Dare to Dream: Life as One Direction

I didn’t know if I had what it took, and I was really nervous about actually taking the step and applying, so in the end my mum filled out the application form and sent it off for me – and I’m so grateful she did. I often have those moments when I think, ‘What if she hadn’t done that’ or ‘What if so and so hadn’t happened?’ I had one the other day when we were all sitting down looking at an article about us. It hit me that if I hadn’t gone in for The X Factor I would still be at college. Instead I’m travelling around the country – and other parts of the world – with four of my best mates, having the best time it’s possible to have.

MOVING ON UP

I can remember so much about my X Factor audition and Bootcamp, but at the same time it all seems like such a blur. The best moment for me out of the whole thing was when we were told we were going to be put in a band together. I’d spoken to Louis, Zayn and Niall at Bootcamp and I remember thinking, ‘This is going to be a lot of fun,’ but I never for a moment thought that things would end up like this.

After the show everyone ended up coming to stay at my stepdad’s house in Cheshire, and for the first few days or so we just bonded with each other. It was a new experience for us all because it was like living in a student flat. My mum and Robin completely left us to our own devices. We all put in some money and my mum put a load of food in the fridge and we were left to get on with it. I cooked dinner for us one night – chicken breasts, chips and peas – and we all sat around the table in the bungalow talking rubbish. Other than that I think we ate Super Noodles most days, and we’d go out into the garden and play football for ages. We’d do ten minutes of singing practice, then play football for three hours, have a swim, drive to KFC … We were just messing around, but it was a really good way of getting to know each other’s personalities. We were learning little bits about each other by having silly banter.

I got on with Louis from the word go. We’re very similar and I like the fact that he has this ability to be nice to everyone while living totally for the moment. It puts a smile on your face when you see someone like that. I feel I can tell him anything, and I felt like that straight away. He can be really funny one minute, but if someone has a problem he can go into serious mode straight away and he gives really good advice.

Spain was so, so weird because we were still getting to know each other and then all of a sudden we were getting on a plane together for what felt like a holiday. We were still finding out so much about each other – in fact, we still are – so it was another really good time. I think we suddenly felt really grown up because we were in this big competition and, even though the X Factor staff were there, we were looking after ourselves to a certain extent.

Getting told we were through to the live finals was another moment I’ll never, ever forget. We honestly had no idea whether Simon would pick us or not, so to get a yes was just the most amazing feeling in the world. We were in shock when we were phoning our parents to tell them, but we had to keep it quiet from everyone else, which made things a bit weird. I wanted to tell the world, I was so happy.

We went back home for a while after Spain, and with some money I borrowed from my mum I ordered loads of clothes for the live shows because I wanted to be prepared. I have paid her back now, by the way.

What was weird then was getting used to people knowing who I was. My audition was shown the day before I moved into the house, so all my friends were texting me to say well done. When I headed up to London we stopped at a petrol station and someone there recognised me, and that was so strange.

Moving into the house was cool, and I didn’t even mind that our room was tiny. It did get pretty grotty, because you can imagine what it’s like with five teenage boys sharing a small space. We had a lot of luggage and there was too much stuff in the room, so it ended up being a bit grim. Apparently at one point someone took a swab from the wall and sent it off to a lab for testing and it had loads of different types of bacteria on it.

We did try to keep the room tidy, but the longer we were in the show the more stuff we accumulated, and the room seemed to get smaller and smaller. I can’t have disliked it that much, though, because Louis and I are planning to move in together. It must have been bearable.

I have so many great memories of being in the house, especially all of the times I went naked. Stripping off is very liberating, I feel so free. It’s always a spur of the moment thing, but no one seemed to mind. I think Mary secretly liked it … I’d become a lot more confident during my time in the show through being in front of so many people, and my confidence came out in my nakedness. I also used to moon a bit at school, because it made me laugh, so I was carrying it on.

Sometimes I was totally starkers, and sometimes I wore a thong. My friend Nick bought me a gold snake-print thong for my birthday, and I took it into the house with me because I thought it would be funny, and then I started wearing it.

One time I had to do a naked video clip for ITV2 where I was standing there with no clothes on and the boys had to pass various objects across me, keeping certain parts covered. That was the plan, but at one point Zayn didn’t move the book he was holding quickly enough and the cameraman got a bit of an eyeful. I think you could safely say I’m not shy.

Performance wise, I really enjoyed doing ‘Something About the Way You Look Tonight’, which I suggested as soon as we heard about the Elton John week. I love that song, and I think it worked really well. We met some amazing celebrities as well. Simon Cowell and Cheryl Cole are absolute legends, and Jonathan Ross had us all laughing. Alan Carr and Russell Brand were really cool as well. I can’t believe we got to meet so many of our heroes.

I found the X Factor final very emotional. We had no idea whether or not we would win, and when we came third it really hit me. I cried as soon as we got off stage, and then I stopped, took some deep breaths and was fine again. After that, when we got invited up to Simon’s office to discover our fate, I tried to stay as calm as possible, but on the inside I was terrified. As soon as Simon told us we had a record deal I started crying again and I sat there thinking, ‘Why am I crying? If this works out it’s going to totally change my life.’ My life had already changed so much, but that was the moment that told me I didn’t have to go back to doing what I did before. At least not for a while.

