Harry Styles launched a massive solo career following his One Direction days, with a legion
of fans who follow his every move.
Though his star burns bright, Styles still exudes the charm of a smalltown English boy.
How does he do it?
This is the untold truth of Harry Styles.
After Harry Styles performed the still-unreleased track "Medicine" live in May 2018, Billboard
reported that
"Twitter users immediately called the song a bisexual anthem, claiming that [the] lyrics
confirm the singer’s sexuality."
It's easy to see what all the fuss was about, what with lyrics like:
"The boys and the girls are here/ I mess around with him/ And I'm OK with it"
Billboard also pointed out that it's difficult to discern the exact lyrics of the song, since
the audio is really rather warbly.
Either way, openly gay figure skater Adam Rippon had this to say about the song:
"I think he's just sort of, like, on a journey and he doesn't really care.
And I hope that, like, young kids can, like, look to that and they can really, you know,
go on a journey."
In August 2019, Rolling Stone profiled Styles, writing that,
"[He] likes to cultivate an aura of sexual ambiguity, as overt as the pink polish on
his nails...On his first solo tour, he frequently waved the pride, bi, and trans flags."
So why, exactly, did he do that?
Styles explained to Rolling Stone:
"I want to make people feel comfortable being whatever they want to be...I'm aware that
as a white male, I don't go through the same things as a lot of the people that come to
the shows.
I can't claim that I know what it's like, because I don't.
So I'm not trying to say, 'I understand what it's like.'
I'm just trying to make people feel included and seen."
As of this writing, the star hasn't publicly defined his sexuality, telling The Sun in
2018:
"I don't feel like it's something I've ever felt like I have to explain about myself."
Harry Styles has an estimated net worth of 50 million pounds, that's approximately 64.8
million dollars.
So of course it's a bit hard to imagine him ever working a day job.
"So tell me a bit about you."
"Um.
I work in a bakery."
At one point, Harry Styles was like every other struggling musician.
Before Simon Cowell plucked the singer from The X Factor auditions, he indeed worked at
a local bakery for two years.
"We're going to the bakery that I used to work in.
I always kind of pop in when I go home."
According to the Mirror, Styles was 14 years old when he started working at W Mandeville
bakery in his hometown of Holmes Chapel, England.
The star made 6 pounds an hour, which is approximately 7 dollars and 80 cents.
He cleaned the back areas and counters, mopped the floors, and washed trays every Saturday.
Though Styles presumably lives a cushy life these days, he apparently never complained
about the hard work.
In fact, it sounds like he was a star employee.
According to Simon Wakefield, his former boss,
"He was the most polite member of staff we’ve ever had.
Customers really took a shine to him.
The shop suddenly had an influx of girls when Harry worked here.
Sometimes there would be 12 of them pouring in at one time."
Considering how people react to him now, that's...pretty much what we'd expect from the future cover
boy.
In his early years as a genuine celeb, Harry Styles slept on a tiny mattress in a suburban
attic.
Emmy-winning producer Ben Winston opened up to Rolling Stone about his friendship with
Styles when One Direction was first getting off the ground.
According to him, Styles basically turned into a house guest that wouldn't leave.
The singer had recently moved out of his childhood home and purchased new digs near the Late
Late Show with James Corden producer, but he had to wait two weeks before he could move
in.
Styles asked if he could crash with Winston, who happily obliged.
But those two weeks suddenly turned into 20 months.
As Winston told Rolling Stone,
"Those 20 months were when they went from being on a reality show, The X Factor, to
being the biggest-selling artists in the world.
That period of time, he was living with us in the most mundane suburban situation...Even
when we went out for a meal, it's such a sweet family neighborhood, no one dreamed it was
actually him."
Harry Styles didn't just leave behind his bakery job when he made it big with One Direction,
he also left behind his former band.
According to the Manchester Evening News, Styles was the lead singer of a pop punk band
called, unfortunately enough, White Eskimo.
