Every Single Album - 'Fine Line' | Every Single Album: Harry Styles

Episode Date: May 5, 2022

Harry Styles is back with another album and it's all about having sex and feeling sad. Nora and Nathan talk about 'Fine Line' and the breakup that influenced this album (1:00), Harry being inspired by artists like Joni Mitchell and Crosby, Stills & Nash (31:00), and Harry's most important collaborators for this album (58:58). Hosts: Nora Princiotti and Nathan Hubbard Producer: Kaya McMullen Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Yo, Rob Harvilla from 60 Songs That Explain the 90s here to inform you that we are back with 30 more songs because the 90s were super long and had a ton of rad music. Please join us every Wednesday for more 60 songs that explain the 90s only on Spotify. Hello and welcome to every single album, Harry Styles. I'm Nora Pinsiodi. As always, I'm here with Nathan Hubbard. Nathan, how are you doing? Let's talk about having sex, feeling sad, and taking mushrooms. Nora.

And releasing an album on Taylor Swift's 30th birthday. It's time to talk about fine line. Here we go. We got a live one here. Yeah. Oh yeah. What an intro. What an intro. Harry Styles walks among us or specifically among you and your California brethren. Like, this is a California

Harry album. It is a Malibu fueled album. It's a drug-fueled album. It's a love-fueled album. It's something else. Feelings fueled album. It's a sadness fueled album. A lot of fuel for this one. Plenty of it.

So this is, it's funny. It's kind of rare other than when Taylor has sort of like re-released stuff, but it's rare for us to get to talk about an album that's sort of in such recent memory, right? Like, tell me your fine line experience because it really wasn't all that long ago coming out in late 20, Yeah, my fine line experience was going to the one night only show at the forum. Please feel free to be whatever it is you want to be in this room tonight. This is a watermelon sugar. And bringing...

Okay, well, now I'm jealous. Bringing my teenage daughter and sitting behind a relatively short, short, small, short-haired blonde human being who was sitting in the front row of the seats that overlook the floor. And half of the arena was going apeshid because everybody was pointing and saying, it's Nile, it's Nile. And then there was this moment where I am looking at the back of the head

and it's this little blonde head. And then there's this moment where the person turned around. And it was Ellen DeGeneres. It was Ellen DeGeneres. And it was so clear that it was Ellen DeGeneres. But everybody on the floor was like, it's Nile. So there was this weird crazy buzz in the arena just of anticipation. And I have to say, I went in that night not having seen Harry perform in person.

And there's not a single person who could have possibly watched. out of the building that night, thinking anything other than this man is a star and this album is a hit. He played a bunch of songs for the first time that nobody had heard before. He went front to back on the album and the whole thing worked. He was in full on Joker dancing mode, like including coming down the stairs just like the movie. But it worked and it was just a moment that cemented him in my mind as the thing. I mean, it was not long after that when I put in my basement, I have a picture of Taylor on the piano during the reputation tour,

and she's, her head is back and, you know, her hair is up and hair's flipping. Hair is flipping. And next to it is a picture of hairy in the white bell bottoms and the pink shirt with his head back in almost the exact same pose. But you can just see there's something different about this human. being. Wait, so you're making this incredibly salient point, which is like the perfect jumping off place for a conversation, but I just need to backtrack for a second. It was actually Ellen DeGeneres? I was kidding. It was Ellen DeGeneres. It was literally, do people know this story? I was just because

they joke that Nile looks like Ellen. No, no. I made that up. Everybody was going crazy and it was Ellen. I thought you knew this. No, yes, it was Ellen. I didn't know. Yes. Oh, that's so good. That's so good. Yeah. I need to look this up. Oh, that's just fantastic. Okay. More importantly, though, I am so endlessly delighted by that.

What you're saying is so interesting. You're just happy that Ellen had better seats than I did. What seats did Ellen get at the... Ellen got good seats at the Adel concert, right? No. Ellen was a little further back. No, Ellen was in the back. Yes.

It was very clear that they had decided... I mean, yeah, Rogan had great seats. Lizzo had great seats. Ellen, they were like, yeah, we got to keep her a little out of the way still. Rogan had raided the Harry Styles drugstash. Yeah, I think he, I think it might have been the other way around. Okay, well, Ellen had better seats for the Harry Styles show than for the Adele. Yes, she was at the peak of her powers.

Outdoor concert. And therefore was front and center. Yeah. Gotcha. All right. Well, more importantly, based on what you just said, I think it's a really important sort of framing mechanism for what we're going to talk about today because Fine Line

I think is fairly universally looked at as just one of the great recent pop albums. And Harry Styles has been so ascendant, particularly around the period that he put this music out in. And we're going to talk about, you know, his first number one single. And all of these things that really sort of brought him from,

oh, wow, this guy has a lot to talk. offer beyond being in a boy band, which I think is what we got in the sort of debut album era to Holy smokes, this is a star. Yes. I think some of the interesting work of this conversation is going to be to separate what he does musically from who he is in the public eye and to kind of dissect how these things work together, but also when we need to kind of distinguish. Harry Styles, the celebrity from Harry Styles, the artist, and figure out where the differences

between those things are and where the interplay between those things is. Because one of the central questions that I have for his upcoming third album is going to be, at the end of it, could I give someone an elevator pitch on what a Harry Styles song sounds like? Other than really wonderfully updated versions of older songs, of other sounds, other songs that we've heard and loved before. That can be so wonderful and enjoyable to hear updated in this way. But as he's developing his own sound, he does so by taking a lot of sounds from the artist that he loves.

And sometimes that's really magical and wonderful. And sometimes, while not, not being a bad thing, it leaves him in this place where it's a little bit hard to access exactly what he wants to do other than recreate the things that are important to him. And that's- Well, he comes by that honestly, doesn't he? Totally. I mean, that was the story of One Direction.

And while he's working with all new people who didn't work on One Direction albums, this is somewhat embedded in him, isn't it? To get in touch with the things that he likes and that he respects, and admires, and to pull pieces out into his own music. I think that's the process of a lot of artists, but it's also part of why I think the reviews for this album are all over the map. He's got problem one, which is some people are just jealous and resentful of this guy. The reviews were not as universally positive as I sort of remembered them.

When I went back, I was a little bit like, people have, critics have more mixed feelings of this album than I remembered. Because in my head, everybody in their mother thinks this album freaking rules. Yes, but like Rolling Stone is even confused. They ultimately made it on their list of best 500 albums of all time, but that was only after ranking it 23 on the list of 50 best albums of 2019. So there was a little revisionist history there, which I think a lot of people have had sense.

