Harry Styles - from X-Factor wannabe to global success

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Why is Harry Styles returning to Ireland for three Croke Park shows?

David McCullagh 0:00
Harry Styles there with Late Night Talking, and we're playing that obviously because he's coming back to Ireland. He has expanded his global tour, including three nights in Croke Park in August 2027. Three nights in Croaker is some feat. He recently broke the world record for the longest residency at Wellmbley Stadium during a single run with 12 shows at the London venue to chart the rise and rise of Harry Styles and I'm joined by Radio One's Louise Doffy. Morning Louise.
Louise Duffy 0:27
Good morning, David.
David McCullagh 0:28
And if we want to look at the start of Harry Styles' career, we have to go back to twenty ten and Simon Cowell.
Louise Duffy 0:35
When he was just a little boy. A li yeah, it's hard to believe. Twenty ten. Sixteen years ago. Um, remember our Saturday nights? Maybe not in your house, but our Saturday nights. Yes. Not for me, but Before we had the traitors we spent our time with Uh X Factor and Simon Cowell was ever present in our world. And 2010 there were five boys who didn't do too well in the boys section, and they went into the groups as one direction. I don't know what Bright Spark had the idea to put these five guys together. Uh Nicole Schürzinger would claim it was her idea. Simon Cowell said it was his. Whoever was on to a winner and uh put these five boys together and we had one direction and they just took off.
David McCullagh 1:18
They sure did and um I mean you can see that from the s success of their very first release, This is what makes you beautiful.
Unknown 1:27
Everyone else in the room can see it. Baby Like nobody is

How did Simon Cowell and the X‑Factor launch Harry Styles and One Direction?

David McCullagh 1:51
What makes you beautiful by one direction. Now my daughter was of an age where she was into them and if we went on long trips we'd have the C D on the car. They weren't bad at all, weren't
Louise Duffy 1:59
they? I mean, listening to that. That is such a hit, isn't it? Yeah, absolutely. It's so poppy.
David McCullagh 2:04
Yeah, and they did resonate. Why were they so popular, do you think?
Louise Duffy 2:08
Uh I think I think we uh i they just were this perfect package. They were five guys who seemed to enjoy each other's company, they got along, they're all handsome, they just were shiny to the outside world. In that year they didn't win the X Factor actually, it was uh Mac Cardell and Rebecca Ferguson came second. Both of
David McCullagh 2:28
whom went on to have fantastic I
Louise Duffy 2:30
know and isn't it hard. I do always feel for those people who had, you know, a couple of years of success and then obscurity beckons. Like Mac Cardell has forty five thousand if you if you want to judge now and the listenership now, he has forty five thousand listeners monthly on Spotify. One directions still have forty five million listens on Spotify. Now that's they haven't released anything since, you know, obviously I think two thousand fifteen, sixteen. When they took that hiatus. Uh so they just really hit a moment. They were at that point where Instagram and social media was taken off. Like your daughter, they had this very loyal legion of fans who grew with them. And then, you know, it's like Westlife doing their uh their shows now.
Louise Duffy 3:08
And Um people like me w still want to go there and go back to that moment of nostalgia. Yeah. So they kind of hit a point in a really uh frenzied fandom and uh it just they they they just got it.
David McCullagh 3:25
Moving on from that though can be tricky because if you come from a boy band, if you're perceived as manufactured, if you've been involved in a reality T V show, all of those could be black marks against you uh as you go ahead go ahead. But Harry Stiles seems to have overcome that, doesn't he?
Louise Duffy 3:39
He did and so f for so many people that uh reality T V background, it can be the albatross around your neck, but not for him at all. Uh not for Nial Horin either. I think they really just flew from there. But I think that they had one direction had gone so far from the reality T V. They had five, six years of huge success. So reality T V was already in the background at that point. Uh and so then when they just started their own careers as solo artists, they were still very young, like in their early to mid twenties. They had to do something, not financially, but they had to do something for themselves. So yeah, they just they they kept flying.

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