"What sort of experience have you got, music-wise?"
"Um, I'm in a band.
I sing in a band with my friends at school called White Eskimo."
Styles only lasted seven months with that particular band, but the boys trucked on without
him.
As of the making of this video, they haven't sold over 50 million records like One Direction…but
it looks like they're still playing shows.
They also released a music video for the song "Save Me" in September 2019.
Meanwhile, White Eskimo's former lead singer hosted and performed on Saturday Night Live
in November 2019…but White Eskimo doesn't seem to be sweating it.
Will Sweeny took over lead vocal duties after Styles left, and he told the Manchester Evening
News that the band doesn't want to live in the shadow of the former boy bander:
"Trying to compare us to One Direction is like comparing us to Westlife or Metallica
to Take That.
We are completely different.
We haven't been Simon Cowelled."
How sassy!
Harry Styles' mom might be the reason One Direction ever happened.
In an interview with Rolling Stone, the singer admitted that he only ended up trying out
for The X Factor because his mom suggested the idea after hearing him sing in the car.
As he puts it:
"Your mum tells you things to make you feel good, so you take it with a pinch of salt."
Styles ultimately competed in the solo boys category, singing a rendition of Stevie Wonder's
"Isn't She Lovely, "much to judge Louis Walsh's dismay.
"Harry, for all the right reasons, I'm going to say no."
"No!"
"Boooo!"
Regardless, Simon Cowell saw something in the young singer and brought him back to be
part of One Direction.
"I made a decision and I did this in about ten minutes.
Why don't we put these five boys in a group?"
"Is that how it happened?
You were just called into a room?"
"Yeah.
I mean, you're not going to say no."
"And you'd all been cut?"
"Yeah."
"And then you were called back."
"Exactly."
In an interview with CBS, Styles discussed the origins of One Direction's name.
He and his fellow band members were tossing around different ideas and he thought One
Direction sounded good.
Evidently, the name is rather random and doesn't seem to hold any greater meaning.
Asked what the name was all about, Styles told CBS:
"I don't…I honestly don't know.
I suggested it and everyone was like 'Yeah, we like that,' and it kind of stuck."
Harry Styles' solo project was a success from the start, and on both sides of the Atlantic.
According to Forbes, his first self-titled, full-length solo album debuted at No. 1 on
the Billboard 200 and has since gone platinum.
He's a Hot 100 regular when you factor in his work with One Direction.
His first solo single, "Sign of the Times," first hit the UK charts at No. 1.
He's also behind several songs you've likely heard, but might not realize he wrote.
In a 2014 MTV interview, Ariana Grande admitted that Styles penned her track "A Little Bit
of Your Heart" after a chance encounter between the two artists at a recording studio.
As she tells it:
"He went into the other room and they were writing for a while and I remember when I
heard it I was like 'Wow that's a really strong verse, that's really beautiful'...and then
the chorus I was like crying!
So it's great."
Styles also partnered up with Meghan Trainor to write an acoustic love song called "Someday
Maybe."
Trainor told BBC Radio 1 that she was surprised a 20-year-old dude like Styles could write
lyrics that were, quote, "poetic and mature."
The song was ultimately given to Michael Bublé, who included it on his album Nobody But Me
under the name "Someday."
Harry Styles reportedly has a passion for romantic comedies.
In an interview with BBC Radio 1, the singer owned up to, or rather, was called out for,
absolutely loving Nicholas Sparks films.
He told host Nick Grimshaw,
"We kind of got into a routine of like, we would write, and then we'd have dinner."
"Uh-huh."
"And then we'd watch countless amounts of romantic comedies."
He goes on to say,
"[We'd watch] anything that Nicholas Sparks has ever done...I always circle back to The
Notebook."
"You love The Notebook."
"I don't like The Notebook that much—"
"You love The Notebook!
You love the Notebook!"
"Okay, I love The Notebook."
