There aren’t many places in New York, or anywhere else for that matter, that feel as cocooned from the outside world as the live room in Electric Lady’s Studio A. Designed to Jimi Hendrix’s specifications, the curvy space is stocked with shiny vintage gear, faded Persian rugs and a cosmic, wall-sized mural. On this Sunday night in September, a little after 9 p.m., the room’s sole occupant is a slight, strikingly handsome 24-year-old, whose unique combination of global fame and acute anxiety can make life outside of insulated creative oases like this one challenging, and who is currently kicked back on an overstuffed leather sofa, pulling meditatively from a joint and watching the smoke curl toward the sound-deadened ceiling.
For the last nine months, Zayn — who in his solo career goes by his first name — has lived in similar womblike rooms in New York, Los Angeles, London and even rural Pennsylvania (more on that later), crafting the follow-up to his debut solo LP, Mind of Mine, which bowed at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 last spring and spawned the Billboard Hot 100-topping single “Pillowtalk,” which has racked up over 750 million YouTube spins. That album, with its Frank Ocean-esque moodiness, bedroom vocals and, “Pillowtalk” aside, resistance to radio-friendly sonics, demarcated a clear line between Malik’s grown-up second act and his beyond-famous first one.
Seven years ago, Malik was plucked at age 17 from a small city in Northern England, teamed up with four other boys as One Direction and tornado-ed into the most intense global teen craze endured by a crew of British kids since Beatlemania. The experience left him unmoored — he abruptly quit the group in 2015 — and as a solo artist, he’s devoted to serving his own muse. In the 18 months since the release of his debut LP, he has deepened his relationship with his supermodel girlfriend, Gigi Hadid, started taking better care of his health, corralled collaborators including Taylor Swift and Sia, and determinedly honed his sound. For an artist so shaken by his time in One Direction that he has yet to launch a tour, the intensely private star has found a way to navigate, even thrive, in his highly public life. Or, as Malik himself puts it, “I don’t do things that I wouldn’t buy into. I try to explain that to people and hope that they understand — it doesn’t come from a place of being arrogant or above anything.”
It’s probably not intentional, but Malik seems dressed to match the room in an outfit you can easily picture Paul McCartney rocking in the early 1970s: a dark-red cable-knit sweater that looks both cozy and off-the-charts expensive, a subtly patterned button-down shirt, earth-toned, jean-cut pants and a pair of black Chelsea boots. His left hand is covered in a mandala-like tattoo; his right is adorned with a pair of red lips billowing smoke. His hair, which evidently grows quickly, has already returned to an appealing fuzz less than a week after he made headlines worldwide by shaving it bald. He’s in New York to take some meetings and work on the album, but the trip also lines up with New York Fashion Week, which means that he and Hadid get to be in the same place at the same time. The pair, says Malik, “pretty much live together,” whether it’s at his homes in Los Angeles and London or at her pad in New York. “It’s actually not that hard for us [to line up schedules],” he says. “It helps that she’s really organized. Thank God! Because I’m really not, so she helps organize my schedule around seeing her.” (Hadid is also one of a small group of people, including Malik’s parents, siblings and management team, who get to hear in-progress music. “She’s in the studio quite a lot,” he says cheerfully. “She likes to cook for me and stuff — when I’m here late, she’ll come down and bring me food. She’s cool.”)
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