But the critical reception to this seems to be, A, there's just some resentfulness and envy maybe, which is not like me dismissing some of the legitimate criticisms, but B, they're keeping him in the boy band box still, right? They're really trying to look for the manufactured piece. They're not really, even here at the beginning of this release, allowing him to be a standalone independent artist. I think that they look very suspiciously at Harry being surrounded by a team of accomplished songwriters and producers and say, well, maybe this isn't him. And then C, they just can't seem to get out of, you know, one of the things that we do is a recurring thing on this pod, which is trace the roots of a lot of these songs in things that came before it. And I think that to some extent, the reviewers, that's exactly what they did to one direction. It's why they missed four. It's why they missed Made in the AM. And there's still a little bit of a hangover through these reviews still, isn't there? Yeah. And I think it misses just sort of the undeniable

of this collection of songs, which top to bottom, I think, is really strong and is just so much fun to listen to and feels really authentic and makes a ton of sense to me when I can. consider them just with Harry the person, Harry the celebrity, Harry the onstage performer, like everything that we know of sort of what his energy is, the enthusiasm for the types of music that he's working with and the people, the other musicians that he's working with. When you consider it in that framework, it all makes a ton of sense to me and really all rings true. There is a piece.

And again, this is what I sort of want to get to the end of this episode with a more thorough understanding of where if someone makes the counter argument, well, how do you know exactly where he is in these songs? I'm not always sure what to say to that. Because so much of the stuff that I love, it's true. You go, oh, well, he's so clearly loved being in the room with that chorus. And he wanted to bring back using a chorus and there's all these instruments and that's so cool. And he gets so much enjoyment out of that. And he loves Joni Mitchell and he gets the dulcimer and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And then you want to know exactly where Harry is. So let's try to figure it out, shall we? On we go. So we start, as we always do, with the biggest hit, which means that it's time for us to talk about

watermelon sugar. Oh, boy. Why do you say that? What does that noise represent? Because invariably in this conversation, we're going to talk about what this song is about. The joys of mutually appreciated oral pleasure, to quote Zane Lowe in their interview. Watermelon sugar, which at this point is out, and everyone's kind of figured out what it's about, the joys of mutually appreciated oral pleasure. Is that what it's about? Is it? That's what everyone's saying.

Oh. That's a way to say it. I mean, yes. This is not potentially the first time that he's written about this, is it? No. No. I think this is a subject near and dear to Harry's heart. And more power to him for that.

Yeah. There are lots of vocal effects. I wish everybody listening to this podcast could see Nathan's face right now. Yeah. I mean, this is the song. about something between the vagina and the female orgasm and maybe both. Right, Nora? Yeah, it's like a, it's a Georgia O'Keefe painting.

That's what it is. That's what it is. And there are lots of interesting vocal effects all over this song. There's like a flange all over the background vocals. It is sonically a pleasure. It is fun as hell. The video is not particularly revealing about the nature of the song.

Oh, the video is pretty revealing in some ways. Yes, in a lot... Well, let's discuss that for sure. The weirdest thing about this song for me is that it is so obviously a summer song. And they did formally release it in, May, but it came out in November as a promotional single really around his SNL performance. Yep.

And it was out of place at the time, but it is such a good, catchy, perfect single of a song, that it still had the legs to be a number one single. Well, and they released the music video in May, I think. And then it had the, you know, this video is dedicated to touching and they're all on the beach and rolling around. And so I think that rollout kind of acknowledged this is a song of the summer type bop. I wonder if, so Harry has said that this song took him a long time to write and that he kind of hated it at one point. And he really went back and forth between. like being super into it and then not into it at all.

I wonder if there's something to that in kind of not presenting it in a way that you could read as sort of traditional. We think this is the absolute winner. This is the pop song. This is going to be all over radio. This is going to be the song of the summer. We're going to release it in time for that to happen supernaturally and exactly as we have it all planned out. maybe because he had a little bit of trepidation at times about the song, he didn't want to totally center it in that way.

Or maybe they just knew that they had a hit. And that no matter how it went, it was going to be, it was going to find its way to the top. There's an awkwardness two-thirds of the way through the song when he sort of, there's a breakdown in the, you know, he sort of breaks it down. And then there's an edit after the, and that summer feeling.

And then immediately there's this edit where he does the sort of soaring, I don't know if I could ever go without, that just feels like it's totally grafted onto the song. I want your belly in the summer feeling. I don't know if I could ever... He hasn't finished the breadth of the previous line before they cut that in. And so I just wonder how much editing went into piecing this song together. and maybe that was part of what he didn't like about it,

but the baseline holds this thing together. There's no stop in the groove in this song. I'm not even sure that he had a song like this ever in his catalog beforehand. I don't think so. I mean, it's his first number one single, right? So in that sense, he didn't. And then the funny thing about that groove just being so strong is they wrote it a little bit like the famous,

Miss I Love KFC Midnight Memories insert. I love KFC. Where they had the chorus, they had that groove. And Harry, they're in the studio, I think, and Harry sees the Richard Brodergan novel in Watermelon Sugar just lying around and goes, hey, that sounds kind of cool. Like, that's a good collection of syllables.

Let's just say that over and over. We had this idea and we had like this chorus. chorus melody and it just kind of was pretty repetitive and the Richard Brotigan book in Watermelon Sugar was on the table and I was like, that sounds cool.

So it really was reliant and born from the eternal power of that groove and that baseline. Well it's awesome. Is it the best song on the album? It just really, I think this depends on your definition of the best song.

Wow. It's my favorite song on the album. I think so. I think sometimes you can't explain these things. I could make, I'll tell you what else I could make an argument for, and there's two songs that I could make an argument for. And they're Canyon Moon and Cherry. Okay. Oh, and now I'm still thinking back to the time under the canyon.

Don't you call him, baby? But I just I don't think that I can deny sort of the watermelon sugar supremacy on this album. Maybe it's just because I love Harry having to explain it over and over again and all the different ways that,

you know, like when he did it on tiny desk, there was a really funny one. It's kind of about like that initial, I guess euphoria of like when you start seeing someone or you start sleeping with someone or just like being around someone and you have that kind of excitement about them and, you know, you know, you know.

