Image from Another Man.
It's been a wild ride, these past thirty-odd days. Singles, live performances, movie trailers, six-thousand-word features written by Cameron Crowe. A huge month for one Harry Styles, whose debut self titled album is live and online today.A very palatable ten tracks long, Harry Styles the album is very much what was promised to us in the form of its first two singles "Sign of the Times" and "Sweet Creature"—a product of what might best be described as Harry's Almost Famous phase."Meet In the Hallway" is Zeppelin circa 1970, "Carolina" is basically "Stuck in the Middle with You", "Woman" must have been written after drunkenly listening to "Benny and the Jets" over and over, and album closer "From the Dining Table" is one part Simon and Garfunkel, two parts Cat Stevens.But look—and apologies in advance for what I'm about to say as it's very guy in your gender studies tute that mansplains feminism to you every fucking week but—everything really is derivative. So fuck it, you know? At least this record isn't derivative like Calvin Harris or Drake. At least this guy's doing his thing. At least your dad won't throw the CD out the moving car's window, babbling on about "nonsense" and "autotune" and "noise pollution".Listen to it in full below if you're into that kind of thing.