“I’m just loving this evolution.” Niall Horan throws a sunny pop-rock Dinner Party. Touring 2023’s The Show in 2024 undoubtedly inspired Niall Horan for his next project. “You have to paint a few pictures before you get the nice ones,” he tells Apple Music’s Zane Lowe. “But I think the tour did a lot for me, and the success of the last album just gave me a confidence to just go in and stand behind a mic, set up a band, jam, see what came from it, and release it.” Enter his fourth solo album Dinner Party, which lets Horan float through dreamy and soaring pop rock with a few tender ballads at the table. The upbeat and earnest “Tastes So Good” opens the 12-track paean to love and relationships (“It just sounds like three dudes in a room jamming, and that’s exactly what it is,” Horan says). “She Gets It from Her Mother”—one of three songs co-written by Morgan Wallen collaborator Rocky Block—bears a twangy ’70s aesthetic. Shiny and catchy, “Pretty” unearths a more mature but still chant-worthy chorus, reminiscent of Horan’s youthful career. The album does end with an emotional wallop. Horan honors his friend and One Direction bandmate Liam Payne, who tragically lost his life in 2024, with “End of an Era.” “We had it, pure magic/Remembering what it was like/Time passes so fast that/I couldn’t tell you goodbye,” he reflects on the atmospheric tribute. And ultimately the singer-songwriter appreciates where he came from and where he’s going. “As long as the fans keep wanting it, that’s all I want to hear,” he says. “I love doing what I do. The older I get, the more aware, the more grateful you become, the more you take it all in. And I’m just loving this evolution.”