And he's just like totally blushing and cracking up. Every time that happens is so funny to me. So maybe I just love the life that it's taken on. Yeah. But it's one of those songs that I have not gotten sick of hearing whatsoever. But there are other tracks, I would say Cherry in particular, where I can dig into it a little bit. bit more and maybe sort of appreciate different musical layers to it. The lyrics, I think,

are really, really beautiful. The strings arrangement is really, really beautiful. Like, I can definitely make the case. I just, watermelon sugar is just the bop of all bops, you know, and I don't want to discount that. Nor, the answer is cherry. It's cherry. Convince me. Convince me. Convince me. Because this entire... I'm already there with you. I just... This entire album

was fueled by the breakup with Camille. And this is the song for her. It is the realist. It has the most vulnerability. It is written both in a moment of extreme sadness about seeing somebody with someone else. It is written under the pressure of feeling,

like he had to write some big songs and really, really sitting with the weight of expectations around what this album was going to be. And it is delicate. It builds those big drum fills that come in at the three minute mark. Into this huge outro, the lovely sort of Camille voicemails at the end in French. Which is just a bunch of nonsense. But all of the imagery.

if this is the best. This couldn't matter less. We need to stop calling it a voicemail. It always gets called a voicemail in articles that have been written about this song. She was talking on the phone. It can't be a voicemail because she's asking questions and getting answers. She had placed a phone call and Harry was recording because he was playing the guitar. So he captured her talking on the phone. But she's saying like, oh, were you asleep? Yeah, we went to the beach. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. just drives me crazy because it's a conversation. It's not a voicemail. Okay. Does that make it less of a good song? No. It doesn't matter at all. I stand corrected. It doesn't matter at all. But it really, look, watermelon sugar, the lyrical component of that is a little bit goofy. And I think there's some song, I mean, it's sex-fueled in that way.

I just think there are some parts of this album that lyrically aren't quite as, detailed or crafted in the way that this song just is as wide open and vulnerable and honest as it could possibly be. And I think that's why it's the best. Yeah. So it is very personal in the sense that, I mean, the voice note is a literal artifact of their relationship, right? The shade, the new boyfriend who's really just like a daddy's spending daddy's money. Does he take walking around his parents' gallery. And she started dating the son of a gallery Scion art collector. Those are very clear details, even just the fact that it's called Cherry is sort of their ship name.

I hear all that. I love this song. And I do think that it's the most intimate and the most personal one on the first. one on the album. I am occasionally, maybe it's just because sort of I come from the Taylor Swift school

of getting every single little minute detail. I think it's really honest in terms of his feelings. I don't know that the lyrics make me feel sort of inside of this relationship

or inside of his feelings in a completely whole way. But that's something that I really go back and forth on. And I do love the song. And I think it's a new level of sharing and taking his fans into his own lived experiences. But in brutal honesty, sometimes I go back and forth on how personal any of this really truly is. Because when Harry talks about it, he often says, this is absolutely my most

sort of raw personal work yet. I used to think that I was letting people in, but I really wasn't. Sometimes I think he does that by painting with a broad brush of sort of here's, here's how I was feeling in general. And this gets the closest to really clear specifics. And I mean, even lines like there's a piece of view and how I dress is interesting. but it's, I don't know.

I'm 95% of the way there is, I guess what I'm saying. But I'm glad that you're 100% of the way there. Cherry doubt. Sometimes I think I want to love it more than I love, love, love it. But I do love it. How does it, how do you feel? I mean, there's a little bit of a battle of the ballads on this album, right? It's followed by falling.

Yeah. Cherry made the set list to Coachella. Falling did not. I just miss your accent Yeah, that kind of bummed me out I mean, not that Cherry made it I love Cherry, but I love falling too. And I love, and I'm well aware

I write too many songs about you. Yes. And I'm well aware I write too many songs about you. For some reason that one gets me and some of the lines on Cherry that are kind of very first person and very in the story

don't hook me quite as much. I still think I probably slightly prefer Cherry, but there's something about the melody and falling that really, really grabs me. Yeah. And they put his voice further up in the mix, too. So part of it, I think, is that maybe that's why I believe it so much

is that he's kind of just telling you, like he's really singing it at you. when you hear it on falling. Does it change the way you think about it if I told you that he wrote it in a towel after coming out of the shower? These guys just love to be naked when they record.

They just love it. I don't know, Nathan, does it change how you feel about it? Yes. You're the one who wants to bring this up all the time. Yes, it does. Well, look, and when he says blame the drink in my wandering hands

and the snow to blame but the drink and my wonder Is he handling himself again? Or is he confessing to... I think he's confessing to infidelity. You think so? That's what it sounds like.

Okay. So it's... I think that's actually a really good... That line is a really good example of some of what I'm talking about. Is I think that some of this stuff reads to Harry as... And I'm speculating, right? But I'm putting in this line in a song about how...

maybe I wasn't totally faithful in this relationship and it led to its downfall and now I'm really sad. And in a very obvious way, that is so incredibly personal, right? Like you are just sharing something painful and difficult about your own shortcomings and your own personal life and putting that into the music and letting it out into the world for people to talk about and know about and digest in that way. And so it makes total sense that. That's, it makes total sense that that that feels very intimate and very personal. He's not really telling you how it happened. You don't get who, what, where, when, why?

And so sometimes, and again, maybe this is where I hold too many things up to the sort of Taylor standard of being super, super dioristic. But I'll go, okay, so maybe there's a cheating situation here. I don't know. But I still feel outside of it. I think you're asking a lot of him. You're asking a lot of somebody who confessed to biting off the tip of his tongue while on mushrooms during the recording of this album.

I mean, we've got to give him a little space to be in space. I think you're right. I am, this is an example of... Taylor wouldn't nail Cherry if she was on mushrooms. She'd do the LASIC eye surgery thing, the banana thing. That's not supposed to be what you're doing. I try to get this one. Okay, let me get the other one for you.

Okay. Here we go. But what do we do with this now? I'll leave it. I'll leave it. It's mine. But it doesn't have a head. That's true.

I agree that... I don't know if Taylor's ever taken mushrooms. I'm not sure I want to see it. No. A lot of really tough to watch crying happens. I think you are right that I'm being tough. I'm sort of a... approaching this from a, you have to be honest about the things that you love. Yeah. And really trying to

interrogate sort of exactly what my relationship is with these songs. Because this album, I just, I play all the time. I love it so much. Almost all of these songs are pretty regularly coming out of my speakers. So that's, that is the source of my need to, to dissect and hold them up to very high scrutiny because I think they deserve it. Well, is there anything else? So you said Canyon Moon. Yes. Canyon Moon for me, I really enjoy. I heard Jenny saying, go get the kids from school, and I keep thinking back to a time under the Canyon Moon.

I just can't get out of the Crosby Stills and Nash, sweet Judy Blue Eyes. compare. Don't let the past remind us of what we are not now. Right. And I get that he himself said it was CSN on steroids. Harry's playing the dulcimer

that, as you alluded to, when we talked about Harry Styles, he was so inspired by Joni Mitchell and Blue and he went out and found the woman who created that instrument for her, right? And she built him one?

Yep. So this feels like such a tribute. We know that Joni was the lady in the canyon. That's Laurel Canyon. There was a whole sound in the 60s and 70s of these artists including CSN, Graham Nash dated Joni Mitchell and wrote just absolutely beautiful songs about Joni Mitchell, including the song Better Man, which you, or Simple Man, sorry, Simple Man, which is like one of my favorite songs of all time.

