Four years after his last record, the rockstar turned disco diva has returned to the dance floor with his fourth studio album. The precisely punctuated title hints at Styles’ main muse for the album — nightclubs in Berlin — and the simultaneous community and anonymity found on a European dance floor.
No stranger to incredible success, Styles won the Grammy award for Album of the Year in 2023 with his last album, “Harry’s House.” Yet, in creating his new project, Styles said he wanted to take a step back and assess his career to date, focusing on the intent of the album’s production rather than simply going through the motions to please eager fans.
After concluding “Love on Tour” in 2023 following his last album, Styles escaped from the spotlight to embrace the leisurely lifestyle of Italy. While in Rome, he said that he was able to focus on the nuances of daily life rather than social media status, which inspired the creation of “Kiss All the Time. Disco, Occasionally.”
The record opens with the album’s single, “Aperture,” initially released Jan. 22. With techno and electronic influence, the track sheds the pastels of the “Harry’s House” era and invites listeners to enter the glamorous world of “Kiss All the Time.” Its chorus, “Aperture lets the light in,” effectively introduces the album’s ethos of liberation.
The following track, “American Girls,” opens with piano notes before introducing its bassline, easing listeners into the album’s lively pace without making any noteworthy choices. “Ready, Steady, Go!” accelerates the records’ rhythm as suggested by its exclamation point, incorporating an addictive electronic dance beat. Similarly, “Are You Listening Yet?” follows with a quick beat and racy lyrics — “The fix of all fixes, unintimate sex / You like the way she talks, but never what she says.” The drums and electric guitar bridge fully immerse listeners into the proverbial party, and as the title suggests, ensure that audiences are fully engaged. The three tracks are light-hearted and instrumentally focused, falling short of displaying Styles’ capability to craft powerfully emotive songs such as “Sign of the Times” or “Falling” from his previous albums, but are compelling nonetheless.
By contrast, “Taste Back” decelerates the pace, showcasing Styles’ lyrical vulnerability with “Must be lonely out in Paris if you talk like that / It was tough with the time, did you come back?” In an introspective journey through the reemergence of a lost love, the lyrics highlight Styles’ tenderness and empathy as a songwriter. The track — the fifth on the album — reintroduces Styles’ romantic lyricism, a celebrated component in his past three albums but is not overly apparent in the spirited album as a whole.
At the album’s numerical halfway mark, “The Waiting Game” and “Season 2 Weight Loss” incorporate electronic beats while primarily focusing on the lyrics. The tracks fall somewhere in between grooving and contemplating, letting listeners choose their own adventure without distinguishing themselves as particularly remarkable anthems.
Alternatively, “Coming Up Roses” halts dancers in their tracks, taking a break from the heavy bass and fast-paced tempos to focus on the British songwriter’s soft vocals. The post-chorus instrumental break ushers in a harmonious composition of strings, reminiscent of a cinematic score or a ballroom dance. The idyllic track is perhaps the album’s strongest display of Styles’ musicality, showcasing the songwriter’s ability to craft emotionally moving pieces.
“Pop” and “Dance No More” place listeners back under the glistening mirror of the disco ball with heavy bass and techno instruments. The album quickly shifts from introspective to liberating — or as “Dance No More” wonderfully puts it, “There's no difference in between the tears and the sweat”, reaffirming the dynamic aspect of “Kiss All the Time.”
“Paint by Numbers” is a brief and lyrically focused track, weighing the effects of external expectations with the lyrics “When they put an image in your head, and now you're stuck with it.” In a recent interview with New Zealand radio DJ Zane Lowe — which has become a series for each of Styles’ album releases —- the artist revealed that the eleventh track was almost the first. The songwriter initially wanted to return from his four-year hiatus with a somber evaluation of his public image and the responsibilities that accompany fame. However, he decided against it and wished for the song to become the album’s pillar rather than the introduction.
Finally, the album ends on an optimistic note with “Carla’s Song.” The final track blends vulnerability with upbeat drums, and the lyrics “Can you hear that voice / Delivering the news? / It's all waitin' there for you” remind listeners to embrace the carefree nature of life. These lyrics make up one small part of a song about seizing each available moment and taking advantage of one’s surroundings, contributing to the album’s overarching theme.
“Kiss All the Time. Disco, Occasionally” is an inventive record full of vitality, finding the perfect balance between reflection and release. While not Styles’ strongest display of emotionality or acoustic instrumentals, the record is riveting and uniquely itself. Following the album’s release, Styles performed a special concert titled “Harry Styles. One Night in Manchester,” which debuted on Netflix Sunday. He also recently announced his “Together, Together” tour, an homage to the “Forever, Forever” video that captured the eminence of “Love on Tour” while introducing the “Kiss All the Time” era.
Read More
A&E Book Club: Define ‘March,’ please
By Eloise Diffley | YesterdayConnected by the many uses of “march,” this list of literature blends the ancient world with modern writers, stories of innocence with war and tyrants and weddings with funerals
Gorillaz reach new peaks on ‘The Mountain’
By Bridget Baile | YesterdayThe album is directly inspired by a trip that band members Albarn and Hewlett took to India in 2023
Hoo’s Watching: On months of women’s history and years of men
By Caroline Lee | 2 days agoThe good news, however, is that if 2025 was a year for the man, 2026 is taking on a more diversified portfolio, with plenty of women in the coming months’ titles.
