Liam Payne Once Said Drinking Was the Only Way to ‘Get Your Head Around’ the Insanity of One Direction
In 2024, One Direction’s Liam Payne died after a fall from a hotel balcony in Buenos Aires. The singer had reportedly been heavily using drugs and alcohol before his death. In past years, Payne spoke about his struggles with addiction and efforts to get sober. He explained that he began drinking during his One Direction years because it felt like the only way to cope with his fast-paced, demanding life.
Liam Payne said he coped with the pressure of One Direction with drugs and alcohol
While being a member of One Direction was a high point in Payne’s career, he said he felt like he always had to be performing. He began to rely on alcohol to get him through this.
“It’s almost like putting the Disney costume on before you step up onstage,” he said in 2019, (per Rolling Stone), “and underneath the Disney costume, I was pissed [drunk] quite a lot of the time, because there was no other way to get your head around what was going on.”
When the band was on tour, they spent much of their time locked in their hotel rooms. This was to keep them safe from the fans surrounding their lodgings, but it also isolated them.
“The best way to secure us, because of how big we’d got, was just to lock us in our rooms,” Payne said. “What’s in a room? A mini bar. So, at a certain point, I thought, ‘I’m just going to have a party for one,’ and that seemed to carry on for many years of my life. Then you look back at how long you’ve been drinking and you’re like, ‘Jesus Christ, that’s a long time.’ ”
Liam Payne shared how he felt about leaving One Direction
The fast pace and level of fame became difficult to keep up with. Payne was also a teenager for a portion of his time with the group.
“There’s no stop button,” he said on the podcast Table Manners (via Rolling Stone). “You’ve got no control over your life. That’s why I lost complete control of everything.”
He said that while he felt afraid when the band broke up, there was also some measure of relief.
“I needed to stop,” he said. “It would’ve killed me.”
He spoke about his decision to get sober
In 2023, Payne told fans he’d been sober for nearly six months.
“I just kind of feel like I’ve got more of a grip on life and everything that was getting away from me, I just feel like I’ve got more of a handle on it,” he said in a YouTube video (via People). “I just needed to take a little bit of time out for myself actually because I kind of became somebody who I didn’t really recognize anymore. And I’m sure you guys didn’t either. I was in bad shape up until that point and I was really happy to kind of put a stopper to life and work.”
He said he felt proud and content with the place he was in.
“It’s good, it’s good to be in this position,” he said. “I definitely don’t need those things anymore. The party’s over.”
How to get help: In the U.S., contact the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration helpline at 1-800-662-4357.
