Louis Tomlinson is pleased how One Direction's fans have responded to his debut single.

Louis Tomlinson

Louis Tomlinson

The 25-year-old singer is thrilled with the response to 'Just Hold On', which he released in collaboration with Steve Aoki, and quipped that the band's fans have "adopted" the house musician.

In a joint interview with Music Choice, Louis said: "The One Direction fans have said that they've adopted you now Steve."

To which Steve replied: "I feel part of the family. They are incredible, the One Direction fans, the Louis Tomlinson fans. They're the definition of what a fan is. They get together, they rally around the song. They rally around what's important. They get these songs in front of people's faces, tastemakers, other fans, radio. They are like the army of bees going around and doing this amazing work that any artist would dream to have to push us all."

Meanwhile, Louis recently confessed his solo career was an "accident".

He explained: "It kind of happened by accident, if I'm being honest. I didn't really know that I wanted to do anything on my own. We just started trying things, and actually, this is one of the first songs that we wrote and recorded, so we got lucky, really."

Asked how their collaboration came about, he added: "We went to go watch a Calvin Harris show. Calvin pulled out and then Steve did the set and, yeah, we were absolutely blown away. We had an amazing night.

"And then after that night, I messaged Steve on Twitter and said, 'Great show. Do you want to work together?' And here we are ... It's quite romantic!"

The pair performed their track for the first time in December on UK's 'The X Factor' and felt having Steve by his side was reassuring for him.

He said: "Especially with the emotion and everything, it all just whizzed by so quickly. I mean, I was terrified at the time, but yeah, it was a real moment and it really helped me going out on my own by having Steve there with me. You know, as my first performance, I wasn't completely alone."