From One Direction to five paths of their own: the Brit boy band’s ex-members chart distinctive musical courses
For years Niall Horan, Zayn Malik, Harry Styles, Liam Payne and Louis Tomlinson toured the world together, delighting young fans. Now each has gone solo and is trying to find their own voice in a competitive industry
A key part of Slow Hands – the top-20 solo hit by this member of the British boy band One Direction – the iffy line likens his lover’s touch not to a summer breeze or a kiss from a rose but to “sweat dripping down our dirty laundry”.
On the page it’s vaguely nauseating. Yet, as Horan delivers the words in his breathy croon, backed by a creeping funk groove, the image conjures a sensuality you can almost feel.
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How’d he know it would fly?
“I was with some friends of mine and we were just kind of shouting out lyrics,” the singer says. “And when we shouted that one – I think it was me who spat it out – the rest of the people in the room didn’t go, ‘Echhh’,” he laughed. “They weren’t horrified by it.”
Any young songwriter wants to find language to set his work apart. But Horan may be more motivated than most: nearly two years after his stadium-filling quartet (fifth member Zayn Malik left in 2015) went on an indefinite hiatus in early 2016, Horan is but one of the former members who are now tending to solo careers.