"You'll never not watch the Notebook."
"It's a good movie."
Teenage fangirls catch a lot of heat, and Tumblr fan fiction doesn't really help their
case.
Nonetheless, Harry Styles seems to see something that the mainstream media doesn't: Teen girls,
who made up a huge chunk of One Direction's fan base, are the future, and they're every
bit as cool as all the hipsters who go crazy over Arcade Fire.
In fact, they're some of the most honest, genuine music fans out there.
Styles told Rolling Stone in 2017,
"Who's to say that young girls who like pop music, short for popular, right, have worse
musical taste than a 30-year-old hipster guy?
That's not up to you to say."
He goes on to defend his fans, claiming that:
"Young girls like the Beatles.
You gonna tell me they're not serious?
How can you say young girls don't get it?
They're our future.
Our future doctors, lawyers, mothers, presidents, they kind of keep the world going.
Teenage-girl fans, they don't lie.
If they like you, they're there.
They don't act 'too cool.'
They like you, and they tell you.
Which is sick."
So there.
Harry Styles certainly channels Mick Jagger with some of his wardrobe choices.
He even did a spot-on impression of the Rolling Stones star during a 2017 Saturday Night Live
appearance.
"'Ello, yes, a lovely show, there's a bit of fun in it, whoo-hoo…oh!"
But Styles' lifestyle couldn't be any more different.
He's not, in fact, rolling fast like a Rolling Stone.
Instead, he might actually be one of the most wholesome rock stars on the planet.
In an interview with The Sun, Styles admitted that he never really drank or did drugs on
tour, partly because he was hyper-focused on turning in a decent performance.
He told the publication:
"On the first couple of tours it was so exciting as we'd have a drink and go to parties.
But for me, the albums got higher so they become harder to sing so I knew if I didn't
come off stage and go to bed I wouldn't be able to sing the next night.
Also, it's just not for me.
I'd rather wake up with a clear head."
This sentiment somewhat sets him apart from some of his former bandmates.
According to the Daily Mail, Zayn Malik and Louis Tomlinson were caught on video smoking
what appeared to be a joint.
And on his solo single "Good Years," Malik even referenced the divisive tour life, singing,
"Too much drugs and alcohol / What the hell were we fighting for?"
Perhaps the reason Styles is so grounded has to do with his solid upbringing.
In 2017, he told Rolling Stone,
"I feel very lucky.
I had a great family and always felt loved."
That said, there were some truly trying times when Harry was growing up.
His parents split up when the singer was seven years old, and Styles reportedly teared up
while discussing this chapter of his life with Rolling Stone.
During the interview, he realized he'd forgotten the exact moment he was told his dad would
be moving out of the house:
"Honestly, when you're that young, you can kind of block it out...I can't say that I
remember the exact thing.
I didn't realize that was the case until just now.
Yeah, I mean, I was seven.
It's one of those things.
Feeling supported and loved by my parents never changed."
To this day, Styles remains close to both of his parents.
He even served as the best man when his mother remarried.
Longtime fans of One Direction know the band seemingly imploded when Zayn Malik left in
the middle of their massive 2015 world tour, officially quitting shortly thereafter.
As Us Weekly reports, the hiatus became indefinite in 2016.
Contrary to popular belief, it wasn't Malik who originally voiced his desire to take a
break…although he later told Beats 1 Radio:
"I never really wanted to be there, like, in the band.
Like, I just gave it a go because it was there at the time."
In fact, it was reportedly Styles who first suggested that the band take a break in 2014.
Eventually, his fellow boy-banders agreed, and they made the announcement a few months
after Malik left.
In 2017, Styles told Rolling Stone:
"I didn't want to exhaust our fan base.
If you're shortsighted, you can think, 'Let's just keep touring,' but we all thought too
much of the group than to let that happen.
You realize you're exhausted and you don't want to drain people's belief in you."
So, now we can officially stop blaming Zayn Malik…okay?
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