18-year-old half-sister, Félicité, was found unconscious at her flat in London and couldn’t be revived. An inquest later found she had died of an accidental drug overdose. Again, he buckled down, looked after his remaining siblings, and committed himself to finishing his debut album.

Settling down with Tomlinson in the corner of a west London photo studio, then, it seems as good a place as any to start: how is he?

‘I’m good, mate, I’m feeling good,’ he says, spreading his arms across a sofa. After wearing a series of high-end outfits for our photo shoot (‘I never feel super-comfortable on shoots; I’ve got one f—king pose – moody’), he’s in a black ’90s-inspired collared jumper, black trousers and black trainers.

He pushes his fringe to one side. The Doncaster accent, which softened in his 1D days, is back to pure, unfettered South Yorks. It’s all ‘in t’band’, ‘I didn’t know owt’, and swearing like a navvy. He’s honest, funny, and if his feet were planted any more firmly on the ground he’d be unable to walk.

I tell him about the YouTube comment, which seems to reflect the genuine care his fans have for him.

‘Ah, yeah I know, they’re considerate, they are. We’ve got a special, interesting bond. They’ve grown up with me – and I’ve been through some personal stuff and they’ve always been there for me.’

Tomlinson’s album, Walls, has been a long time coming. Immediately after One Direction split, he released a couple of singles – dance-y pop collaborations – which were fine, but not what he wanted to make. Halfway through writing Walls he realised, ‘If I’m chasing radio with every song I write, I’m not going to be doing this job for very long.’

So he relaxed, and the result is a mix of strong, melody-driven pop of the kind One Direction mastered, and what Tomlinson is really into, namely guitar-driven indie and Britpop. Some songs for the fans; some nodding to the future.

‘It’s a five-album plan. There’s bits where I’ve been almost selfish, and bits where I’ve been respectful to the fan base and what they love listening to,’ he says. ‘Then the next will be a step closer to the stuff I want to make. But I’ve got to earn my stripes.’

The dominant theme, I say, appears to be resilience. On the single Don’t Let It Break Your Heart, he advises, ‘Even when it hurts like hell / Oh, whatever tears you apart / Don’t let it break your heart.’ On the rousing title track (which features a writing credit for Noel Gallagher, who gave his blessing for a chorus strikingly similar to an Oasis tune), he sings, ‘These high walls that broke my soul / I watched all come falling down.’

It could be to do with grief, professional struggles, or his relationship. He nods.

‘Yeah, I write very autobiographically and had so much going on in my head, but in the struggle I’m trying to paint the message that you’re always left with a choice: to see the glass half-full or half-empty. It’s showing there’s hope.’

Some songwriters have found grief productive, others paralysing. Tomlinson was the former. One track on Walls is the previously released Two of Us, a beautiful, simple song written about his mum (‘You’ll never know how much I miss you / The day that they took you, I wish it was me instead’).

‘What’s amazing about this job is that regardless of the situation, you get something positive at the end of it. That’s obviously an emotionally heavy song for me, but fans have come up to me in floods of tears and talked about how it’s helped in their own tragedy. It’s incredible. From the dark, you can give hope.’

For the first three years of his life, Tomlinson was raised alone by Johannah, who split from his father, Troy Austin, when he was a baby. They lived above a launderette in Doncaster, where his mother worked multiple jobs, principally as a midwife, before she married Mark Tomlinson, a van salesman who became Louis’s stepfather. The three moved into a two-up, two-down, which was soon filled with half-sisters: Lottie, now 21, Félicité, then twins Daisy and Phoebe, now 16.

‘It was mad. They’re manic, young girls…’ he says. ‘Mum and Mark had a decent income but they couldn’t spread it around [a family of] seven. At times things were really good, you’d get 20 quid in a birthday card, but others were really difficult. I remember the electricity meter – you’d get five quid on the house as an emergency when you couldn’t top it up. Sometimes it’d be a gamble when it’d run out…’

Tomlinson wasn’t particularly academic – ‘though I’m not daft or owt’ – but loved school. There, he joined a band at 16 and found he was OK at singing, so he applied to audition for The X Factor. He failed, twice, but succeeded on the third try, in 2010, performing a fairly terrible (he admits it) version of Plain White T’s Hey There Delilah.