I just want to hold you. want to hold you down. So there's all of this like intrigue and interest, which Harry being a little bit of a student of the past, you could see him getting so fired up and being involved in. We know, listen, Stevie Nix was out on stage with him at that

one night only. So there, some of that worship really threads through Canyon Moon, the Hammond organ that you sort of might hear on Love the One You're with by CSN. How does that resonate with you? You can put that aside and just enjoy the song for what it is, because it is a really

fun song. Yeah. This might sound sort of damning by faint praise, but it really, really is not to me. It's just a song that I think sounds awesome. And it sounds awesome enough that all of that backstory. It is not what to you. When you say it really is not to you. Oh, that just is saying that I think it sounds awesome should not be interpreted as damning by faint praise. Like that, yeah. Why do we listen to songs, right? Like, if we think something sounds awesome when you want to hear it over and over again, that's pretty important. It just sounds awesome. Yeah. I ultimately do find the backstory rather charming. The woman who built the dulcimer's name is Joellen Lepidus, and she had built the dulcimer that Joni played on Blue.

Harry got so obsessed with it that he tracked her. She built one for him. She gave him lessons. It is actually Harry playing the dulcimer on this song. I think that's very cute. The thing with this song is that I just want to drink a sprits and sit on a porch and listen to it a bunch of times. And you need songs like that.

And it's a really, really, really good one. Yeah, it is. It slots nicely into any 70s, early 70s, late 60s. acoustic rock song. Is there anything else on this album? But, but, but what? It doesn't sound out of... You sound like a critic.

It doesn't sound out of place on... On this album. Like one of my playlist, which has some of that on it. But you can... It doesn't... He does do a really good job of making these things

somehow still sound pretty contemporary. I agree. Sonically, this album is really a masterpiece. Yeah. It just is big and interesting, always. I think in some ways this is why I'm focusing so much on, okay, let's be in some ways really harsh, right? And really interrogate what's happening on the lyrics. And where does Harry deserve full credit for the sonic influences and where do we need to parse that out and credit others? Because when it comes down to just what this album sounds like, the sounds of it, I think. are immaculate. And that is its ultimate strength is that there's just

moment after moment on this album where what's going into your ear holes feels pretty nice when it goes in. That's a metaphor for what this album is about. I heard it while I was saying it. I regret it already. I heard you hearing it.

Kaya, please help me. I heard you. Canyon Moon's great. Hearing it. there are a number of other songs that were put out as singles. And I'm just curious, are there other songs? I mean, Ador You is the obvious one. There was a lot of interesting marketing that went into Adoriu.

They created this fake island, fantasy island eroda, right? Which is Adore spelled backwards. In all the seas, in all the world, there has never been a land. quite like the Isle of Heroda. Shaped a mistake of it like a frown. It is home to an all but forgotten fishing village that has had... And fans got a bunch of weird social media advertising about it. And so there was a...

Not unlike, by the way, the newspaper ads that were placed in support of the upcoming album from Harry. So they have done a lot of creative stuff around that. I love Adore You. It's a really fun song. I love Ador You too. And I love in Tiny Desk when Harry says that it's about a fish. It's about a fish. and I just had this fish and I just really liked it.

And that's that's kind of the whole story behind the song, really. It's about a fish. I just had this fish. I just really liked it. And Amy Allen gets a writing credit on Adore You. She produced Halsey's Without Me, which is a song that I love very much. I do too. So that's cool.

Yeah. I'm into Doriu. I'm super into golden. Yeah. I mean, the top of this album. It's a great scene setter. It is. Totally. Mitch on the Glock and Spiel. Awesome.

How about lights up? Yeah. So, like, the first four, the way that this album reads to me is that the first four tracks are, we're coming for the hits. You're so golden. Not unlike every other One Direction album that's ever been put out. Sure.

Although I guess in some ways that's a little bit of a departure because all of Harry's debut album could kind of have been read as we don't care about coming for the hits all that much. We just want to make this sort of rocky thing that we really want to do. Yes.

Then Cherry falling to be so lonely is the, I'm very sad, about my French ex-girlfriend section. Okay. Then she sunflower is the, I'm still rather sad about my French ex-girlfriend, but I'm going to take some mushrooms

to maybe feel less sad about it. Yes. And then Canyon Moon, treat people with kindness, is sort of like, hey, the mushrooms worked and I'm having a nice time again. Okay.

And then Fine Line is like a hard song for me to play. place. But to get back to your question about lights up, all four of those first four songs, which are sort of poppy and fun, all of them work for me. Watermelon sugar is best. I think Golden is probably my second favorite of that group of four. And then Adore you and Lights Up, it kind of depends on the day. But I'm into all of them. I think they're all great. There's a little darkness in Lights Up. I mean, he says himself at one point, he doesn't really know what it is or what it means.

The video is fairly suggestive, to say the least. He puts it out on National Coming Out Day. I have a question for you that I'm going to wade very gingerly into. The pearl necklace, the fashion sense, we've talked a lot about some of the sort of honoring of the LGBTQ community. If this was Taylor Swift, who, by the way, in the me video was called

calculating and co-c-c-c-c-contrived and p-p-p-p-pandering. Is this all just who Harry is? Or is some of what he does here in service of not just honoring the community, but is he doing this for business reasons?

Is it co-cicca contrived at all to you? No, so I think the thing that we're talking, I think that that conversation revolves around why, and to what extent is it fair to call something like that contrived and calculating when that does happen? I don't, I don't say it. is contrived on Harry's part. I think he's

one, I think he's walked the walk for a pretty solid amount of time. No doubt. I also think that look, if an artist is sort of coasting on credit that they get for supporting a marginalized community and they're doing it for their own benefit or to seem like a good guy,

that sucks. By the way, It's the you need to calm down video, isn't it? Not the me video. I don't think that's what my personal opinion, I don't think that's what Harry's doing. I don't either. He's definitely given some interviews where he's talked about like, look, I just want people to feel like they are seen and welcomed at my shows and

in my fan communities. I don't want to pretend that I know anybody's experience. I don't want to pretend. that I am not immensely privileged as a white man. Is there a piece where Harry doesn't get, does he avoid some criticism? Probably in part because he's never explicitly expressed his sexual orientation. He's only ever publicly dated women,

but he's never defined himself in that way publicly. And does that give him something of a shield maybe where people don't want to criticize and then not be sure? maybe, but I don't think that there's anything bad about that because if he were criticized I would think the criticism was unfair so even if it's unfair

in what it's levied against other people I like to believe that this is authentic and I think there's reason to believe that it is. There are moments where it could be argued that he's playing to the crowd he has a lot of fun with the ambiguity of the lyrics

in she for example And she sleeps and hits Playes for time Yep And I think that's totally fine And okay And I just asked the question Because I actually think

If this was Taylor The knives might be a little bit sharper But also You know, Harry, one could argue Has had a sort of more overt support For the community Through the course of his career Yeah

And this is not to criticize Taylor Right? Because I think I think largely I think a lot of of that criticism is is unfair and it's not helpful to come down really harshly on on people for trying to create positive spaces in their fan bases. Right.

