Louis Tomlinson tells Rolling Stone UK about new album ‘How Did I Get Here?’: ‘It feels like a reflection of how confident I am’

As Louis Tomlinson graces the cover of Rolling Stone UK for the first time, the former One Direction star has told us about the lighter direction of his new album How Did I Get Here?

The singer’s third album lands on January 23 next year and the lead single ‘Lemonade’ sees Tomlinson head in an impressive psych-pop direction, with the song anchored by one of his catchiest choruses to date.

Now, he joins his former bandmates Harry Styles and Niall Horan in covering Rolling Stone UK, and you can pre-order the magazine here.

Tomlinson wants the album to “feel like a journey from the mildly dark sonic place” of his last album, 2022’s Faith in the Future, to a much sunnier destination. “I hope it feels like a reflection of how confident I am, but breezy is a real nice way of putting it,” he says in the cover story for our latest issue. “It’s been a long time since, professionally and personally, I’ve been able to have a little spring in my step. So, hopefully that comes across in the record.”

RS UK was also lucky enough to hear a number of other tracks on the record. ‘Imposter’ is a slinky indie sleaze jam, while the anthemic ‘Palaces’ has shades of The Cure.

Tomlinson recorded some of the album in Los Angeles and portions in the English countryside, but says the album really took shape during a relaxed songwriting camp in Santa Teresa, a surfing village on Costa Rica’s Nicoya Peninsula.

That camp saw him joined by collaborators including Nico Rebscher, David Sneddon and Theo Hutchcraft from Hurts for three weeks of “good food and living the project at a slow pace”.

Describing the relaxed approach to recording, Tomlinson explained: “What it does for me is build up a lot of trust and confidence in the people that I’m working with. What it isn’t about – and I did many of these sessions [in the past] – is being in a room where people are hoping that we write the single. I get that everyone’s got a livelihood, but sometimes in that situation, you can feel more like a means to an end than [like you’re working with] someone who really wants the best for the record.”

He went on: “Ever since being in One Direction, I’ve been searching for this kind of team mentality,” he says. “I’ve done it the same with my live band on tour – we very much move as a unit, and that’s really important to me.”

Explaining how Costa Rica shaped the record, he added: “As I’ve got a bit older, I’m really buying into more hippie-ish ideas. I realised I liked the idea of just bathing in that atmosphere and seeing what happened to the music there. I don’t think songs like ‘Lemonade’, ‘Sunflowers’ and ‘Lazy’ would have happened without Costa Rica.”

Issue 24 of Rolling Stone UK with Louis Tomlinson will drop on October 9. The full story will arrive online in the week after.