What Makes You Beautiful

"What Makes You Beautiful" was our introduction to One Direction, the baby-faced boy band consisting of Zayn Malik, Niall Horan, Harry Styles, Louis Tomlinson and Liam Payne (Horan is Irish; the others are English). The five teens applied as solo candidates to the seventh series of the ITV reality show The X Factor, but failed to qualify for the Boys category. After a suggestion by guest judge Nicole Scherzinger, the quintet were put into a band and eventually finished third behind runner-up Rebecca Ferguson and winner Matt Cardle. Following their successful run on The X Factor, the group signed a £2 million record contract with Syco Records, which ended up being a very good investment for the label.

This was One Direction's first single. It received its first airplay on August 10, 2011 and was released a month later on September 11, 2011. Speaking to BBC Radio 1 DJ Chris Moyles, band member Harry Styles said: "When we were recording in the studio we knew instantly that we wanted this track to be our first single." The song was a huge hit and became the most-performed One Direction at their concerts.

The song was written by The X Factor vocal coach Savan Kotecha and Swedish songwriters Carl Falk and Rami Yacoub, whose other joint songwriting credits include The Wanted's "Lose My Mind." Yacoub has also co-penned several of Britney Spears' hits including "Stronger" and "Lucky." One Direction didn't have much creative input on this and the other songs from their debut album, Up All Night, but they did more songwriting on their next albums.