But I think some of what Taylor has been criticized for is being a little bit late to the party. Politically generally. Yes. And for voicing. only once it's convenient. Okay. And I maybe give her a generous read and think that she's been on a little bit of a personal journey where that's sort of just been the timeline when things have happened.

Right. But what I would say for Harry, I'm not sure that when Harry began voicing or just demonstrating support for LGBTQ fans in particular, I think that started. before it was particularly convenient. Because I'm sure there were people making arguments that One Direction fostering that community in their fan base was not exclusively good for business. And they definitely did it anyway.

There was a group called Rainbow Direction, which was a fan group. It wasn't organized by the band, but it was certainly supported by them. And they were with them super early on, and they were really good at organizing these meetups around One Direction shows. but they went on to have a bunch of other artists,

I think Taylor included, ask them for help in doing the same things around their tours. So I do think that the timeline is important here. Like I think Harry's just been pretty out front from early on in his career when he was a really, really, really young person. and I think that makes what he does seem pretty authentic. Well, there you go. Is there anything else on this album that for you competes for best album or best song on the album?

No. What about you? No. Listen, fine line I love to listen to you. You said you're not quite sure what it is. That's because I think it's a Bonnie Bear song. Like the outro is very, very much like the outro

on the Boney Bear song Perth. But I love the way that it closes the album in the same way that I really love how Golden starts the album. So I don't know. I think we've touched on what songs are likely to be considered amongst the best. Treat people with kindness

I'm not really sure what to do with, right? It's like a Jesus Christ superstar song or something. How are you're supposed to dance. That's what you're supposed to do with it. I mean, the Phoebe Waller's, right? Yes, the Phoebe Waller Bridge music video is great. Yeah, is awesome. So I enjoy that.

What are you going to cut? So we're going to fight now. There's two songs that I can consider cutting. You're going to cut Cherry? No, I told you was my favorite song for me album. Well, you said we're going to fight. how we would fight. Okay, fine. So one of the songs that I could make an argument for cutting is she. But the other one is fine line.

Yeah, I can see it. I like the outro too. It just doesn't really fit with the album to me. Maybe it's because I can't put it into the category of pop song, sad about my girlfriend, doing mushrooms, having fun. And then it's just like, fine line. Why is fine line here? maybe it's because there's sort of very little hairy on it and there's not a lot of words to it and it just feels it's also six minutes long. I just don't get fine line, is I think what I'm saying. Yeah, I think it's a Boni Vair song and that's okay.

That's okay. I have argued for grandpa shooting songs that are too close, right? On Change Your Ticket, you know, was, was, we compared to girls by 1975, like, change your tickets a really good song if girls doesn't exist. But girls exist. So if I want to hear it, I'll listen to girls. On this one, it's not exactly Perth, but there sure feels like there's a lot of similarities on the last part. So I could see how you would let that go. I just like the way that it closes the album. There's just an

ethereal nature to it that feels interesting to me. I am surprised that, you know, you're just, you're hanging on to be so lonely. Don't play. He didn't play it on tour. It feels like a Jack Johnson song a little bit. It's interesting. But it's not a ukulele. It's like a Gita Laleigh.

The six-string ukulele. Just, you know, feels like a Jack Johnson's. song and I'm just not sure. You look, there's something interesting lyrically that goes on on this album. In Adore You, he references brown skin,

he references strawberry. Which came, are images that were on golden and watermelon sugar. And then right on Adorio, he's talking about it, on, to be so lonely, the first line is don't blame me for falling which is the previous song

comes right after falling and he also says don't call me baby again which came from cherry so there are these interesting sort of two songs that maybe explore a subject as you said then followed by one that he re-digs up some of the imagery that is not a reason to keep to be so lonely for me.

So I do love that. I love the fact that it comes right after following in the first lyrics or don't blame me for following. I think that's cool. In the verses where the, I think it's like the double bass is really quivering and it sort of has that like, are we on a canal in Venice

and hearing people playing music in the streets thing? That is a little weird to me. When it gets into the choruses, I think it's a really good, actually just really like how this song sounds. I think it's cool that this is really a Mitch song and was really born out of

him messing around on the guitar and sending Harry voice notes. It's not my favorite song by any means, but I'm more... I'm certainly more into it than she. Okay, but she is definitely a Mitch... I mean, it sounds like a Pink Floyd song. She's just testing the limits for me of how many mushrooms we should do and then record songs.

Okay. It's also six minutes long. Yeah. Well, Mitch's solo at Coachella, where he presumably was not on mushrooms, not sure why I'm presuming that, but was pretty impressive. I mean, he really shredded that. That is the argument for keeping the song is for the guitar solo. and I think it's a stronger argument when you hear it live

than in the recorded version because it just feels like two different songs to me I don't really connect what's going on at the end with the guitar part to what Harry's on the song

I don't know it just seems like a drug trip yeah well it's heavy dark side of the moon stuff here and if you're going to throw darts at the album for being derivative in parts this is one of those songs where you might hit some parts of the target.

What about sunflower? What does volume six mean? Are there five other sunflowers? I don't know if there's an actual answer to this. This again seems like one of those things, or it's just like, we get it, guys. You were doing a lot of drugs and decided that this seemed cool.

I do like that song, though. All the vocal stuff at the end, the whoops. Yeah, well, it's funny. One of the things that I like about treat people with kindness is that you almost have Nile's heart attack. Ow! Oh, there you go. Coming back on that. You're so happy that you got to bring that back out.

Ow! But then, yeah, the end of Sunflower is insane. They were definitely on a lot of drugs. Yeah. And he's like gasping for breath at one point and they're yelling and wooing. But it's like it's really an interesting arrangement and interesting writing. it's an amazing display of his vocal ability. He's doing all...

You forget, he's doing all the vocals on this song. And he's got in the high register, in the low, and he's making... It's really an impressive song. I don't adore the song, but it's interesting enough. It holds your attention. I'm just still stuck on what volume six actually means.

I mean, I know there's... Maybe he's documenting relationships, but this is one of those Easter eggs that I don't have an answer to and I want it. I just think it's like when people decide to cough, cough, Taylor, make an album and put everything in lowercase.

