Harry Styles’ pop culture trends and marketing for new album from Press Kitchen’s Lourdes Duque.
Image: Karwai Tang/WireImage
Album Photo Cover: Mikayla Grimes
If you are not a huge fan of Harry Styles — or have not been bombarded with edits and videos about him like I have these past few weeks — then let me be the first to tell you that his new album has finally been released! “Kiss All The Time. Disco, Occasionally.” was teased to be a brand new version of the singer that we have never seen before, and it has the fans going crazy. Ticket prices are sky high, and the lack of California concerts, a stake in the heart for Los Angeles fans, has taken over the pop culture news. In all honesty, Harry Styles does not need a major PR push to be front and center of every major outlet. His core brand of love and embracing of uniqueness has always been at the center, only now it seems to have truly shifted into his music. With only about a month’s worth of announcements about the new album, the artist’s musical shift has led the charge forward and has fans eager to see what this authentic version will entail.
Have you ever heard of the phrase, “Absence makes the heart grow fonder”? Harry’s team used this quote, whether intentional or not, and ran with it. The artist was out of the public eye — minus his sightings running marathons or walking the streets of New York — with no tease or announcement of any new music for four years. Harry had made it known that he was taking this time to reconnect with himself and find the kind of music he wanted to create. Now, this led him to reinvent the Harry Styles brand into a more house/pop sound, but it also allowed the public to miss him. Not many stars allow for this moment of reprieve, leaving the public stuck in a cycle of fatigue from overexposure. After not hearing a word for years, fans were eager to hear just about anything from their favorite artist.
Since we must roll back to the devastating news of absolutely no California dates (as of now, hopefully), Netflix teamed up with Harry to create a solution for those who can’t attend the live concert. On Sunday, March 8, Netflix released a professionally recorded, one-night-only concert of the album, filmed in Manchester. It is one of the rare times an artist releases footage like this, allowing fans to relish the moment of the first live performance. Besides the movie-made concerts, like Taylor Swift’s The Eras Tour, this version of a live concert event truly allows fans to feel immersed. This was truly an amazing PR move for the pop star because it not only shows how important this album is to him, but also that his first priority is his fans. To share the first live performance of the entire album, with a few inserts from his past work, on a major streaming platform for everyone to see, shows his commitment to his craft and appreciation for those who have been with him every step of the way.
With the Grammy Awards set to be in February, Harry’s entire PR and marketing run for KATTDO, from high profile appearances like SNL to smaller podcasts such as Brittany Broski’s “The Royal Court”, makes sureevery inch of ground is covered. Giving the fans what they want is what makes a good PR run, and Harry has done just that.