Liam Payne obituary: Boy band star who had the X factor

Liam Payne first registered on the pop radar as a fresh-faced 14-year-old, trying out for The X Factor in 2008.

“I should really be concentrating on my [school] work but I just think about singing too much,” he said before his first audition, his Wolverhampton accent and thick fringe front and centre.

“It’s a dream and I’d love to do it.”

His rendition of Fly Me To the Moon impressed the judges, as did his boyish charm – he showed a cheeky streak when he flashed a mid-song wink at Girls Aloud star Cheryl.

But Simon Cowell wasn’t quite convinced he was ready, so told him to do his GCSEs and come back in two years.

When Liam did just that, auditioning with another classic song, Cry Me A River, in 2010, the missing pieces were all now in place.

As he started singing, Cowell’s eyes lit up as he registered Liam’s newfound maturity and charisma.

Whatever the X factor is, Liam had it.

The judges still faced a tough decision that year – so during a discussion about whom to save, they decided they could keep five boys by putting them together in a group.

Liam, Zayn Malik, Louis Tomlinson, Niall Horan and Harry Styles were informed they were now a boy band – and One Direction were born.

They didn’t actually win The X Factor that year, coming third behind Matt Cardle and Rebecca Ferguson in a final watched by 17 million people.

But Cowell knew a good thing when he saw it. He signed them to his label and, after waiting nine months to release their debut single, they soon outpaced their rivals.

That single was What Makes You Beautiful, an instant pop classic that went straight to number one – the first of four UK chart-toppers over the next four years.

Liam was cast as the sensible one, and told the Guardian in 2019 about one of the group’s early hotel stays.

“We’ve got plates being thrown out the window, mattresses being ridden down the stairs, and I’m getting calls from the manager saying: ‘You need to sort it out’.”

Sudden fame was a lot to take in, and he told Scott Mills on BBC Radio 1 in 2020 that he was “really quite uptight about a lot of everything that was going on” at that time.

“It was hard to have fun sometimes in that circumstance when there was so much pressure loaded on to it.”

But after about a year, he learned to relax. “And the more fun we had, the more successful it got.”

One Direction inspired full-on pop mania – stadiums full of screaming teenage fans, thousands camping outside their hotels, 70 million records sold.

“I was very confused about fame when it all happened,” he told the BBC in 2019, “and learning to be a person outside of your job was difficult. But now I feel like I get it. I’m a lucky boy.”

As time went on, Liam discovered a talent for songwriting as well as singing, with writing credits on half of the band’s final two albums, on songs like History, Steal My Girl and Story Of My Life.

Tensions in the band bubbled up, though, as the pressure returned.

In 2022, Liam told Logan Paul’s podcast that things had almost come to blows. “There was one moment where there was an argument backstage, and one member in particular threw me up a wall,” he said, without naming the bandmate in question.

It became clear that the end for One Direction was nigh. “It was so touch and go at every single show,” he said. “I was slowly losing the plot.”

Liam turned to alcohol, and continued drinking after the band went on “hiatus” in 2016.

“It was very erratic behaviour on my part – I was partying too hard,” he told the BBC.

In the post-1D world, Liam launched a solo career, with his 2017 debut single Strip That Down, featuring US rapper Quavo, peaking at number three and being nominated for two Brit Awards.

His collaboration with Rita Ora on the song For You – from the Fifty Shades Freed soundtrack – reached number eight and earned another Brit nomination.

And eight years after he flirted with Cheryl as a 14-year-old in the X Factor audition room, the pair began a relationship. They had a son, Bear, in 2017, but split up in 2018.

He got engaged to model Maya Henry in 2020, but they later called it off. Earlier this month, she said on social media that the singer had recently been repeatedly sending her unwanted messages.

Following their relationship, he had been together with US influencer Kate Cassidy since 2022.

He suffered health troubles in recent years, being in hospital twice in 2023, reportedly with kidney problems.

And his solo career struggled to maintain momentum.

A comeback single Teardrops, released this March, missed the charts, and there were reports that a second solo album and a documentary about his life had been put on hold.

That life story included more than he could have imagined in those original teenage dreams.