Following the death of former One Direction member Liam Payne, Sharon Osbourne spoke out on Instagram claiming that the music industry let him down. She expressed her sadness that Payne was “just a kid” when he entered the industry, “one of the toughest industries in the world”. Osbourne’s words join a chorus of tributes pouring in from around the globe after the 31-year-old’s tragic death in Buenos Aires.
In her emotional tribute to Payne, Osbourne lamented, “We all let you down. Where was this industry when you needed them?” Payne, who first rose to fame as a teenager after appearing on X Factor at age 14 in 2008, reflected on his meteoric rise in an interview with the BBC in 2019 and discussed his confusion about fame when it all happened. He spoke about his “erratic behaviour” at the time the band broke up, acknowledging that he was “partying too hard.”
After becoming a massive success with One Direction, Payne found his solo career to be more challenging to maintain. In 2023, he was forced to cancel his solo tour after being admitted to the hospital with a kidney infection. Osbourne is not the only one to have called out the music industry in the wake of Payne’s death. Boyzone’s Mikey Graham urged record companies to take seriously their “duty of care for the vulnerability of their young talent,” adding that the “fame can be very damaging, especially in today’s world.”
Katie Waissel, who was a contestant on X Factor in 2010 alongside One Direction, has long been an advocate for better support for those who appear on television. Waissel spoke with the BBC last year about the “obscene amount of pressure” she felt as a contestant, and she continues to campaign for better support in the wake of Payne’s death
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