Liam Payne is best known for being a member of the boy-band One Direction.
Liam Payne Biography
Liam James Payne, born on 29 August 1993 is an English singer and songwriter, who is best known for being part of the band One Direction. He won the Attitude Award for Sexiest Man of the Year in 2015.
Early Life
Liam was born in Wolverhampton, West Midlands, England. He has 11 GCSEs completed at St Peter’s Collegiate School and attended Wolverhampton College’s Paget Road, studying music technology. At the age of 12 he started taking up boxing lessons and at 14 he auditioned the first time for The X Factor. Payne didn’t make it through the Boot Camped but was encouraged to return and try again the next series.
Getting Together
He tried again in 2010 but didn’t qualify for the “Boys” category, even though after the solo auditions, he was one of the favorites to win the competition. Guest judge Nicole Scherzinger suggested he should join Harry Styles, Louis Tomlinson, Niall Horan and Zayn Malik and together they formed One Direction. Coached by Cowell, they got the 3rd place in that edition of X factor and they gained lots of popularity. Their final performance on the show was an acoustic version of Natalie Imbruglia’s “Torn”.
After The X Factor ended, Cowell got the boys a contract with Syco record label. They started to record their first album and also did a tour in the UK. In 2011 Up All Night was born. Their first studio album reached number one in United States Billboard 200 and sold 176 000 copies in its first week. Their iconic hit and also their first single, “What makes you beautiful” made number one in Mexico, Ireland, and the UK. As One Direction, the boys sold over 35 million records worldwide. Billboard crowned them as “Top New Artist” in 2012. When Zayn Malik left, Liam got to sing the high notes for the band he was met with positive feedback.
Going Solo & Influences
Payne decided in 2014 that he wants his solo projects to appear under his own publishing company and therefore he created Hampton Music Limited. He collaborated with several artists, including DJ Mustard, Miguel, Omi, Pharrell Williams, Wiz Khalifa.
Liam considers Pharrell Williams and Justin Timberlake to be some of the biggest influences for him. “The person who has inspired me most is Pharell Williams who I worked with a while back. I got talking to his producer recently and asked him what Pharrell was like when he was younger, and he said to me that when he was my age he couldn’t press a note on a keyboard. And that was amazing to me because at 22 I thought I was too old to learn guitar”, he declared.
Photo Source: Gazette Review
