Pretty Venom |N.H|

65

Niall Horan

"If you try putting a slap bass in my song I'll kick you out of the band."

Louis looks up at me, his mouth falling open slowly like he isn't sure if he should take me seriously or not.

He lowers his eyebrows at me, cocking his head while relaxing his arms over the bass guitar that sits in his lap. "Mate, come on. We can switch it up for the new record and be like the Red Hot Chili Peppers."

I shake my head immediately at his suggestion. "Absolutely not."

Louis came to my hotel room about an hour ago, showing up unannounced with his bass case in one hand. It turns out that when I had turned Harry down for another writing session, he really did end up going to the rest of the band to take his ideas elsewhere.

It's good for us to do that anyway – splitting up and writing with different pairs, I mean – because we all have different writing styles. Our individual influences come from different bands, which makes our writing unique when we're put together.

For example, Louis is really into alternative rock, specifically from the 90s. His major influences are the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Third Eye Blind, The Smashing Pumpkins. He has great taste, but that music isn't even close to what we're aiming for in our band.

Liam favors bands like Van Halen, Motley Crue, and Green Day. He was given his first drum kit by his grandfather when he was a kid after his mother yelled at him for smacking his silverware on the kitchen table during dinner. Classic Liam, but I'm sure glad he stuck with it all these years.

Harry listens to everything. Since he doesn't play an instrument, he has learned to admire each for what they are, while the rest of the band favors their own over anything else. It's good that Harry keeps his interests broad though, because he's always suggesting trying different things vocally, which I can encourage, but I can't get behind a slap bass.

My taste in music, on the other hand, is obviously the best in my opinion.

Nirvana, Arctic Monkeys, The 1975, Deftones, Guns N' Roses.

I'm always thinking in the best interest of the band, and the music I listen to has a wide enough range, but one thing they have in common is their individuality when it comes to guitars.

When I got my first guitar from Zayn, I used to play all sorts of rock songs on a nearly broken acoustic, which didn't sound the greatest, but I didn't care. I would play until my fingers bled, or until my mother would yell at me for playing past curfew. Whichever came first.

I bought myself my first electric guitar not too long after. I'm not proud of where the money to buy it came from, but in the moment, I didn't care. All I cared about was the matte red stratocaster I had in my hands, and the black pickguard I bought for it that was seriously the icing on the cake.

Now, I play on a matte black Gibson Les Paul during most of the set, switching it out with my dark green Schecter Fastback for a few songs in between.

My point is, since we all have different interests and different inspirations that drive our writing, we get a different kind of sound from different pairs.

I love writing with Harry, and I feel like our writing is strong, but if I want something a little heavier sounding, I know to go to Liam, and if I want something slower, I go to Louis.

However, I always look forward to seeing what the other guys come up with when they write, and I was fairly impressed with what Louis brought me this morning.

After switching out a few lyrics, we settled on a temporary name, and now we have moved onto a different song that was written a few weeks ago. Louis and I had been discussing adding a bass solo during the bridge, and his only suggestion was a slap bass.