Niall Horan celebrated his newly released album The Show with fans across the country. On Friday, June 9th, Horan joined his fans for an iHeartRadio Album Release Party which streamed via iHeartRadio's Hit Nation Channel and was broadcast across iHeartRadio's pop and Hot AC stations. Not only did Horan discuss his third studio album with iHeartRadio's JoJo Wright during an exclusive Q&A, but he also performed his new songs as well as a few classics from the early days of his solo career.

Amid the screaming superfans, Horan kicked off the set with the first single he shared from The Show, "Heaven." While talking with Wright, the former One Direction member revealed that he knew from the get-go the song would be the lead single. The track was written during a writing session at Joshua Tree. "We got "Meltdown" and "Heaven" out that trip," he recalled, "and that's when I knew, we were very close if not, nearly done [with the album]."

Horan continued playing songs from the new album including it's titular track "The Show," which wasn't heard until the album dropped, and the second single, "Meltdown." When asked what makes The Show different from his first two albums Flicker (2017) and Heartbreak Weather (2020), Horan replied, "I think it's just been a natural progression from one to the next." He continued, "When I wrote my first album I was 22 or 23 probably. I think things change, life changes, you grow up, your influences change a litte bit, you want to be more experimental."

"I think it's probably just the most experiental album, really," Horan, who cowrote all 10 songs on The Show, said. "Even the ballads have a little bit more about them. I'm trying to navigate to the next [album], meandering my way through."

While Horan is very much looking forward, he ended his Album Release Party by throwing it back to the start of his solo career, singing "Slow Hands" and "This Town" from his debut solo album Flicker. As expected, his fans passionately sang along to every word, and its only a matter of time before they're singing along to the new songs on The Show.

Listen to The Show in its entirety on iHeartRadio!

Mike Miller