A few months later, at the ‘bootcamp’ stage, Cowell had the idea of creating a band comprised of Tomlinson and four other solo boys: Harry Styles, Zayn Malik, Niall Horan and Liam Payne. They were to be called One Direction. Tomlinson, who’d been intimidated by the standard of other vocalists in the competition, ‘bit their hand off’ at the offer. ‘I was like, “This is my ticket.”’

The show came just after his second run at the first year of his A levels. He’d failed the first time, with UUE in psychology, PE and English, which his mum had ‘absolutely ripped [his] head off’ for. The second time he’d gone one better, UEE. So he lied, telling her he got a smattering of Ds, and came up with a plan.

‘I waited until after the X Factor final, when we were all sat around drinking champagne, and told her, “By the way, I bulls—tted you on those results. I failed again, but hopefully we’ll be all right now…”’ he laughs. ‘She was fine. I picked my moment well.’

One Direction came third in the final, losing to runner-up Rebecca Ferguson and winner Matt Cardle, a former painter-decorator who now performs in the West End. But it was always felt that the group would go furthest, not least because Cowell was such a supporter (all the other boys have now left his record label, Syco, but because ‘loyalty is the biggest thing’ for Tomlinson, he’s stayed).

Eighteen when the group started, Tomlinson was the oldest member (the others were 16 and 17), ‘just allowed to drink, just allowed to drive’, but suddenly everything in his life was controlled.

‘You’re ready to be reckless and stupid, but then I was in the band and couldn’t ever act like that, especially not publicly,’ he says. They went on their first headline concert tour in 2011, and soon had fans surrounding their hotels overnight, wherever in the world they went. Naturally, they embraced partying.

‘There was a good 18 months where I was going out all the time. The press love to write about that as if it’s this chaotic thing, and at times it was, but it’s also an escape. Once you have a couple of drinks down you in a club, you’re just someone in the club, part of everyone else, and not everyone is looking at you.’

Even when he was away, he kept in contact with his mum by phone – or in person, when she could join him – as much as possible. The two were impossibly close: she had access to his emails; he told her when he lost his virginity; she knew about his finances.

‘One thing I’ve learnt since losing her is that any decision, even if I knew the answer, I’d call her,’ he says. ‘I didn’t realise how reliant I’d become on her. That was the hardest thing for me, understanding that living life after meant making decisions on my own. I thought I’d always have a sounding board. There was a different level of credibility with my mum, because I idolised her.’

Styles has recently joked that One Direction were ‘grown in test tubes’ by Cowell, but Tomlinson insists that part of their appeal lay in the fact that they all had their own personalities and talents, which weren’t forced on them. Still, it took him years to know where he fitted. Styles was cool, a heart-throb. Malik was moody and mysterious. Horan was cute and Irish. Payne was whatever Payne was. But Tomlinson wasn’t sure.

‘You’ve got to be dead cocky in Doncaster to survive – it’s either that or be picked on. So I used to walk around with a chip on my shoulder. But I’d always been the funny guy, centre of attention, so I never struggled to make mates,’ he says. ‘It was weird suddenly being in a situation where one or two members are constantly in a better position. It took me a while to understand my strengths. I was the oldest and it wasn’t until the third album when I made it my mission to write the most.’

He succeeded: Tomlinson’s writing credit appears on 39 of the 96 songs One Direction recorded, four more than Payne and dozens more than the rest. But it was intense. There were times when he considered quitting the band, if only to allow him to escape the attention, but he likens that to children running away from home. ‘By the time you get halfway down the street you regret it and go back…’

‘Directioners’ were ‘fanatical’ about the boys, to a frequently absurd degree. And not every encounter was surreally funny. The year after the hiatus began, in 2017, Tomlinson and Calder were involved in a scuffle with paparazzi and fans at the airport in LA. Fists possibly flew, and Tomlinson was arrested, only for no further action to be taken. The fans now are still loyal, still ardent, but they’ve matured with him.

What kept him grounded, as the money rolled in (I have heard that each of the boys amassed a £40 million fortune from the band, and that collectively they still earn around £38,000 a week from royalties, merchandise and so on) and the fans bayed, was keeping friends from Doncaster around. When I arrived at today’s photo shoot, Tomlinson was busy doing his singular pose at one end of the room, while at the other, near the free pastries, a young redheaded bloke in a tracksuit lurked, scrolling through his phone.

