Louis Tomlinson says of the five original members of One Direction, he was “forgettable, to a certain degree.”
He explained: “Like Niall [Horan], for example. He’s the most lovely guy in the world. Happy-go-lucky Irish, no sense of arrogance. And he’s fearless. There are times I’ve thought: ‘I’d have a bit of that.’ Zayn [Malik], back in the day. He could relate to me on a nerves level. In the first year we were both the least confident. But Zayn has a fantastic voice and for him it was always about owning that. Liam [Payne] always had a good stage presence, same as Harry [Styles], they’ve both got that ownership. Harry comes across very cool. Liam’s all about getting the crowd going, doing a bit of dancing… And then there’s me.”
Tomlinson says when 1D was put together in 2010 on the UK series X Factor, he was little more than “the kid wearing espadrilles” at the back.
“I didn’t sing a single solo on the X Factor,” he recalled.
“A lot of people can take the piss out of that. But when you actually think about how that feels, standing on stage every single week, thinking: ‘What have I really done to contribute here? Sing a lower harmony that you can’t really hear in the mix?’”
In an interview with Tom Lamont of The Observer, Tomlinson also revealed that he didn’t want One Direction to go their separate ways.
“In the last year of One Direction I was probably the most confident I ever was,” he said. “And then it was: ‘OK, hiatus!’
“It wasn’t necessarily a nice conversation. I could see where it was going.”
Tomlinson said he figured he would wait “two years, five years, whatever it be” for One Direction to get back together.
“If you’d asked me a year or 18 months ago: ‘Are you going to do anything as a solo artist?’ I’d have said absolutely not.”
Tomlinson collaborated with Steve Aoki for “Just Hold On” and just tweeted that his next single, “Back To You,” is coming soon.
“Really excited for you all to hear the new single,” he tweeted on Saturday. “Got a good feeling about this one.”
Still, Tomlinson isn’t quite sure how the guy at the back seven years ago ended up a solo artist.
“I’m trying to work out why it is that I’m [doing this],” he said.