Harry Styles' 'Sign Of The Times' Has A Rather Surprising Backstory

Harry Styles has shared the rather surprising backstory behind his chart-topping song, ‘Sign Of The Times’.

The former One Direction singer unveiled his debut solo effort earlier this month, and quickly stormed to the number one spot in the UK singles chart.

Clocking in at more than five and a half minutes, it’s quite the departure from the sound we heard him showcasing with 1D, and it seems the track’s narrative differs from the group’s carefree ditties about romance and partying, more than any of us had realised.

In a new interview with Rolling Stone magazine, Harry revealed of the song he penned himself: “’Sign of the Times’ came from ‘this isn’t the first time we’ve been in a hard time, and it’s not going to be the last time.’

“The song is written from a point of view as if a mother was giving birth to a child and there’s a complication.

“The mother is told, ‘The child is fine, but you’re not going to make it.’ The mother has five minutes to tell the child, ‘Go forth and conquer.’”

Well… we weren’t quite expecting that.

Describing his self-titled solo debut’s influences, he continued: “A lot of my influences, and the stuff that I love, is older. So the thing I didn’t want to do was, I didn’t want to put out my first album and be like, ‘He’s tried to re-create the Sixties, Seventies, Eighties, Nineties.’

“Loads of amazing music was written then, but I’m not saying I wish I lived back then. I wanted to do something that sounds like me. I just keep pushing forward.”

During the same interview, Harry spoke for the first time about his brief romance with fellow singer/songwriter Taylor Swift, and addressed what he really thought about the rumours he inspired her hit, ‘Style’.

Read Harry’s interview in full in the new issue of Rolling Stone.