Even though I’d always wanted to be in a band and sing on stage when I was growing up, I never imagined it would actually happen. Imagine being told you could do exactly what you want to do for a job. It’s one of those things you always want to hear, and then when you hear it you don’t know how to react.

I couldn’t wait to tell my family the news – in fact I wanted to shout it out to everyone – but of course we had to keep it quiet. I went back downstairs to the bar area because there was a little party going on down there, and I think my parents could tell from the look on my face what had happened. We all had a massive hug and all of us were unbelievably happy and excited.

A CHRISTMAS TO REMEMBER

I think we were all looking forward to having a break over Christmas. I missed the boys quite a lot, but at the same time it was great to just relax and see my family. Loads of my friends wanted to catch up, so things were quite busy, but I didn’t want people to think that I’d changed and I didn’t have time for them or whatever. Sometimes I’ll be speaking to my mates for a while and they’ll say, ‘It’s so weird, you haven’t changed at all,’ and that always makes me feel so relieved. Sometimes I stop myself from talking too much about stuff I’ve been doing, because even though it’s my job I don’t want to seem like I’m showing off or name-dropping.

I would hate anyone to think that I was trying to impress them. I don’t need to; they’re my oldest friends.

All of my friends have been so supportive of everything I’ve been doing. It was frustrating for me, because sometimes during the show I’d get a text and I’d want to reply straight away but I’d be whisked away – then everything would go out of my head, which meant I sometimes forgot to reply to people. But all of my friends were so good about it and so understanding when things suddenly became crazy busy. They knew that even if I didn’t get to reply I liked the fact that they were still texting me and they were there for me. One of the great things about being on the tour was that we knew where we would be and when, so friends could come and visit us and we could catch up. It was much easier to organise seeing each other.

A lot of my friends are genuinely happy about how well things have gone so far and they like asking me questions. That’s how I know who is a genuine friend and who isn’t. I have come across some jealousy, and some people have made comments and distanced themselves from me without actually letting me know. I’ve tried to talk to them as I always would and they’re a bit cold with me. When you’ve been close to someone it’s hard when they start acting that way towards you. I’m not going to chase after people and beg them to be my friend, but I wouldn’t want them to think I don’t care, because I do. So while some people assume or think I’ve changed, it’s actually them who have changed.

There are times when I would like to go home and just be normal and see my mates again and go to all of the old places. I enjoy spoiling my family, and there are times when I would love to treat my friends as well, and I know that my true friends won’t think anything of it. I’m not just talking about money. It’s also nice to be able to help people in other ways. For instance, my friend Ben is really talented musically and wanted to get some work experience, so I managed to get him some on the tour and he loved it. I would never have had the opportunity to do something like that before, but I’ll help my mates out in any way that I can.

I’m trying my best to stay as down to earth as possible, so I don’t want people doing things for me that I could do myself. Sometimes people think they should get me a bottle of water or some lunch, but I’m capable of picking up my own water, so why should they have to do it? It’s nice that people offer, and I understand that if we’re really busy and we don’t have time to get lunch, or we’re rehearsing on stage and we can’t grab a drink, someone may get it for us, but if a bottle of water is in a fridge two feet away from me I can walk over and get it.

My mum would never let me get away with that sort of thing. If I was at home and I asked her to get me a drink she’d be like ‘You know where the glasses are.’ At the same time it’s funny when I go home now because I’m so used to doing everything myself, but my mum still likes to look after me in a lot of ways, so I feel like a proper kid again when I’m back with my family.

A lot of people say nice things about the band and we get a lot of praise. Obviously it’s lovely to hear and it always puts a smile on your face when someone tells you that you’re good at what you do, but I want to keep my feet on the ground as much as possible. I would never want to get big-headed. It’s such an unattractive trait and I can’t imagine myself ever being like that. I always want to be aware of staying true to myself.

I spent Christmas mainly at home with my family. That was the most important thing to me. That, and seeing my friends, which I managed to do a few times. Things had been so busy that all I wanted to do was have a break, watch TV and eat and sleep. I had such a nice time, doing the same family things we do every year.

One thing that was different was that some fans came to my house over Christmas, and it was so cold that I felt really bad about them being outside. I did go out and see them as much as possible if I was there, but I felt terrible that they were standing in the freezing cold because of me. As a band we’ve always said that we’ll never complain about people coming to see us or wanting autographs or photos. They’re the reason we’re doing all of this.

We appreciate the support so much. It’s great to know that people like what we’re doing. Some days I read 100 great Twitter comments and there may be one from someone saying they don’t like me. If I’m having a bad day for some reason, that’s the one I remember and it can make me feel a bit down. Then I’ll go back and read the nice messages again and they’ll lift me. They mean a lot to all of us.

