ELLE Digital Cover Star: Louis Tomlinson, Right Where He’s Meant to Be

It’s rare that an artist you grew up listening to still feels present in your life years later, not as a memory, but as a voice that has evolved alongside you. For many Gen Zs and younger millennials, growing up meant growing up with Louis Tomlinson. His songs have soundtracked everything from teenage uncertainty to adult recalibration,  through wired headphones, AirPods, and back again.

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So when his face appears on a slightly glitchy Zoom screen across time zones, it doesn’t feel nostalgic. It feels current. There’s an ease to Tomlinson that translates instantly. He listens closely, laughs easily, and answers without performance polish. That emotional transparency has long defined his music, songs that oscillate between vulnerability and lift, between self-doubt and defiance. It sits at the heart of How Did I Get Here?, his third studio album, and perhaps his most self-aware record yet.

The title reads like a question, but Tomlinson doesn’t frame it as existential.

“How Did I Get Here? is not a question I think I’ll ever know the answer to,” he says. “I feel very lucky and grateful to be where I am.” Growing up somewhere this kind of trajectory “doesn’t traditionally happen to people very often,” he describes the record as celebratory, almost disbelieving. “I wanted it to feel like a statement.”

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That clarity came from confidence. Third albums often arrive heavy with expectation, but this one wasn’t rushed. “I was in a really good place to make this record,” he explains. Touring his previous work gave him assurance. “It was going to be ready when it was ready. If it had taken another 12 months, I would have been okay with that.” The result is a record that feels unforced, buoyed by instinct rather than calculation.

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“Momentum is really important to me creatively; indecision definitely gets in the way of that,” he says. “In the writing room, I like to be led by instinct. I like to think it comes from somewhere, so I just run with it. That’s kind of how I live my life too — act first, think second. Sometimes it gets me into trouble,” he adds, laughing.

That instinct pulses through the album. Imposter sits with self-doubt without collapsing into it. Sunflower feels like light pushing through something heavier. And Lemonade, one of the record’s most infectious tracks, has taken on an unexpected life in India, fans setting up lemonade stands in tribute, turning a song into a shared cultural moment.

He laughs when told. “I love that.” The track, he says, was always meant for the stage. “Those songs were written with the live show in mind. If there’s a listener and a performer, there’s always going to be a place for those songs in my records.”

That dynamic between artist and audience crystallised when Tomlinson finally performed in India at Lollapalooza India in 2025, a long-awaited moment for both him and his fans. “It felt really triumphant,” he says. “It had been a long time coming. I really wanted to get over to India and feel the atmosphere, the crowds.” After years of trying to make it happen, finally standing on that stage felt earned.

Despite years of touring globally, moments when fans sing back his lyrics still don’t feel ordinary to him. “That’s the kind of thing you dream about when you’re younger,” he says. “There’s something really unifying and special about that.”

The album itself was shaped by movement, written across the UK, Los Angeles and Costa Rica. Recording in the latter brought a certain tranquillity. “Writing and recording in a really tropical, beautiful place is only going to be good for the record. I can feel that in it.” It was, he adds, “the most fun I’ve had making a record. No doubt.”

In an industry obsessed with metrics, Tomlinson is pragmatic about success. “I’d love to sit here and say I don’t look at the numbers,” he admits. “But of course, there’s that competitive side of me.” Still, he refuses to let charts define him. “If it doesn’t chart great, I’ll go on a great tour. So I’ll do all right.”

India, he says, is firmly on his list again. “The sooner the better as far as I’m concerned.”

As the call winds down, there’s no grand statement about legacy,  just gratitude, instinct, and forward motion. How Did I Get Here? doesn’t linger in nostalgia. It stands in the present, confident in its arrival.

And perhaps that’s the point.

For an artist who once asked the question, the answer now feels less about disbelief, and more about being exactly where he’s meant to be.

Team Credits:

Editorial Director: Ainee Nizami Ahmedi; Art Director: Alekha Chugani (Cover Design); Photographed by Rory Barnes; Words by; Ekta Sinha; Artist's India Marketing: OUTDUSTRY