One Direction didn’t win season seven of The X Factor, the reality show that turned them into household names in 2010. They came third.
But the reaction today to the death of band member Liam Payne is a testament to the band’s subsequent fame and success – going from runners-up to global stardom, and five No.1 albums. Their third, Midnight Memories, was the best-selling album in the world in 2013.
Payne, from England’s West Midlands, was just 14 when he first auditioned for the popular UK show. It was 2008 and reality was the new height of TV.
One Direction (from left) Liam Payne, Zayn Malik, Niall Horan, Louis Tomlinson and Harry Styles, in 2012. Credit: AP
It would be two more years before he finally got his big break on the show – but not as a solo star. It was British starmaker and X Factor judge Simon Cowell who took Payne, along with four other solo contestants, Harry Styles, Niall Horan, Louis Tomlinson and Zayn Malik, and created One Direction – and with it a cultural phenomenon.
The potency and endurance of One Direction’s music is a reflection of the astonishing scale of their popularity. And, like the Beatles or ABBA, One Direction’s moment in the cultural sun was an extraordinary one.
There were four sell-out world tours. The Midnight Memories tour broke records, becoming the 15th-highest-grossing music tour of all time. That the artists ahead of them on that list include Taylor Swift, U2, Elton John and Beyoncé is confirmation of the kind of commercial company One Direction kept.
Liam Payne performing in Los Angeles in 2015.Credit: Getty Images
In 2016, like ABBA before them, One Direction did not officially disband but rather went on an indefinite hiatus. As well as Styles’ huge breakout success, Payne’s star soared; his debut solo single, Strip That Down, shot into the Top 10 in Britain and the US.
His planned second studio album and tour were delayed in 2023 due to Payne’s ill health; only the first single of the album was released, Teardrops, which he co-wrote with NSYNC member JC Chasez.
The global reaction to his shock death has reflected the reality-TV generation’s first experience of collective grief.
Like his music, Payne will be blessed with the kind of immortality that pop culture can bestow. His songs are a soundtrack to the lived experience of his fans in a way that is difficult to put into words. For earlier generations, it was Madonna, or ABBA, or even the film music of John Williams or Hans Zimmer.
The tragic epitaph to Payne’s life is that, at the time of his death, he was an artist who was perhaps only beginning to fully realise his potential.
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