He introduced himself as Oli, Tomlinson’s ‘mate from Donny’, who has spent the better part of a decade travelling the world with his pop-star friend, and seems to operate as a walking comfort blanket. They live together when Tomlinson’s in LA.

They also live together when he’s in London. I imagine there’s space for house guests wherever he is, though: it has been reported that he put his Hollywood Hills mansion on the market last year for $6.995 million, and the previous year valued another property in California at $13.999 million, after apparently renting it out for $40,000 per month.

‘I’m hoping to do a bit of work with Louis’s tour manager this year,’ Oli says, cheerfully. I later discover he’s so ever-present with Tomlinson that he even has his own fan accounts on social media.

‘I remember bringing a mate out for our first US tour. He called from his hotel with his mind blown by being able to pick up a phone and they’d just bring you food,’ Tomlinson says. ‘I go back to Donny and hear heavy s—t – struggles with jobs, money, family, health. That humbles me, and gives me a better emotional intelligence.’

He reckons ‘eight out of 10 people have an ulterior motive’ when they meet him. Luckily he can tell if someone’s a pre-fame friend. His name is pronounced ‘Loo-ee’, but he wasn’t keen on it as a child, so had mates, like Oli, pronounce it ‘Lewis’, which they still do. Unfortunately Cowell guessed at ‘Loo-ee’ on The X Factor, so that was that for the stage name.

By 2015, some members of One Direction felt an itch to break off – or just have a break – and try their own thing. Malik had gone in March, and while a full split seemed inevitable, Tomlinson was still caught off-guard.

‘I was f—king fuming at first. We were working really hard – people [namely, Payne] have said overworked, but we weren’t overworked, that’s just what happens when you’re a band that size, though I understand. I thought I’d mentally prepared myself for a break, but it hit me hard.’

He was finally feeling comfortable in the band, and hadn’t thought about a solo career.

‘About a week after, I sat there thinking, “Strike while the iron’s hot,” but I wasn’t ready. I was bitter and angry, I didn’t know why we couldn’t just carry on. But now, even though I don’t fully understand everyone’s individual reasons, I respect them.’

They’re ostensibly all still mates, despite going in radically different musical directions, though some are closer than others. Tomlinson seems to mention Horan with most affection, and the pair performed at the same event in Mexico in November, titillating 1D fans by sound-checking together with one of the band’s old songs.

If it was up to you, I ask, would the group still be going? He considers this for a moment.

‘It if was up to me, yeah. I’d maybe have said, “Let’s have a year off.” But yeah, probably. I’m sure there’s a better analogy out there but it’s a bit like [shutting down] Coca-Cola. You don’t say, “Right, let’s hang the boots up on that,” because it’s a massive thing.’

Afterwards he muddled around for a bit, including releasing those early singles – one of which he performed on The X Factor, rigid with grief, just days after his mum’s death. Then he returned to the show last year as a judge, alongside Cowell, Robbie Williams and Williams’s wife, Ayda Field.

Did he get on with Robbie? He smiles, arching an eyebrow. ‘Why do you ask?’ Well, he came out of a boy band, went solo…

‘Oh, yeah, he was all right. He’s a good man, we were just different from each other. Certain moments I thought, “F—king hell, Robbie, just sit down for five minutes, I’ve got something to say.” I love his missus though, Ayda, she’s sound.’

Tomlinson liked mentoring, and during our conversation it becomes clear he’s fuelled by responsibility. He was the oldest sibling in his house, and although Mark Tomlinson and Johannah’s second husband (after divorcing Mark in 2011, she married Dan Deakin in 2014; they had twins Ernest and Doris) are still around, he became a paternal figure after she died. He’s particularly involved in the lives of Daisy and Phoebe, to whom he’s ‘a kind of second parent’.

‘Without being too soppy, I like looking after people, it’s cool. At the moment I’m stressing trying to convince Daisy and Phoebe to go to sixth form. They’ve been to private school near Donny, and it’s proper expensive. I’m paying for it thinking they’re staying on, but now they don’t want to go. I told them education is important. I’m like, “You’re 16, you haven’t got a f—king idea what the real world is,”’ he says.

