How One Pop Star, Harry Styles, Ruled the UK Charts in a Wild 2022

More than anything else in the UK during the chaotic rollercoaster that was 2022, Harry Styles didn't just have a good year but owned it," the Official Charts Company said. His infectious single 'As It Was' was named the UK's best-selling single of the year, and his third album 'Harry's House' had the best sales for albums. The guy who once put on a dress for Vogue now reigns as British pop royalty. And let's not kid ourselves, he looks good in it.

If anything defined 2022, it was streaming, and the numbers were dizzying. The Brits streamed 159 billion tracks last year, more than 147 billion in 2021. That's roughly 3 billion songs a week. In there, swimming in that sound, Styles' synth-pop anthem floated round and round, soundtracking everything from the morning commute to the middle-of-the-night heartbreak

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But as streaming surged, the physical music formats had a different story. Physical album sales were down overall by 13.1%, but there was one sweet surprise: vinyl not only survived but thrived. For the 15th consecutive year, vinyl sales increased, with 5.5 million units sold. It's as if music lovers were like, "Yeah, fine, we'll stream Harry on the go, but we want Harry's House on wax as well." And who can blame them, honestly?

In Styles's boy-band days, he fashioned a solo career that marries memories with audacious experimentation. Harry's House was both retro and new, pulling from '80s synths and soft-spoken lyricism without ever succumbing to mimicry of any sort. And 'As It Was'? It was heartbreak contained in a fizzy, radio-friendly hit that you couldn't flee, not that you'd have wanted to.

Something was grounding about Harry's music in a year where everything was up in the air and being shifted around. As the politicians played musical chairs, headlines screamed 'chaos,' but Harry provided something for us to sing, dance to, and cry to. He was there, reminding us that somewhere, even in madness, a good tune could help make everything seem a little more okay.