Harry Styles says Billie Eilish's rise to fame 'broke the spell' of wanting to be the 'young thing'

• Harry Styles recently opened up to Apple Music's Zane Lowe about his new album and career.
• He said after he left One Direction, he felt pressure to "play that game of remaining exciting."
• However, Billie Eilish's rise to fame helped him realize, "I just wanna make good music."

Harry Styles said he's "incredibly thankful" for Billie Eilish because she helped him come to terms with his own age and career.

The "As It Was" singer recently opened up to Apple Music's Zane Lowe about his third solo album, "Harry's House," which arrives on Friday.

Styles said he had a "really big moment" of realization "when Billie Eilish first blew up."

"Being in the band, I'd always felt like we were really young," he said, referring to One Direction, who went on indefinite hiatus in 2015. "It was fun and exciting 'cause we were young."

"I had a moment, seeing her do this at such a young age, where I felt like, 'I'm not that young anymore,'" he continued. "For a while, it was like, 'How do you play that game of remaining exciting?' And I just had a moment where I felt like, 'OK, we're not the same thing.'"

He added: "In the same vein of like, you're not always going to be the 'young thing,' I was like, 'OK, I would like to really think about who I would like to be as a musician.'"

Styles said that he and Eilish have met a few times, but he mostly admires her "from afar" because she "represented something to me."

Because Eilish, 20, is eight years younger than Styles, 28, her rise to fame helped him let go of the pressure to be shiny and new, which Styles described as "unbelievably liberating."

"She totally broke the spell for me, in a way that I'm very grateful for," he told Lowe. "It's maybe weird 'cause I've never told her that."

"I just wanna make good music," he concluded. "That's it. That's what I wanna do. And everything else is, like, what it will be."

Styles shared a similar sentiment during his recent interview with Better Homes & Gardens, reflecting on his desire to stay relevant amidst a "different generation" of musicians, including Eilish.

"You can't win music. It's not like Formula One," he said. "I was like, in my lifetime, there will be 10 more people who burst onto the scene in that way, and I'm only going to get further away from being the young thing. So, get comfortable with finding something else that makes you happy."