It's just like an aesthetic thing. Okay. Or maybe it's not. Maybe it has some secret meaning, but I don't know what it was. What I do know is that our pal Greg Kirsten works on this song and like rocks out, just shreds on the electric sitar.

As one does. As one does. Got Greg on the sitar just holding it down. I think he also plays the organ on that, but that song too. He does. I know that it's sacrilegious, but do you love treat people with kindness as a song? Yes. I love it as a message.

No, I love it as a song. But I like Broadway. Yeah. Like, I am a person who has a really good time when I see people singing and a pit orchestra playing. and a dance break and someone yelling all together now, which is exactly what happens on this song. So I'm super into it. Okay. You're all about it. Okay.

Yeah, it's impossible to be cut because it's just too much at the center of the message. I just wasn't sure how you feel about the actual song-song. I feel very good about the actual song-song. I understand that it might not be for some people, but it's very much for me. All right. So you're shipping fine line into space.

Yeah. I'm taking she off the album and having it be something that just happens live. Well, you're talking a lot about Greg Kirsten. Is he our most important collaborator on this album or do you have somebody else? No. Greg Kirsten just showed up to do a bunch of drugs and write and produce Sunflower. It's Kid Harpoon. Play the electric sitar and then run away.

Talk to me about Kit Harpoon, aka Thomas Hull. Yeah, Kit Harpoon is all over this album and is the one who got Harry to translate what he was feeling after this breakup with Camille into music. That's the key insight. The hardest thing to get an artist to do

is to channel that feeling into music and it happened across this record. So I give it to Kid Harpoon. And Kit Harpoon had worked on Carolina and Sweet Creature on the debut album, but then got to sort of take a front seat roll on Fine Line. He'd also worked with Florence in the Machine a bunch before this point. I'm into it. We've also got, well, so hold on. We've also got Tyler Johnson, who kind of similar thing.

He worked with Jeff Basker and was sort of an assistant who'd done some work on the debut album and then takes on. a first chair role for Fine Line. Kid Harpoon, Tyler Johnson, and Mitch Roland are almost always the other credited co-writers, along with Harry getting the first writing credit on all of these songs. And then Basker shows up on Cherry, She, and Treat People with Kindness. And then we've got Greg Kirsten. We mentioned Joelle and Lapidus, who built the dulcimer. I think that's important.

Okay. But I'm going to give you another one. Oh, boy. I think my, I'm going to take us outside of the album a little bit. Because my most important collaborator is another Harry, who is Harry Lambert, Harry Styles stylist. Okay. Who had been with him since he was still in one direction.

But I think this is the era where how Harry dresses really cements itself as sort of part of the package here. I mean, this is, he wears the Gucci dress on the cover of Vogue. He co-chairs the Met Gala in 2019 and wears this all black and sheer blouse and these high-waisted pants. It's just an incredible outfit. He gets his ears pierced so that he can wear a very specific pearl earring. And so Harry is Harry Lambert's philosophy on dressing Harry Styles, also dressing some of his other clients. some of whom also have some history of sort of playing with gender fluid fashion. I think feels at least emblematic of how Harry tends to look at it.

There's a quote from Harry Lambert when he was asked if he thinks of his work as political. And he said, the answer is not really. I just think playing with gender stereotypes shouldn't matter. Why should we give a shit what someone wears? If something political comes of it or if it makes someone feel more comfortable to be themselves, then great. if it pisses someone off, great, whatever. And there's something about that relentlessly defiant, like, I'm just going to do this because I want to and because I think it's interesting and cool.

That feels pretty resonant with how Harry approaches a lot of this stuff. And it seems like he's coming into his own musically in terms of being willing to express his feelings after his breakup through a lot of these songs. but he was also really doing that in how he presented himself publicly. And a lot of that had to do with clothes. And Harry Lambert's the one who dresses him for all of these events and for the Vogue cover, but also for the album cover here. You know, that's where the white pants and the pink top and all of that is coming from.

So Harry becomes such a style icon around this point. And it seems like they have a really, really good partnership that, you know, really kind of started taking off all the way back in 2015, which was when he wore that full floral Gucci suit at the AMAs. So it's been a long time building, but I think this is sort of where it takes it up a notch. What do you think he wears around the house? That's a great question.

Like, does he wear like Aviator Nation sweatpants and then throws on the... Does he dress like you, Nathan? Is that what you're asking? A guy can dream. I mean, a lot of what Harry wears seems comfortable. Like, he could, maybe he just has... That disco ball jumper at Coachella did not look comfortable. Okay, but the silhouette could be comfortable.

Like, maybe he just has a silk cashmere version. Okay. I would wear that. You think he just curls up in a... Like a huge dress when he's sitting... around with Olivia watching the... In a low V... Dunkirk again?

In a low V like gray silk cashmere jumper. That's what I think is going on. We need to know what Harry wears around the house. That would actually be... He should do a 73 questions

or something or at home with Harry Styles. He'll never do it. It's like the last thing in the world that he wants to do. Hi. But for the clothes alone, I would be very, I would really want to see. Well, I mean, you could also say

his fashion was maybe Peake Harry in this moment. But then take me to the Peake Harry moment. Yeah, it's so hard because this whole era is Peake Harry. Like, he's hosting the Met Gala. He's the face of another

perfume, Gucci's genderless fragrance. Gucci Memoir of another new odor perfume universal. He gets he gets spiked in the balls by Michelle Obama playing celebrity dodge ball on James Gordon's show Harry Stiles gone solo all over again

Obama winds up and right in the one D he gets to induct Stevie Nix into the rock and roll hall of fame just like the white wing dove sings a song sounds like she's singing Stevie Nix is the first female artist to be inducted into the Rock and Roll

Hall of Fame for a second time. He gets to be Tom Petty and do stop dragging my heart around. Yep. He crushes Saturday Night Live. Is it not the railing me to death line from the Sarah Lee sketch? Yeah, for him, Sarah Lee

commented with a few eggplants, water drops, a train, and a ghost emoji. And that's a reference to getting railed to death. I'm glad you went there I was a little bit I think his S&L

is so good because the other one that we could have gone with was the monologue where he references One Direction and says wouldn't it be cool if they were here tonight?

They're not. I was in a band called One Direction. How crazy would it be if they were here tonight? Well, they're not here. They might be. They're not. Or saying the show's not good anymore because no one's on cocaine.

Like, there are so many good lines. But yes, I think you're right. I think it's the Sarah Lee sketch. Yeah, it's the Sarah Lee sketch. I guess my question for you is there's another former boy bander who is considered one of the great S&L hosts of all time. And that is Justin Timberlake. Can Harry get there? Or was this a one night only?

Harry was really good. It's not a one night only. No, he will do it again and he will crush again. here's the thing that Timberlake has on him. And it's a song that we've talked about on this season already. Harry's got to do a lonely island. Yeah. Or he's got to at least, you know, could Harry have done Three Sad Virgins?

