Harry Styles
photo: lily redman · cc by 2.0 ↗Harry Styles grew up in Holmes Chapel, Cheshire, and shot to fame at sixteen as a member of One Direction, formed on the British 'The X Factor' in 2010, going on to become one of the biggest pop acts of the decade. After the group's hiatus he launched a solo career in 2017 with a self-titled album that leaned hard into 1970s classic rock and soft rock, then broadened into a warmer, more danceable pop on 'Fine Line' and 'Harry's House.' His 2022 single 'As It Was' became a global smash and 'Harry's House' won the Grammy for Album of the Year, cementing a solo persona built on retro-leaning songcraft, flamboyant, gender-fluid style, and arena-scale showmanship.
Styles has cited Bowie as an inspiration, praising his fearless willingness to evolve, and his debut solo single 'Sign of the Times' was widely compared by critics to Bowie's dramatic, slow-building glam-rock ballads. The link is one of theatrical scale and gender-fluid, chameleonic presentation as much as sound.
listen forCue Bowie's 'Life on Mars?' and listen to how a hushed piano verse swells into an operatic, string-swept climax, then put on 'Sign of the Times' — Styles builds the same way, letting a mournful ballad detonate into an arena-sized, falsetto-topped crescendo.
Styles's self-titled debut was shaped by the classic rock he grew up on, and the Rolling Stones are named among those touchstones; his rowdiest solo tracks trade the group's polished pop for a raw, guitar-driven strut in the Stones' mould.
listen forDrop the needle on the dirty, swaggering guitar riff that opens 'Brown Sugar,' then jump to 'Kiwi' — Styles rides the same kind of raunchy, distorted riff and a snarled, barroom vocal instead of the gloss of his ballads.
Styles has repeatedly named Shania Twain as a main inspiration both musically and in fashion, crediting her genre-crossing country-pop and playful, confident showmanship; he later brought her out as a surprise guest at Coachella. The influence surfaces less as twang than as her knack for a bright, unabashed feel-good hook.
listen forPut on the winking, giddy bounce of 'Man! I Feel Like a Woman!' and then 'Watermelon Sugar' — both ride an easy, sun-warmed groove and a flirtatious, singalong chorus that chases pure pleasure without a hint of irony.