‘What’s difficult about those two is they’ve only known the 1D craziness. They’ve grown up in this elitist way, which is very different from my upbringing and Lottie’s, and the values my mum taught us.’

He gives a ‘kids, eh?’ sigh. ‘Consistency is the big thing. I’m trying to get better at being in their heads enough so they think, “I wonder if Louis thinks this is a good idea?”’

Lottie lives in Hackney, east London. When she was a teenager, Tomlinson got her a job assisting One Direction’s make-up artist, and within a few years she’d become a ridiculously popular Instagrammer (currently with 3.4 million followers, still 10 million shy of Louis). Her big brother told her Instagram’s fine, but she must ‘become a proper businesswoman’ in case the bubble bursts. In 2018 she launched Tanologist, a successful fake-tan brand.

‘I’m so proud of her. She’s just been in Australia, where she’s stocked in Melbourne’s version of Boots!’ Tomlinson says, beaming.

Félicité, known to the family as Fizz, was also a budding Instagrammer. After her death last March, a post-mortem revealed ‘toxic’ levels of anti-anxiety and pain medications, as well as cocaine, in her blood. Six months later, an inquest heard that she had visited her GP in August 2018 and ‘gave a history of recreational drug use… on a consistent basis since the death of her mother’. She had taken overdoses and been admitted to a rehabilitation clinic.

Tomlinson hesitates to say anything was ‘easier’, comparing the deaths of Félicité and his mum, as ‘both felt very individual, and hit me with a big impact… but I think dealing with the family, how I can be there for them, that was a lot easier the second time because the first time I was grieving and didn’t know what to say. As time went on I grew to understand what to say to my sisters.’

Prioritising the feelings of your sisters in the immediate aftermath is understandable, I say, but I wonder if anyone took care of you. He looks surprised.

‘No, but friends and family, my best mate… I feel their support but I get most out of doing stuff for other people. I don’t say that to sound like a good guy, it’s genuinely what gives me strength.’

Did you ever consider grief therapy?

‘Nah, a lot of people recommended it but I’m a little bit old-fashioned when it comes to therapy. I’m sure it’s incredible, but I thought I’d be all right, and I have been till now.’ One of his many tattoos consists of the words ‘It Is What It Is’ across his chest. ‘I know the things I’ve been upset about in my life are s—t, but I can’t change them, so you have to make the best of what you’ve got.’

Tomlinson gives his own big smile. Our time’s nearly up, and he’d like a cigarette. After all you’ve been through, I tell him, people would have understood if you’d called it a day. You could have lived off royalties, enjoyed a quiet life.

‘Definitely, definitely. But do you know what? It didn’t cross my mind once. I somehow have an inability to worry, and just get on with things,’ he says, shrugging. ‘It’s definitely made me stronger. I’ve gone through every emotion, and I’m just f—king excited now.’

I think we have an answer. How is Louis Tomlinson? Hopefully, he’ll be just fine.

Walls is released on 31 January

[elceeu2morrow]

By Guy Kelly 17 JANUARY 2020 • 8:00PM

He became a bona-fide teen pop superstar as part of One Direction, then suffered unthinkable personal loss. Louis Tomlinson talks to Guy Kelly about fame, family and what comes next.

Louis Tomlinson took part in an online video recently, in which he was tasked with answering the internet’s most-searched questions about him. It was fairly tame, as you might expect of a pop quiz thrown at a pop star. ‘How do you pronounce Louis Tomlinson?’ the first read. There’s an interesting answer to that, actually, but we’ll come to it. ‘How old is Louis Tomlinson?’ was the second. He’s 28. And then came the third. ‘How is Louis Tomlinson?’

In the video, the man himself looks a little bewildered, dismissing the query as ‘random’ before moving on. But underneath, in the YouTube comments – one of the few nooks of the internet where love and goodwill still thrives – a fan repeated it. ‘“How is Louis Tomlinson,”’ they wrote, ‘the only question that matters.’ More than 7,000 people ‘liked’ it.

