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More than 20,000 fans from all over the world flocked towards the Co-op Live arena in Manchester on Friday to watch Harry Styles perform his first concert in two and a half years – some waiting 48 hours for a place down the front.
Styles will perform his new album Kiss All the Time. Disco, Occasionally in full, after its release earlier today. Anticipation for the show had been high since tickets went on sale for £20 in early February, which, barring a performance of the album’s lead single Aperture at the Brit awards – which took place at the same arena a week earlier – will be Styles’ first time on stage since closing out a tour in Italy in July 2023. It has been marketed as a homecoming show for the pop star, who was raised outside the city in Holmes Chapel, Cheshire.
Outside the Co-op, a growing line of brightly dressed superfans – or Harries, as they are officially called – waited patiently to be let in, with some, wrapped in foil blankets to stay warm, having already been in line since Wednesday in order to fight their way to the front of the barriers once doors opened.
Four friends – Melissa, Dani, Begum and Jessica – had only been waiting in line for an hour and a half, but were no less excited to watch their idol end his hiatus.
“We absolutely love him, we love his new album, it’s so dancey and fun and it’s going to be amazing,” said Begum, who also has tickets to see Styles twice on the world tour he is undertaking in the summer. “We love his new era and he seems really happy, which makes us happy as well.”
Kara Rosenberg, 27, travelled to Manchester from Chicago for the show, stating that it was a “once in a lifetime experience” to watch him make his comeback.
“I first became a fan of him watching the British X Factor with a VPN back in 2010,” she said. “He brings me seriously so much joy and so much nostalgia. I really love everything he stands for and he brings people together in such a positive way and I feel like he just spreads happiness wherever he goes.”
The £20 ticket price is considerably lower than for Styles’s concerts this summer, staged as residencies in stadiums. Seated tickets for his now sold-out Wembley Stadium concerts started at £44, but went up to 10 times that amount, while standing tickets were at least £144.
Some fans had complained in online forums about the cost of the tickets, but others are clearly willing to spend. Richard, a security guard at the venue, said fans had arrived early on Friday morning in the hopes that they could barter for any spares, for large cash sums.
“It’s mental – one of the lads working said that someone paid a grand in cash for someone’s ticket,” he said. “There’s a whole bunch of them with signs begging for tickets. I saw someone offering pictures of their feet in exchange for a ticket. I’ll be honest, I hadn’t ever seen that before.”
Among the ticketless masses are Lena, Alex and Natalie, three friends in their early 20s who flew from Berlin to attend the gig. The trio, who met through their shared love of Styles, and between them have seen him 50 times, were steadfast that they would find a way into the concert.
“We all met because of Harry, so we need to be here tonight,” said Lena. “This is a bonding experience, it’s sacred. We’ve come all the way because we love Harry so much and because tonight is going to be so special.”
The friends have had previous success with this method, having watched Oasis at Wembley last summer despite arriving at the venue with no tickets in hand.
“The key is persistence,” said Alex. “We feel pretty good about it, we’re calm, we know we’ll get tickets. It will happen and we’ll be with Harry.”
Kiss All the Time. Disco, Occasionally is expected to be Styles’s fourth US No 1 album in a row, and third chart-topper in the UK. (His second album, Fine Line, reached No 2.)
Reviews have been generally positive so far, with four-star ratings from publications including NME, Rolling Stone UK and the Independent.
The Guardian’s Alexis Petridis was more reserved, awarding it three stars as it was “devoid of unequivocal pop bangers along the lines of As It Was or Watermelon Sugar”. He also criticised the lyrics: “A sense of musical vagueness is compounded by what Harry Styles is singing … As suggested by Kiss All the Time. Disco, Occasionally’s title – which sounds like something you would see on a poster in a certain type of person’s kitchen, next to a sign informing you that it’s prosecco o’clock – the album has a problem with words.”
