UK based boyband One Direction have been working on what will be their fourth studio album and Simon Cowell has now revealed that he had the first listen to the effort. 

Writing on his official Twitter page just before the weekend, the music mogul admitted that he heard the highly anticipated record and was simply blown away: "Listened to most of the new @onedirection album last week. It's one of their best."

Upon seeing this exclamation of praise, Harry Styles' mother shared it with her own followers on the social networking site. The lads also recently opened up about the record, with heartthrob Niall Horan telling America's 'The Today Show' that it's 'more edgy' than their previous releases:

"Think it's going to be a little bit more edgy. But obviously we feel like we've got some really good songs and we are happy."

Liam Payne added that they have been more hands-on this time around where songwriting is concerned: "We've all taken a hand in the writing this time. And we've literally written almost every song."

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