Harry Styles has returned for a third LP, taking his musical ambition to levels higher than ever before, best displayed by the opening track of his newest record, ‘Harry’s House’, titled ‘Music for a Sushi Restaurant’.

The song opens right away with a tight groove over a floaty arpeggiated synth riff, setting the mood for both the verses and the choruses. A swell enters the sound field, punctuated with a perfectly pitched screech from the British singer, quickly transitioning out to the descending chord progression used for the majority of the song. Once the verse kicks in, however, things get extremely serious. The intimate, soft-spoken delivery from the singer paired with the aforementioned four-on-the-floor groove over a repeating bass line. The groove is eternal in ‘Music for a Sushi Restaurant’, from start to finish. Just upon the first thirty seconds of the song, especially once the funky horn-led chorus kicks in, listeners will see just how out of this world the singer took the instrumentation, the production, and the songwriting for ‘Music for a Sushi Restaurant’. It sets the tone incredibly for the rest of the album, almost used as a foreshadowing of all the different genres the artist takes on for the entirety of ‘Harry’s House’. ‘Music for a Sushi Restaurant’, however, is by far the most ambitious, pairing elements of R&B, dance, and the now-classic Jacob Collier-style of modern Jazz (especially in the second verse, during the scoo-bee-do-bah-dee-bah-poo licks).

‘Music for a Sushi Restaurant’ feels like not only an insanely creative opener for Harry’s newest album, but also a genuine love letter to songwriting as a whole. You can’t help but hear the fun Harry and his team must’ve had working on this track; you can practically hear the smiles through the notes. It’s a very purposeful track, enjoyable both in isolation and especially within its greater context.

Author: Nicholas Gaudet

Music producer and writer from Dieppe, Canada.