No. Because he doesn't have a dick in the box to his name. That's what I'm saying. Dick and a box. Yeah. We got it. You really need to articulate that. I want my mom.

I want to go home. I mean, his comedic chops are well refined, thanks to his James Corden stuff. Like, he's got that pitch in his arsenal. But he's got a little ways to go to catch up to Justin Timberlake Saturday Night Live. Yeah, but I think he just needs more reps. Because those sketches were all pretty,

funny. Yeah. The one where he's Doug the dog right. In Joan. Right. Joan, I love you

love the way you feed me ham. It's all, it's got it. It's for sure. I just, this was a moment where poor Sarah Lee

literally had to shut down the comment section because they were just getting killed. And good on the Saturday live people for the way they wrote and good on him for stepping in and taking it over. And Bowen. Bowen Yang's great in that sketch.

It's really funny. It's just really, really funny. Oh, yes, I did write this. Wow. Okay. Railing me to death is a great hairy moment. Nora, let's move on. Are any of these songs about Taylor Swift? God, make it stop. No. And thank goodness they're not. Because he seems to have a much, have had a much more compelling and meaningful relationship with Camille Rao. Yeah.

And we got this. There is a moment, though, as a part of this cycle in which he crossed paths with Taylor Swift, and that was at the 2021 Grammys. True. And what I want to ask you is there was a big freak out about it because they were like, okay, there's peace in the kingdom. But, like, it wasn't the warmest of interactions, was it? I thought it looked super awkward.

I know we were in the time of COVID, and there was not a lot of. a hugging, but like, nobody was wearing masks at that, like, I mean, Taylor had the flower mask, but like people were hugging. I know that they were because I, but they didn't hug. And Taylor's a hugger. You've, you've taught us this, the Taylor is a hugger. Yeah, she hugged me one time. She didn't hugged Harry Styles at the Grammys. What? So it can be both, right? I think if I had to guess, I would say that if, for, those of us who would mostly find happiness in Taylor and Harry doing what makes sense for them as people, but who would find some happiness in their being peace in the kingdom to potentially

facilitate even just mutual support of two artists who I think are very fantastic and produce fantastic work. That seemed like a sort of first step, if anything. The first icebreaker of, okay, let's let bygones be bygones. We can interact in a way that's, yeah. Right. But we can interact in a way that's respectful. Hi, good to see you. And it's a little awkward, right? Like anybody who's ever had to interact with an X in public. Much less doing it on camera when you know there are literally millions of people who are going to freak out depending on which gesture you make. what you do everything. But there is,

there's that weird feeling of like, by the sort of letter of everything that happened, you're not necessarily over everything. Because you're like, oh, that was fucked up. Like, I know that was fucked up. Yeah.

But time has passed. Everyone's okay. Taylor's known to carry a grudge. Well, sure, but like, do you ever, you ever,

you ever carry a grudge that you sort of know you deserve to carry, but then enough time passes that you just don't really care that. much anymore. Yes. You think that's what we're looking at. I sort of think that's it. It was a big night for her. I mean, it's a really big night. I mean, it wasn't a bad night for Harry. Won't a

first Grammy ever. All of these songs are fucking massive. So thank you so much. I feel very honored to be among all of you. So thank you so much. Thank you. It was a good night for both of them. Probably a better night for Taylor. But a good night for both of them. Slide. but hey, best pop solo performance? Like, we'll take it. Totally. And he had not been acknowledged either as a solo artist or as a member of One Direction by the Grammys in that way before.

So that's an important step. He was just trying to make an album about having sex and feeling sad. And here he was. I hear he was at the Grammys. Let it be a lesson to everyone. Yeah. Yeah. So I guess just to close the loop,

I would say that it's an interesting precursor to their next meeting. if ever that happens, right? Because it can go one of two ways, and one of the ways is that was just them making nice when they were, when they knew that on some level they were being watched. And if they're in a situation like that again, it'll probably be kind of identical

in the sense that warm enough, but still a little bit at arm's length. Or that's the icebreaker to the next step, which is like, hey, I know some of that stuff was bad and I'm sorry for my part in it. I'm sure you are too. There's some of that that I still think was screwed up. But I really like your songs. Like, what's been going on?

And then you see what happens. Okay. Joe Alwyn is a better looking Brit. Controversial take, Nathan. I have no idea. Is he an actor? What happened on March 25th? not that much. We kind of went

we were like going into lockdown. February 25th was when he did Tiny Desk. Okay. But March 25th, we were getting super, super de duper lockdown. And that's what's interesting about this album. I mean, COVID really does play a part in it. He does the one night only show. And he's not able to go out on the road and tour.

And what that sort of had the, you know, the happy consequence of doing was massively, extending this album cycle. The first couple singles did okay, but they didn't do great. I mean, adore you peaks at number six, but lights up gets to 17. Falling, which is the third single, only gets to 62. And at that point, you might be like, hey, do we have a problem? I just think they knew that they had watermelon sugar in the bag. It was already being played all over the place just from its sort of promotional release. But May 2020 is, long time after that after this album came out for for you to have your first number one single off of it and and because of covid

the feebie waller bridge video didn't come out until like new year's day 2021 i think so you had a very long extended cycle for this album to get its entire due and you know he ultimately comes back and plays off the rest of those tour dates for love on tour in 2021 but it's very very very very rare to have this long of a cycle. I mean, Taylor just, you know, her, her album that came out around the time of COVID, she stepped on with three other albums, right? Right. So this one got, for only 10 songs, this one got a lot of time in the sun, which is what makes the next one so interesting. He felt pressure putting this one out. Imagine what he must feel putting this next one out. Well, do you think that has anything to do with the single release cycle?

Because I guess we were kind of talking about this earlier, but I wonder if he has in some ways a little bit of a weird relationship with watermelon sugar. Like we talked about how he went through cycles of really not liking it and then also kind of really liking it. And he'd also felt that pressure to make kind of big radio hit songs when maybe some of the stuff that he wanted. to make was more like cherry and wasn't that. And so I wonder if it gave him for a time a little bit of a complicated relationship with watermelon sugar because it's just so undeniably a great song. But I also wonder if it's a little bit of the thing that vexed him about feeling the pressure to create for this album. And I wonder if there's a little bit of the fact that it wasn't centered right off the top

has a little bit to do with the fact that he didn't want people to just listen to that song. He wanted to make sure that enough people heard the whole thing, heard the whole album, heard more of these songs. Yeah. Well, in the wrong context, you might not have taken the song seriously. But it's, to your point, such a bop that it's just a sort of hard to ignore. Did Harry win this album?