BACK TO THE FUTURE

The New Year meant getting back to work, and we knew it was going to be busy. We had the tour coming up, so we had rehearsals for that, and we also had quite a lot of meetings and gigs, so things were pretty non-stop. But we’d all had a good break and we were ready to get back into it.

One of the first things we did was go to LA. When we got told we were going there my mouth literally fell open. I love going abroad but I’d never been to LA and had always wanted to. I’d seen and read so much about it, so I was looking forward to seeing how much of it was true.

LA is something else. Everyone you see looks like they’re famous, but I really liked it as a place. It was really hot there, so we were wearing shorts and t-shirts most of the time, and we got to chill out quite a bit as the hotel we stayed in, the W, had a pool.

What I found weird was that the people over there are so polite. When you get your breakfast brought to you in a hotel in England they’ll drop it off and barely say a word, but over there they’re so cheerful you want to invite them in to share it with you. This one woman who dropped off my food was like ‘Good morning, sir, how’s your day going? Where do you want me to put this good stuff?’ They literally couldn’t do enough for you.

We did some recording in this really cool complex where there were loads of different things going on. In one studio they were recording the backing vocals for Glee, and then Randy Jackson’s office was 100 metres away, so we went and met him and he was an amazing guy. He was so friendly.

We got some time off to go shopping too, so I literally raided Abercrombie and Fitch. Louis reckons I bought every single t-shirt they had in there, but I think he’s exaggerating. I did get quite a few, though …

I wish we’d had more time in LA, but we did really enjoy the five days we spent there. It was like I expected it to be, with the sun and the glamorous people, and it’s definitely somewhere I’d like to go back to. I really want to go to Venice Beach and see what that’s like.

We were all quite tired when we landed back in London, but we were soon woken up by the sight of hundreds of fans. It’s become a bit of a legendary story now about us being mobbed and the police being called and everything. I’d never experienced anything like it in my life. We’d seen loads of fans at The X Factor, but usually they were either outside behind a gate or in the audience. And when we meet fans at hotels or outside gigs they’re usually in small groups. Well this was definitely not a small group!

I was really shocked by the whole experience of having to run through the crowd, but I made myself enjoy it instead of being scared of it, because I knew it was something special. When we were in the police van afterwards we all sat there going ‘What the hell?’ It was almost as if it hadn’t happened, it was so surreal, but looking back on it now it was an amazing moment.

When tour rehearsals came around we were well aware that we would have to work really hard. We wanted to put on an amazing show and we had a lot of new stuff to learn, including dance routines. We were taught things like how to put more energy into moving around, which is hard when you’re in an empty warehouse performing to no one.

We also had to practise putting talking bits in between songs, which also felt weird because we’d be talking to an audience of six crew members, and even they didn’t respond.

Getting to put everything we’d learnt into practice was the ultimate pay-off for all the hard work we’d done. I can’t even begin to describe what it was like when we all stood on the stage together for the first night of the tour in Birmingham. Looking out and seeing all the banners and hearing thousands of people shouting your name … It really doesn’t get much better than that. We’d performed on The X Factor and we’d done gigs, but nothing compared to this. I had to stand there for a moment just to take it all in, but as soon as we started singing we were off.

I think even that first arena performance in Birmingham was different to anything else we’d ever done in terms of how much energy we put into it and how much we moved around the stage. It felt almost natural being there, even though it was also completely and utterly surreal. There were several times when we all looked at each other and I could tell we were all thinking the same thing – ‘This is incredible!’

The rush you get being on stage in front of so many people is indescribable. I wish everyone could have that feeling. I can be so tired and feeling like I’m in a bad mood, then I get on stage and I feel amazing. I’m so hyped up when I come off stage that I shout a lot and jump around. There’s no feeling like it.

I loved the tour so much I never wanted it to stop. I didn’t even get homesick, because we were so busy we didn’t get time to think about it, but I actually felt really guilty about that. All in all we were pretty well behaved on the tour, but we had our moments, like the fruit fight. At least we didn’t throw any TVs out of windows or anything … but there’s still time.

The wrap party at the end of the tour was good, but we all felt sad saying goodbye to everyone. I was up until about five in the morning so I was a bit tired the next day, but we had a day off to chill out so it didn’t matter too much.

When the tour was over, Louis, his mate Stan, my friend Johnny and I all went off on a skiing holiday together. I’d never been skiing before and I was desperate to give it a go. We had a brilliant laugh in Courchevel and I’d love to go back again.

We worked really hard on the album to find the right songs. They needed to be perfect. We wanted our first single to be a big summer song. For instance, when the Black Eyed Peas single ‘I Gotta Feeling’ came out in 2009 it was the song of the summer. When everyone heard it, it reminded them of all the good times they’d had. We wanted our first single to be like that and be the song that everyone would remember.

The people we got to work with on the album were incredible. Steve Robson is very, very talented and has worked with James Morrison and Take That and all sorts of people. Working with RedOne and Rami was very cool too because they’re legendary. It feels so odd to be working in all of these studios that we would never have even dreamed of walking into before we were in the band. It was quite surreal.