Harry Styles Covers Peter Gabriel’s “Sledgehammer” on the Howard Stern Show (First Public Performance)

Some covers feel like a casual nod. This one lands like a bright flashbulb in a dark room. When Harry Styles sat down with Howard Stern, the conversation took a quick turn into pure music-fan joy, the kind that makes a listener sit up and grin. Styles didn’t just mention Peter Gabriel’s “Sledgehammer.” He spoke about it with the kind of love that only comes from living with a song for years, turning it up too loud, and still finding new details in the sound.

At the heart of the moment is a simple truth: Harry Styles covering “Sledgehammer” is the sort of crossover that feels both surprising and perfectly right.

Howard Stern opens in the most relatable way possible, as a fellow fan. He brings up “Sledgehammer” and immediately sets the tone by saying he’s a big fan of Peter Gabriel’s classic. It’s not framed like a trivia question or a deep-cut flex. It sounds like two people who genuinely like music talking about the songs that never lose their shine.

Then Stern asks the question everyone in the room is already leaning toward: why does Styles love that song so much? Styles answers with a line that says everything about how he hears records.

He calls it, “I think it’s like the best mixed song ever.” Not best song, not biggest hit, not most iconic video. Best mixed. He’s talking about the sound itself, the way the record feels when it hits the speakers. He adds that it “just sounds incredible,” and he keeps coming back to the record as an object, a finished piece of audio that still feels alive.

It’s a very musician answer, but it’s also a listener answer. Anyone who’s ever turned up a track because it sounds good, not because they planned to analyze it, understands exactly what he means. Styles doesn’t drift into a long speech. He doesn’t need to. His praise is short, direct, and vivid.

When he says “the record itself,” he’s pointing at something fans often feel but don’t always name: some songs don’t just have great hooks, they have a full-body sound. They fill a room. They glow. They pop in a way that makes everything else seem a little flatter for a minute.

That’s the lane “Sledgehammer” lives in for him, and it sets up why what happens next feels so personal. This isn’t a random cover picked off a list. This is a song he’s been itching to play out loud, in the right space, at the right volume.

The conversation gets even better when Styles explains that his connection to “Sledgehammer” isn’t only about growing up with the track. It also ties into where he and his team worked on new music. Styles says they recorded a lot of the new album at Real World, Peter Gabriel’s studio in England.

Real World is more than a famous name. In Styles’ telling, it’s a place with a pull. He calls it “an amazing studio,” and there’s a clear sense that being there changed the energy around the sessions. He also mentions a practical reason for going: he “wanted to get out of London.”

That one detail paints a whole picture. A different pace. Different air. Different room tones. A setting where the day can feel less like a schedule and more like a stretch of time to chase sounds. Then comes the part that will make any music fan laugh, because it’s so human.

Styles says that once they got into the studio, they all wanted to blast “Sledgehammer” in the room “so bad.” Not quietly. Not on someone’s phone speaker. In the room, through the system, the way a song like that deserves to be played. So they asked the staff if it was okay.

The response was perfect: the guys there looked at them like, of course, and basically told them everybody does it. Styles describes it as getting “absolutely cranked.” It’s easy to imagine that moment without adding anything extra: a famous studio, a famous song, and a band acting like fans for a few minutes because some songs bring that out in people.

That story also does something important for the performance that follows. It turns the cover into a payoff, like a wish finally getting granted out loud.

After all that talk, Stern makes the move every viewer hopes for. He cues up a live moment and says, “Let’s do a little Fletcher,” then adds that it’s because Styles loves the song. Styles answers with a simple, excited line: he’s “excited to hear this.”

That detail matters. It doesn’t sound like someone bracing for a performance. It sounds like someone ready to enjoy it, ready to hear how it lands in the room with his band, ready to feel the song happen in real time.

When the music starts, the transcript captures it in broad strokes, but the vibe is clear. There’s an opening, then the band finds its pocket. There’s a moment where “open up” rings out, and later a little burst of “new stuff,” followed by applause.

It plays like a live-room snapshot: sound in motion, then the audience reaction, then the sound surges again. Even without a play-by-play breakdown, the key point comes through. The rendition is tight enough that it earns an immediate response, and loose enough to feel like a real performance instead of a museum piece.

This is the sweet spot for a great cover: respect for the original, plus the thrill of watching someone else drive the car.

After the “wow” settles, Stern asks the question that changes the whole story. Have they ever performed it publicly before? Styles answers: this was the first time. That’s the headline inside the headline. This wasn’t a cover that had been workshopped on tour for months. It wasn’t something fans had already seen in shaky phone clips. It was a fresh public debut, happening live in the Stern studio, after a conversation that explained exactly why the song matters to Styles. For music fans, first-time performances have a special electricity. They feel like catching a spark at the moment it jumps.

Styles’ “best mixed song ever” comment also points to why “Sledgehammer” keeps showing up in musician conversations, decades after its release. Some songs age because of nostalgia. Others age because the sound still feels big, bold, and fun the second it starts.

“Sledgehammer” has that kind of reputation. Even when someone has heard it a hundred times, it can still make a room feel lighter, louder, and more awake.

That’s also why the Real World story fits so well. A studio connected to Peter Gabriel naturally carries a little extra gravity for artists who care about how records sound. Styles doesn’t need to spell that out. He just tells the story, and the meaning comes through on its own.

Conclusion

Harry Styles didn’t treat “Sledgehammer” like a throwback. He treated it like a living thing, a record that still sounds huge, still feels good, and still deserves to be played loud. The Real World story adds a warm, funny layer, because it’s exactly what any fan would want to do in Peter Gabriel’s studio. And the fact that it was their first public performance gives the cover an extra snap, like catching a rare moment in real time. For anyone who loves classic pop with muscle and color, this one is worth replaying and sharing, then chasing down the full interview for the story behind the sound.