Harry Styles – Harry's House [Vinyl LP]

Harry Styles – Harry's House [Vinyl LP]

Details

• Format: Vinyl LP, Album, Gatefold, Stereo
• Catalogue Number: 194399 97481
• Barcode: 194399974810
• Genre: Pop / Indie Pop / Pop Rock / Soft Rock
• Label: Columbia / Erskine Records
• Originally Released: 20 May 2022
• Condition: New & Sealed

Description

Harry's House is the third studio album by Harry Styles, released on 20 May 2022 through his own Erskine Records in partnership with Columbia Records, and one of the most commercially and critically successful British pop albums of recent years. Recorded across multiple locations in the UK, Los Angeles and Tokyo between 2020 and 2021, it was written by Styles alongside his three principal collaborators — Kid Harpoon (Thomas Hull), Tyler Johnson and Mitch Rowland — all of whom also produced the record in various combinations. In its first week of release it sold 182,000 album-equivalent units in the United States, debuting at number one on the US Billboard 200, and simultaneously topped the charts in the UK, Australia, Ireland, the Netherlands and numerous other territories. At the 65th Grammy Awards in February 2023 it won Album of the Year, Best Pop Vocal Album and Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical — three of the most significant recognitions available in mainstream music — alongside nominations for Record of the Year and Song of the Year for the lead single "As It Was". It was named among the best albums of 2022 by Rolling Stone, Pitchfork, NME, The Guardian and a large number of other critical publications.

The album's central creative inspiration is Haruomi Hosono — the Japanese bassist, composer and producer known for his work in Happy End, Yellow Magic Orchestra and an extensive solo career — whose concept of the "house" as a metaphor for psychological interiority Styles adopted for the record's title and thematic architecture. Styles has described the album as an attempt to make music that feels domestic in scale — intimate, introspective, concerned with everyday emotional life — while remaining fully accessible as pop. The production throughout reflects this ambition: layered but never cluttered, warm rather than cold, drawing from 1970s soft rock, Japanese city pop, chamber pop and classic singer-songwriter traditions without being reducible to any of them. It is the most sonically unified record of Styles' solo career, and the one on which his voice — developed significantly across three albums — is placed most consistently at the centre of the mix.

The thirteen tracks span a considerable range within a coherent emotional register. "As It Was" — the lead single, released 1 April 2022 — spent 15 weeks at number one on the UK Singles Chart and 15 weeks at number one on the US Billboard Hot 100, becoming one of the biggest-selling global singles of the decade; built on a propulsive synth-pop production with an interpolation of a children's song sung by Styles' friend Arlo Parks, its lyrical subject is the difficulty of returning to ordinary life after a period of isolation and change. "Late Night Talking" — the second single — is a rolling, melodically inventive piece of pop that draws from Todd Rundgren and early 1970s AM radio rock. "Music for a Sushi Restaurant" opens the album with one of its most surprising productions: a brass-led funk piece with a deliberately absurdist lyric. "Matilda" — a quiet, devastating ballad addressed to a person Styles has described only as someone he knows — is the album's most emotionally direct moment, its production entirely stripped back to acoustic guitar, piano and voice. "Boyfriends" draws from 1970s soft rock balladry in a manner that recalls Harry Nilsson; "Cinema" is the most explicitly pop-funk track on the record. The closing "Love of My Life" — a gentle acoustic piece addressed to England itself, written as Styles was preparing to spend extended time in the US — ends the album on a note of tender, unadorned simplicity.

This pressing on Columbia / Erskine Records is on black vinyl, lacquers cut by Ryan K. Smith (RKS) at Sterling Sound, pressed by MPO in France, housed in a gatefold sleeve with a plain blue inner sleeve with die-cut holes revealing the disc labels. Includes a 5" × 7" postcard and a 12-page booklet. Creative direction by Molly Hawkins, graphic design by Bradley Pinkerton, photography by Hanna Moon, styling by Harry Lambert.

Tracklist

Side A

1. Music for a Sushi Restaurant
2. Late Night Talking
3. Grapejuice
4. As It Was
5. Daylight
6. Little Freak
7. Matilda

Side B

1. Cinema
2. Daydreaming
3. Keep Driving
4. Satellite
5. Boyfriends
6. Love of My Life

Credits

• Harry Styles – Vocals, Instruments, Co-Writer
• Kid Harpoon (Thomas Hull) – Producer, Co-Writer
• Tyler Johnson – Producer, Co-Writer
• Mitch Rowland – Producer, Co-Writer
• Ryan K. Smith (RKS) – Lacquer Cut (Sterling Sound)
• Molly Hawkins – Creative Director
• Bradley Pinkerton – Graphic Design
• Hanna Moon – Photography
• Harry Lambert – Styling
• Jeffrey Azoff, Tom Skoglund, Tommy Bruce – Management
• Label – Columbia / Erskine Records