Harry won the album. Wrong! Camille won the album. Whoa! She won the album. I don't know. Oh. That's not a real take.

Harry won the album. But this is a real take. The real take is for all of the great things that watermelon sugar did for this album and career, I have a problem lyrically with one part of it that I just can't shake.

It's not the imagery. It's great. What's not great is I want your belly. I want your belly. Because it just, I cannot separate it from the Austin Powers fat bastard, get in my belly. Get in my belly. That seems like a you problem. I don't know that it's a me problem.

Does anybody else have this problem? I just hear him being like, get in my belly. Yeah. No, I don't have that problem. Get in my belly. All right. Well, that's the lyrical part. I kind of like that lion.

Fine. Just because it's a little different. I don't know. Yeah, belly is just such a, I don't know. It's like moist. Well, yeah. And I think in that way

there's like a weird, there's like a weird carnal intimacy to it. So why didn't you use the word moist? Anyway. All right. That's on Harry's house. What's the best lyric? What do you love about this?

I'll give you one that it doesn't make me think of Austin Powers, but is a line that confuses me a little bit, but in ways that I really love, is from Sunflower, and it's my eyes want you more than a melody. Because in some ways, there are some moments where I think that's a great line The cadence to it is really nice.

I'm totally into it. And then sometimes I think that makes no sense whatsoever. Yeah. It's hard because if you put it in the context of like him searching to make songs that are going to go, you could see it like, okay, he really is, he's processing through all these emotions and he wants, he's desperate for that melody. But then it's also like, what the fuck? But why your eyes? You hear a melody. Yeah. I'll tell you why.

Mushrooms. very fair that's why never forget when you get confused when you find yourself walking down what you think is a dead end alley

on this album you just need a little voice that says mushrooms and then all make sense then you can just turn around and go back to the main through fare and then when you get lost again

you just oh right yes oh mushrooms don't do drugs kids it'll make you like Harry Styles oh wait That probably wasn't a great argument. Another one that I mentioned this before, but I'm well aware I write too many songs about you.

Yeah. I'm into it. I love that. I love that line. And I'm well aware I write too many songs about you. Do you have any other favorites? No, I told you I love Cherry. I really that I, don't you call them what you used to call me?

There's something so simple and beautiful about that. I love it. I think on fine line, spreading you open is the only way of knowing you is quite a line. See, that's a little much for me. It is? It's offends my delicate sensibility. You're fine with everything else, but that one.

I don't know. The heart wants what it wants. Oh, the pearl clutching. The fake carries pearl clutching that you're doing. That is the one where I, where I, where I pearl clutch. I don't know why.

Yeah, I understand it. I understand it. You just said that watermelon sugar, which is very clearly about naughty stuff

is your favorite. But this one, this line you can't handle. Yeah, because watermelon, like, it's not exactly euphemistic. Watermelon sugar

is at least of a thinly, very thinly veiled euphemism. Extraordinarily thinly. The veil has been pierced on that song. There's no, it's not veiled. It's fine.

Well, I'm glad that I got to make you uncomfortable. And now it's time for you to deliver what everyone knows you're going to say about how you grade this album. Are you going to give your space, yourself any space here for Harry's house to be better? Like, I just want to just put out there. Like, because you're about to give it a grade. I know what you're going to do here. And you're about to give it. I just, I know what my heart wants to do.

And which is to give it an A. Yeah. Because this is one of my favorite albums in recent memory. It's one that I listen to a lot. It's one that I think is super, super compelling. I don't get sick of the songs. It's not that I can't find any weakness. with it.

I don't know that I feel like I, the things that I feel like I know about Harry because of this album are pretty universal. Yes. Yes, there's intimacy in expressing that you get jealous and petty and all of that. And I think that's powerful on a lot of these songs. It's not exactly an original story.

No. Which a lot of the greatest, songs of all time deal in universal themes. So that's not necessarily a bad thing, but it's just that we've talked about albums, a lot of Taylor Swift albums specifically that are so specific, and I love that about them. Sometimes it's just hard for me to sort of orient myself around a different way of doing things. I also just think that the performances of this album that he's done are so fantastic that that adds to it. Nora, it's okay.

This album is an A. This album is an A. It's an A. It is a joyous, wonderful palette full of color and sonic delight. It is not too sugary. It is not too sour. It is an expression of an artist at his absolute peak. And that's what makes me very, very anxious. about the album that we're about to get in the next few weeks, because I'm not sure how easy it's going to be to deliver something after this.

It wasn't the lockdown album in the way that, you know, that folklore was, okay? But it did carry with us through quarantine in a lot of ways. So it has that very sentimental component that was lighter. Folklore was heavy. I mean, it was heavy because it was a heavy time, but there was some lightness that sort of persevered through the entire COVID situation, thanks to this album. And I just am worried that it's going to be hard to do better for him.

Not because he's not incredibly gifted and that he can't grow at all. It's just this thing really struck at a moment in time. It is an A, and it is really difficult to replicate something. like this. It's what makes the next few weeks so fascinating in terms of this artist because he's right on the cusp. I mean, if he delivers something that is in the same ballpark, this is the proverbial biggest star in the world. I mean, he is then in the Beyonce Taylor category, period, I think. I think you're right. No, I think you're right. There's also a chance that it falls a little short. And let's see what you're right.

what happens. Yeah, and it's funny. It's, it falling a little short in actuality is no great crime, right? Like, there are a lot of albums that are not as good as fine line, but because this is what came before it, it does set the stakes up in a way that is pretty exciting, but I imagine is a little stressful. I feel like I'm watching the last two minutes of a really tight sports game, like a basketball game.

It's very exciting. A lot of suspense. Like, I get that feeling in my stomach. I am curious if some of that lightness, though, will end up carrying through to Harry's house. Lights up, treat people with kindness and adore you were the last songs that were written for fine lines. So he definitely ended in terms of the creative process.

Yeah. He ended the cycle on a very, like, up, note. But after I think doing a lot of the, I'm very sad about my French ex-girlfriend stuff a little bit earlier in the cycle. Yes. So. But let me give you the reason for optimism.

Please. The reason for optimism is the line in as it was, what kind of pills are you on? There is. There is. Not just because clearly there were drugs involved in. the making of this album. But in all seriousness, that's a very vulnerable, little bit darker, substantive song that feels like it actually was heavily influenced by quarantine and by loneliness. So there is some real substance to that first single that gives me hope that we're going to

see something that is different, but of equal quality. Well, I'm very excited to hear it. This has been every single album, Stiles. I'm Nora Pinciotti. He's Nathan Hubbard. We will be back on Monday to talk about Nilehorn's second album, Heartbreak Weather. Thank you as always to Kai McMullen for producing this episode. We'll talk to you all soon.