Given all Tomlinson’s been through in the past four years, it seems reasonable to ask. In 2016, the band he’d been in man and boy, One Direction, went on an indefinite hiatus after six years. Since being welded together by Simon Cowell on The X Factor in 2010, ‘1D’ had enjoyed perhaps the most stratospheric rise in music (five platinum albums, four world tours) since The Beatles. It hadn’t been Tomlinson’s decision to break up the band, and he wasn’t – still isn’t – particularly happy about it.

[complete article below the cut]

In December of that year, his beloved mother, Johannah Deakin, died a few months after being diagnosed with leukaemia. She was 43. Tomlinson pressed on with his nascent solo career, but unimaginable tragedy struck again. In March 2019, his 18-year-old half-sister, Félicité, was found unconscious at her flat in London and couldn’t be revived. An inquest later found she had died of an accidental drug overdose. Again, he buckled down, looked after his remaining siblings, and committed himself to finishing his debut album.

Settling down with Tomlinson in the corner of a west London photo studio, then, it seems as good a place as any to start: how is he?

‘I’m good, mate, I’m feeling good,’ he says, spreading his arms across a sofa. After wearing a series of high-end outfits for our photo shoot (‘I never feel super-comfortable on shoots; I’ve got one f—king pose – moody’), he’s in a black ’90s-inspired collared jumper, black trousers and black trainers.

He pushes his fringe to one side. The Doncaster accent, which softened in his 1D days, is back to pure, unfettered South Yorks. It’s all ‘in t’band’, ‘I didn’t know owt’, and swearing like a navvy. He’s honest, funny, and if his feet were planted any more firmly on the ground he’d be unable to walk.

I tell him about the YouTube comment, which seems to reflect the genuine care his fans have for him.

‘Ah, yeah I know, they’re considerate, they are. We’ve got a special, interesting bond. They’ve grown up with me – and I’ve been through some personal stuff and they’ve always been there for me.’

Tomlinson’s album, Walls, has been a long time coming. Immediately after One Direction split, he released a couple of singles – dance-y pop collaborations – which were fine, but not what he wanted to make. Halfway through writing Walls he realised, ‘If I’m chasing radio with every song I write, I’m not going to be doing this job for very long.’

So he relaxed, and the result is a mix of strong, melody-driven pop of the kind One Direction mastered, and what Tomlinson is really into, namely guitar-driven indie and Britpop. Some songs for the fans; some nodding to the future.

‘It’s a five-album plan. There’s bits where I’ve been almost selfish, and bits where I’ve been respectful to the fan base and what they love listening to,’ he says. ‘Then the next will be a step closer to the stuff I want to make. But I’ve got to earn my stripes.’

The dominant theme, I say, appears to be resilience. On the single Don’t Let It Break Your Heart, he advises, ‘Even when it hurts like hell / Oh, whatever tears you apart / Don’t let it break your heart.’ On the rousing title track (which features a writing credit for Noel Gallagher, who gave his blessing for a chorus strikingly similar to an Oasis tune), he sings, ‘These high walls that broke my soul / I watched all come falling down.’

It could be to do with grief, professional struggles, or his relationship – he’s happily with his girlfriend, 27-year-old fashion blogger Eleanor Calder, but they’ve been on and off over the years. He nods.

‘Yeah, I write very autobiographically and had so much going on in my head, but in the struggle I’m trying to paint the message that you’re always left with a choice: to see the glass half-full or half-empty. It’s showing there’s hope.’

Some songwriters have found grief productive, others paralysing. Tomlinson was the former. One track on Walls is the previously released Two of Us, a beautiful, simple song written about his mum (‘You’ll never know how much I miss you / The day that they took you, I wish it was me instead’).

‘What’s amazing about this job is that regardless of the situation, you get something positive at the end of it. That’s obviously an emotionally heavy song for me, but fans have come up to me in floods of tears and talked about how it’s helped in their own tragedy. It’s incredible. From the dark, you can give hope.’

For the first three years of his life, Tomlinson was raised alone by Johannah, who split from his father, Troy Austin, when he was a baby. They lived above a launderette in Doncaster, where his mother worked multiple jobs, principally as a midwife, before she married Mark Tomlinson, a van salesman who became Louis’s stepfather. The three moved into a two-up, two-down, which was soon filled with half-sisters: Lottie, now 21, Félicité, then twins Daisy and Phoebe, now 16.

