Amsterdam, one of the more low-key of Europe’s great cities, is an unlikely place to launch a tour as hotly anticipated as Harry Styles’ long-awaited “Together Together” global trek — especially when he’s only performing shows in one city per continent for this entire year. Walking around the city on this chilly May weekend, it was easy to see his contribution to the city’s tourist trade: One was as likely to hear British or American accented English as Dutch on the city’s streets, and when Styles asked the 60-something-capacity crowd at the Johan Cruijff Arena on Saturday night, “How many of you are not from Amsterdam?,” the roar was approximately three times as loud as when he’d asked the same of the locals moments earlier.
Which is not to say the audience wasn’t screaming for the entire show, because they were. As he must have expected, the response to his low-key latest album, “Kiss All the Time. Disco, Occasionally.,” has been less fanatical than that of his previous ones — which, to be fair, is a very high bar. But the songs from the new album get much bigger in a live setting. In large part that’s down to his versatile band, which grows to some 18 musicians at certain points during the show. But of course, it’s mostly down to him.
Styles is a one-in-millions performer, with a hurricane-force charm that’s dashing and sexy and goofy at the same time, and he brought all of it on Saturday night.
The show’s pacing seemed intended to ease the audience into the new material. The mood was set with Elvis Presley’s gorgeous 1972 version of “Bridge Over Troubled Water” as intro music, followed by a video of Styles walking through a garden and getting a phone call, with a woman’s voice asking, “Harry, are you coming out tonight?” The giant screens lit up with animated images as the band kicked in and Styles, clad in sneakers, black slacks and a red leather jacket, launches into “Are You Listening Yet” from the new album. By the middle of the song he was halfway down one of the illuminated walkways that encircled the floor of the arena.
Photo: Anthony Pham
But he gave the crowd some quick satisfaction with a string of older favorites: “Golden,” “Adore You,” “Watermelon Sugar” and “Music for a Sushi Restaurant.” A pair of new songs followed, and he concluded “What we like to call act one of the show” with a gentle version of “the song we used to end the set with, but now it feels more like a beginning”: the title track of his second album, “Fine Line.” For the next act, he promised “we’ll be dancing.”
The group launched into “American Girls,” and followed with a long run of tracks from the new album. While the songs are elevated when played by a live band, what really made the difference was the staging: The entire group played in the middle of the walkway for 15 minutes mid-show. with Styles joined by two dancers for “Treat People With Kindness” and “Pop.” He talked with the crowd at length, addressing people holding signs, helping one named Theresa who couldn’t find her mother — “Theresa’s mum, are you here?” and she waved almost immediately. Another audience member named Jana said it was her birthday, so he led the entire crowd in a “Happy Birthday” singalong.
The main set closed with “Carla’s Song” and “Aperture,” with the group briefly leaving the stage before an encore. The full band — including string players — took their positions and Styles played “Matilda” and a soaring “Sign of the Times.” He finished with a joyful “As It Was” that found him showing off his well-publicized runners endurance by sprinting full-speed down the runways as the band vamped on the chorus.
Styles will be on tour for the rest of this year — with multiple concerts in London, Brazil, Mexico, Australia and a whopping 30 shows at Madison Square Garden — and, sources say, well into next. On the basis of Saturday night’s show in Amsterdam, he’ll be playing to ecstatic crowds for a lot longer than that.
