“When I needed them most..”: Liam Payne’s Final Thoughts on Harry Styles, Zayn Malik, and Rest of One Direction Bandmates Will Make Your Heart Ache 

Liam Payne, who rose to fame alongside Zayn Malik, Harry Styles, Louis Tomlinson, and Niall Horan in One Direction, tragically passed away at the age of 31. After falling from a hotel in Buenos Aires, Argentina, the singer met his heartbreaking death on October 16, 2024. Meanwhile, despite his separation from his fellow band members, Payne had remained a Directioner throughout his life.

Two weeks before his tragic demise, Liam Payne attended his fellow bandmate Niall Horan’s concert in Argentina on October 2. While he danced and clapped during the concert, Payne also expressed his desire to chat with his former groupmate. Through and through, the singer opened up about his true feelings about One Direction and even shared his final thoughts on the band. 

Liam Payne Opened Up About the Ups and Downs of One Direction

You can take the band members out of the band but not the band out of the members. And late singer Liam Payne is the biggest example of this. Despite One Direction being disbanded in 2015, Payne surprisingly remained attached to the memories and his fellow bandmates throughout his life. 

So much so that before tragically passing away on October 16, Liam Payne had attended Niall Horan’s concert in Argentina on October 2, alongside his girlfriend Kate Cassidy. The 31-year-old singer had even reflected on his desire to chat with Horan, claiming that a conversation may have been long overdue, via X.

I think we might just go and say hello. It’s been a while since me and Niall have spoken. We’ve got a lot to talk about. And I would like to square up a couple of things with the boy. No bad vibes or anything like that. But just, um, we need to talk. 

Meanwhile, prior to his visit to Argentina, Liam Payne had reflected on his fond memories from One Direction, during an interview with The Guardian in December 2019. Addressing the ups and downs of the band, Payne noted how they had beautiful moments during the last few shows since the tension was gone. 

It was a little bit dark and twisted towards the end of it, but the last few shows were really beautiful moments because the pressure cooker had been let off. It was almost like counting down to holiday—we were going to wake up that Monday morning with no schedule. 

Unfortunately, although the singer had been a true Directioner from the beginning, his comments about the band and his fellow bandmates have differed from time to time. 

Liam Payne Made Some Mean Comments About His Former Bandmates

Despite sharing his heartfelt remarks and nostalgic comments about his band members during his 2019 interview, Liam Payne had surprisingly criticized Harry Styles, Zayn Malik, Niall Horan, and Louis Tomlinson, during his appearance on the Impaulsive podcast, in 2022. Speaking with host Logan Paul, Payne claimed to have “many reasons” to dislike Malik, who left the group to go solo in March 2015.

Payne said of Tomlinson:

He is my best mate now, but in the band, we hated each other — like to come to blows hated each other. It was close. Louis was wild. He wanted to be wild. He’s got this spirit. 

Talking about physical fights, he added:

It was well known within the band that I don’t like taking s**t. There was one moment where there was an argument backstage and one member, in particular, threw me up a wall.

So I said to him, ‘If you don’t remove those hands, there’s a high likelihood you’ll never use them again’.

The Live Forever singer also spoke about Zayn Malik, saying:

There’s many reasons why I dislike Zayn and there’s many reasons why I’ll always, always be on his side. If I had had to go through what he went through — with his growth and whatever else…

My parents are overly supportive to the point where it’s annoying at times. Zayn had a different upbringing in that sense.

However, despite dropping offensive comments during his controversial podcast, that later infuriated One Direction fans, Liam Payne later traced back to those remarks after completing a 100-day stay in rehab. 

The Strip That Down Singer Later Apologized for His Remarks in 2023

Within a year after his infamous appearance on Logan Paul’s podcast, Liam Payne released a lengthy video on YouTube in 2023 revealing that he had spent 100 days in rehab while attributing his previous comments about his bandmates to frustration with his career. Previously, during a conversation with Men’s Health Australia in June 2019, Payne had opened up about relying on alcohol as a coping mechanism. 

It’s almost like putting the Disney costume on before you step up on stage and underneath the Disney costume I was pissed quite a lot of the time because there was no other way to get your head around what was going on.

I mean, it was fun. We had an absolute blast, but there were certain parts of it where it just got a little bit toxic.

Following his honesty about his struggles with mental health and alcoholism, Liam Payne released a YouTube video in 2023 apologizing for his indecent remarks on Harry Styles, Zayn Malik, Niall Horan, and Louis Tomlinson. Unfortunately, his YouTube apology video ended up being his last remarks on his bandmates.

I think for me, a lot of what I said just came from the wrong place. I was so angry at what was going on around me that instead of taking a look inwards I decided to take it outwards…

My own frustrations with my own career and where I kind of landed, I took shots at everybody else which is wrong. So obviously, I want to apologize for that because that’s definitely not me.

Payne spoke fondly about his former bandmates:

The rest of the boys have really stuck by me. When I needed them most, they kind of came to my rescue…

I feel like I have a grip on life now and everything that was getting away from me. After I got back out, that process had worked for me, but there were still some little bits left that I kind of had to deal with myself. 

Sadly, Liam Payne passed away recently on October 16, after falling from the third floor of a hotel in Buenos Aires. According to the police report via CNN, they had received a 911 call about an aggressive man who was possibly under the influence of drugs or alcohol. Unfortunately, upon reaching the location, police found Payne dead, at just 31 years of age. RIP Liam Payne.