‘It was mad. They’re manic, young girls…’ he says. ‘Mum and Mark had a decent income but they couldn’t spread it around [a family of] seven. At times things were really good, you’d get 20 quid in a birthday card, but others were really difficult. I remember the electricity meter – you’d get five quid on the house as an emergency when you couldn’t top it up. Sometimes it’d be a gamble when it’d run out…’

Tomlinson wasn’t particularly academic – ‘though I’m not daft or owt’ – but loved school. There, he joined a band at 16 and found he was OK at singing, so he applied to audition for The X Factor. He failed, twice, but succeeded on the third try, in 2010, performing a fairly terrible (he admits it) version of Plain White T’s Hey There Delilah.

A few months later, at the ‘bootcamp’ stage, Cowell had the idea of creating a band comprised of Tomlinson and four other solo boys: Harry Styles, Zayn Malik, Niall Horan and Liam Payne. They were to be called One Direction. Tomlinson, who’d been intimidated by the standard of other vocalists in the competition, ‘bit their hand off’ at the offer. ‘I was like, “This is my ticket.”’

The show came just after his second run at the first year of his A levels. He’d failed the first time, with UUE in psychology, PE and English, which his mum had ‘absolutely ripped [his] head off’ for. The second time he’d gone one better, UEE. So he lied, telling her he got a smattering of Ds, and came up with a plan.

‘I waited until after the X Factor final, when we were all sat around drinking champagne, and told her, “By the way, I bulls—tted you on those results. I failed again, but hopefully we’ll be all right now…”’ he laughs. ‘She was fine. I picked my moment well.’

One Direction came third in the final, losing to runner-up Rebecca Ferguson and winner Matt Cardle, a former painter-decorator who now performs in the West End. But it was always felt that the group would go furthest, not least because Cowell was such a supporter (all the other boys have now left his record label, Syco, but because ‘loyalty is the biggest thing’ for Tomlinson, he’s stayed).

Eighteen when the group started, Tomlinson was the oldest member (the others were 16 and 17), ‘just allowed to drink, just allowed to drive’, but suddenly everything in his life was controlled.

‘You’re ready to be reckless and stupid, but then I was in the band and couldn’t ever act like that, especially not publicly,’ he says. They went on their first headline concert tour in 2011, and soon had fans surrounding their hotels overnight, wherever in the world they went. Naturally, they embraced partying.

‘There was a good 18 months where I was going out all the time. The press love to write about that as if it’s this chaotic thing, and at times it was, but it’s also an escape. Once you have a couple of drinks down you in a club, you’re just someone in the club, part of everyone else, and not everyone is looking at you.’

Even when he was away, he kept in contact with his mum by phone – or in person, when she could join him – as much as possible. The two were impossibly close: she had access to his emails; he told her when he lost his virginity; she knew about his finances.

‘One thing I’ve learnt since losing her is that any decision, even if I knew the answer, I’d call her,’ he says. ‘I didn’t realise how reliant I’d become on her. That was the hardest thing for me, understanding that living life after meant making decisions on my own. I thought I’d always have a sounding board. There was a different level of credibility with my mum, because I idolised her.’

Styles has recently joked that One Direction were ‘grown in test tubes’ by Cowell, but Tomlinson insists that part of their appeal lay in the fact that they all had their own personalities and talents, which weren’t forced on them. Still, it took him years to know where he fitted. Styles was cool, a heart-throb. Malik was moody and mysterious. Horan was cute and Irish. Payne was whatever Payne was. But Tomlinson wasn’t sure.

‘You’ve got to be dead cocky in Doncaster to survive – it’s either that or be picked on. So I used to walk around with a chip on my shoulder. But I’d always been the funny guy, centre of attention, so I never struggled to make mates,’ he says. ‘It was weird suddenly being in a situation where one or two members are constantly in a better position. It took me a while to understand my strengths. I was the oldest and it wasn’t until the third album when I made it my mission to write the most.’

