Every Time I Turn Around

Niall Horan “Nice to Meet Ya”

“Nice to Meet Ya” is a remarkable facsimile of the slickest end of British rock at the end of the 20th century, a song that was made this year but sounds exactly like it could be track 14 on a CD packaged along with a copy of Q or Select somewhere between 1997 and 2000. The vocal melody sounds extremely Noel Gallagher to me, and there’s traces of Primal Scream, Mansun, Blur, Garbage, Fatboy Slim, and The Chemical Brothers in the arrangement. It doesn’t pull from any particular reference point, it just feels very particular to around 20 years ago. And this makes sense given that Niall Horan was born in Ireland in the early 90s and almost certainly grew up hearing a lot of music like this. He’s very good at channeling this energy. Horan is aiming for “bad boy” here and the calculation is obvious, but the laddish swagger suits his voice well.

This also sets him apart from his former bandmates in One Direction, who’ve all gravitated to different musical aesthetics but all project an overbearing earnestness. It’s especially striking in contrast with Harry Styles, whose relentless focus on being Pop-Rock’s #1 Very Good Boy has kept him from making much in the way of actually compelling rock music. Whereas Styles’ most rocking moments – mostly just “Kiwi” – sound like a Broadway musical’s sanitized approximation of a very generic notion of ’70s rock, “Nice to Meet Ya” sounds like the work of a person with very specific taste who isn’t afraid to come off a bit sleazy, or even just like an actual human rather than an idealized image.

Buy it from Amazon.