Get ready world: there's new Niall Horan content coming. No, it's not an album—he just released
Heartbreak Weather in March. Apparently a couple months in isolation has made the Irish singer quite the chef and he's ready to put those slowcooker talents to good use by releasing a cookbook. Okay, maybe his kitchen skills aren't quite to that level just yet, but thankfully, Horan's using his time alone to cook up new music as well. We'll take a single with a side of quinoa, please.The singer is
etalk Open House's third performer, offering up an at-home performance of his single "Black And White" off his latest album and Niall sat down with
etalk's Traci Melchor, remotely from his home in London, to talk about the music he's writing, his culinary pursuits and former One Direction bandmate
Zayn Malik's exciting baby news.
Traci: First of all, where are you joining us from?Niall: I’m in my living room in London. This is where the magic happens.
How have you been doing in these quarantine times?I’ve been doing completely fine. Obviously, I would have preferred to be on tour—I would have been playing Toronto last week. I would have played my last show of the North American leg with Lewis [Capaldi] last night, which is a major shame. But, listen, these things happen. I’m back at home; I’m working out; I’m cooking; I’m writing songs; I can’t complain. As I’ve said—I heard Ricky Gervais saying it last week when people were asking him how he was doing in quarantine. He was like, “Listen, I’m not a nurse working a 14-hour shift so I’m doing fine.” And I would tend to agree with that.[video_embed id='1976070']Niall Horan performs 'Black and White' from his new album 'Heartbreak Weather'[/video_embed]
Any special skills you’ve been working on? Or anything you’ve rediscovered about yourself during this time?I’ve been writing a lot more than I usually would be able to. I’m quite a clean person. I like the house to be clean all the time—everything in its place, OCD to an extent—and I’ve found because I’m home all the time, that feeling is heightened. I find I’m cleaning so much more. I have been cooking a lot more for myself. I’ve been trying to workout a lot and kind of be the person who comes out at the end of this quarantine in good shape and not be the opposite. So, I’ve been cooking a lot and working out and I’ve definitely become a lot more patient. I think, as people, we’re quite impatient. And I definitely am—I always need to be doing something, but I’ve definitely found that just being at home is actually okay.
Any special dishes that you’re cooking? What’s your go-to dish?Two days ago I made like vegan falafel burgers—they were nice—which I’ve never made before, never made like a vegan meal. What else have I been doing? Doing a lot of lunches. I’m trying to eat as clean as I can so a lot of food is quite boring—a lot of quinoa, a lot of like chicken and veg and stuff like that. And then dinners I’ve been doing a lot of—I bought a slowcooker, so I’ve been doing like a lot of stews and Bolognese, Italian food basically, like cook it over the course of the day. So yeah, [I’m cooking] everything that I don’t really get time to do.
I feel like there could be a recipe book in the works there?Oh yeah, it’s coming big time. I’m sure there’ll be publishers knocking down doors.[video_embed id='1829771']RELATED: Niall Horan asked Shawn Mendes for restaurant recommendations in Toronto [/video_embed]
What does the rest of your day look like?Today, I’m going to go record a couple things and then—it’s 27 degrees here in London today, which is blowing some minds—so I’m going to stick the golf clubs on my shoulder and go play nine holes.
I want to ask you about a tweet you sent out that said “sitting in the dark at 2am writing a song.” Is that a product of Niall in lockdown or is that a normal Niall night?I actually wrote that tweet from this chair; I was sitting right here. No, that hasn’t been for a long time. Sometimes when we’re writing like the album and we go away on a trip and that’s all we’re doing, sometimes we’ll be up at that time. But just something came to me. I was sitting on the couch—like, this is my couch from last night [turns camera]. There’s the guitar on the couch. I sit in that corner and kind of watch TV and also have the guitar in my hand at all times. So I just came across something and came over here and started writing and then at 2AM, I found myself in really low lighting just writing a song which is really quite random for me. It was quite nice in a weird way.
Your new album Heartbreak Weather is out. Obviously, this is a pretty surreal time—how do you think heartbreak feels different during an unprecedented time in the world? I mean, it’s definitely harder to meet up with someone if you’re breaking up with them [laughs]. I released the album just as this all started. I did a week on
The Late Late Show with my friend James Corden and then it was literally on the day of that last show that I flew back to London because the place was about to go into lockdown. It was definitely a weird time—when the media is dominated by the pandemic and stuff it was quite hard to release the album, I guess. I was actually about to make a trip to Canada to do some promotion up there and then that got cancelled. I was supposed to do some stuff in New York and that got cancelled. Yeah, just not the best timing of things ever, but listen, it’s all good—there’s bigger things to be worrying about than my music.I guess, how [heartbreak is] different? I don’t really know because I’m not going through it, but I wouldn’t like to be going through a breakup right now, I’ll tell you that.
It’d be very hard or it’d be really easy—out of sight, out of mind, maybe? Yeah, maybe. Exactly! It’s nearly a selfish way of looking at it but, you’ve gotten away with it, you know?
Speaking of big news—Zayn’s big news! Do you have a message for the daddy-to-be? Ah, congratulations to them both! I’m very happy. He’ll do a good job—he’s always good with kids and stuff and Gigi’s a lovely girl so I think they’ll be fine. They’ll be great.
etalk Open House is a weekly series that features performances and exclusive interviews with incredible talent like
The Killers,
Tones and I and more. Catch the series on Thursday night as part of etalk’s regular broadcast at 7pm ET on
CTV and 7:30pm on CTV2.[video_embed id='1967598']BEFORE YOU GO: The Killers frontman Brandon Flowers tells us about leaving Las Vegas[/video_embed]