He succeeded: Tomlinson’s writing credit appears on 39 of the 96 songs One Direction recorded, four more than Payne and dozens more than the rest. But it was intense. There were times when he considered quitting the band, if only to allow him to escape the attention, but he likens that to children running away from home. ‘By the time you get halfway down the street you regret it and go back…’

‘Directioners’ were ‘fanatical’ about the boys, to a frequently absurd degree. And not every encounter was surreally funny. The year after the hiatus began, in 2017, Tomlinson and Calder were involved in a scuffle with paparazzi and fans at the airport in LA. Fists possibly flew, and Tomlinson was arrested, only for no further action to be taken. The fans now are still loyal, still ardent, but they’ve matured with him.

What kept him grounded, as the money rolled in (I have heard that each of the boys amassed a £40 million fortune from the band, and that collectively they still earn around £38,000 a week from royalties, merchandise and so on) and the fans bayed, was keeping friends from Doncaster around. When I arrived at today’s photo shoot, Tomlinson was busy doing his singular pose at one end of the room, while at the other, near the free pastries, a young redheaded bloke in a tracksuit lurked, scrolling through his phone.

He introduced himself as Oli, Tomlinson’s ‘mate from Donny’, who has spent the better part of a decade travelling the world with his pop-star friend, and seems to operate as a walking comfort blanket. They live together when Tomlinson’s in LA, where he has a three-year-old son, Freddie, from a short relationship with stylist Briana Jungwirth.

They also live together when he’s in London, along with Calder, to whom it was recently reported that Tomlinson is engaged (his representatives denied the rumour). I imagine there’s space for house guests wherever he is, though: it has been reported that he put his Hollywood Hills mansion on the market last year for $6.995 million, and the previous year valued another property in California at $13.999 million, after apparently renting it out for $40,000 per month.

‘I’m hoping to do a bit of work with Louis’s tour manager this year,’ Oli says, cheerfully. I later discover he’s so ever-present with Tomlinson that he even has his own fan accounts on social media.

‘I remember bringing a mate out for our first US tour. He called from his hotel with his mind blown by being able to pick up a phone and they’d just bring you food,’ Tomlinson says. ‘I go back to Donny and hear heavy s—t – struggles with jobs, money, family, health. That humbles me, and gives me a better emotional intelligence.’

He reckons ‘eight out of 10 people have an ulterior motive’ when they meet him. Luckily he can tell if someone’s a pre-fame friend. His name is pronounced ‘Loo-ee’, but he wasn’t keen on it as a child, so had mates, like Oli, pronounce it ‘Lewis’, which they still do. Unfortunately Cowell guessed at ‘Loo-ee’ on The X Factor, so that was that for the stage name.

By 2015, some members of One Direction felt an itch to break off – or just have a break – and try their own thing. Malik had gone in March, and while a full split seemed inevitable, Tomlinson was still caught off-guard.

‘I was f—king fuming at first. We were working really hard – people [namely, Payne] have said overworked, but we weren’t overworked, that’s just what happens when you’re a band that size, though I understand. I thought I’d mentally prepared myself for a break, but it hit me hard.’

He was finally feeling comfortable in the band, and hadn’t thought about a solo career.

‘About a week after, I sat there thinking, “Strike while the iron’s hot,” but I wasn’t ready. I was bitter and angry, I didn’t know why we couldn’t just carry on. But now, even though I don’t fully understand everyone’s individual reasons, I respect them.’

They’re ostensibly all still mates, despite going in radically different musical directions, though some are closer than others. Tomlinson seems to mention Horan with most affection, and the pair performed at the same event in Mexico in November, titillating 1D fans by sound-checking together with one of the band’s old songs.

If it was up to you, I ask, would the group still be going? He considers this for a moment.

‘It if was up to me, yeah. I’d maybe have said, “Let’s have a year off.” But yeah, probably. I’m sure there’s a better analogy out there but it’s a bit like [shutting down] Coca-Cola. You don’t say, “Right, let’s hang the boots up on that,” because it’s a massive thing.’

Afterwards he muddled around for a bit, including releasing those early singles – one of which he performed on The X Factor, rigid with grief, just days after his mum’s death. Then he returned to the show last year as a judge, alongside Cowell, Robbie Williams and Williams’s wife, Ayda Field.

Did he get on with Robbie? He smiles, arching an eyebrow. ‘Why do you ask?’ Well, he came out of a boy band, went solo…

‘Oh, yeah, he was all right. He’s a good man, we were just different from each other. Certain moments I thought, “F—king hell, Robbie, just sit down for five minutes, I’ve got something to say.” I love his missus though, Ayda, she’s sound.’

Tomlinson liked mentoring, and during our conversation it becomes clear he’s fuelled by responsibility. He was the oldest sibling in his house, and although Mark Tomlinson and Johannah’s second husband (after divorcing Mark in 2011, she married Dan Deakin in 2014; they had twins Ernest and Doris) are still around, he became a paternal figure after she died. He’s particularly involved in the lives of Daisy and Phoebe, to whom he’s ‘a kind of second parent’.

‘Without being too soppy, I like looking after people, it’s cool. At the moment I’m stressing trying to convince Daisy and Phoebe to go to sixth form. They’ve been to private school near Donny, and it’s proper expensive. I’m paying for it thinking they’re staying on, but now they don’t want to go. I told them education is important. I’m like, “You’re 16, you haven’t got a f—king idea what the real world is,”’ he says.

‘What’s difficult about those two is they’ve only known the 1D craziness. They’ve grown up in this elitist way, which is very different from my upbringing and Lottie’s, and the values my mum taught us.’

He gives a ‘kids, eh?’ sigh. ‘Consistency is the big thing. I’m trying to get better at being in their heads enough so they think, “I wonder if Louis thinks this is a good idea?”’

Lottie lives in Hackney, east London. When she was a teenager, Tomlinson got her a job assisting One Direction’s make-up artist, and within a few years she’d become a ridiculously popular Instagrammer (currently with 3.4 million followers, still 10 million shy of Louis). Her big brother told her Instagram’s fine, but she must ‘become a proper businesswoman’ in case the bubble bursts. In 2018 she launched Tanologist, a successful fake-tan brand.

‘I’m so proud of her. She’s just been in Australia, where she’s stocked in Melbourne’s version of Boots!’ Tomlinson says, beaming.

Félicité, known to the family as Fizz, was also a budding Instagrammer. After her death last March, a post-mortem revealed ‘toxic’ levels of anti-anxiety and pain medications, as well as cocaine, in her blood. Six months later, an inquest heard that she had visited her GP in August 2018 and ‘gave a history of recreational drug use… on a consistent basis since the death of her mother’. She had taken overdoses and been admitted to a rehabilitation clinic.

Tomlinson hesitates to say anything was ‘easier’, comparing the deaths of Félicité and his mum, as ‘both felt very individual, and hit me with a big impact… but I think dealing with the family, how I can be there for them, that was a lot easier the second time because the first time I was grieving and didn’t know what to say. As time went on I grew to understand what to say to my sisters.’

Prioritising the feelings of your sisters in the immediate aftermath is understandable, I say, but I wonder if anyone took care of you. He looks surprised.

‘No, but friends and family, my best mate, my girlfriend, my son… I feel their support but I get most out of doing stuff for other people. I don’t say that to sound like a good guy, it’s genuinely what gives me strength.’

Did you ever consider grief therapy?

‘Nah, a lot of people recommended it but I’m a little bit old-fashioned when it comes to therapy. I’m sure it’s incredible, but I thought I’d be all right, and I have been till now.’ One of his many tattoos consists of the words ‘It Is What It Is’ across his chest. ‘I know the things I’ve been upset about in my life are s—t, but I can’t change them, so you have to make the best of what you’ve got.’

What he’s got is an album to launch, a world tour to prep for and, immediately, a flight to catch. He and Oli are off to see Freddie. ‘When I’m working I definitely don’t see him enough,’ Tomlinson says, ‘but he looks just like me, which is cool. I’m excited to see his big smile.’

Tomlinson gives his own big smile. Our time’s nearly up, and he’d like a cigarette. After all you’ve been through, I tell him, people would have understood if you’d called it a day. You could have lived off royalties, enjoyed a quiet life with Calder, Freddie, your sisters.

‘Definitely, definitely. But do you know what? It didn’t cross my mind once. I somehow have an inability to worry, and just get on with things,’ he says, shrugging. ‘It’s definitely made me stronger. I’ve gone through every emotion, and I’m just f—king excited now.’

I think we have an answer. How is Louis Tomlinson? Hopefully, he’ll be just fine.

Walls is released on 31 January