Liam Payne was failed by the music industry, Sharon Osbourne has said in an emotional tribute to the former One Direction star.
Writing on Instagram, Osbourne said Payne was “just a kid” when he “entered one of the toughest industries in the world”.
“We all let you down,” added the TV personality and former X Factor judge, alongside a black-and-white photograph of Payne.
Osbourne is the latest to add her voice to the tributes that have poured in from across the world after the 31-year-old singer fell to his death in Buenos Aires on Wednesday night.
“Liam, my heart aches. We all let you down. Where was this industry when you needed them?” Osbourne wrote.
“You were just a kid when you entered one of the toughest industries in the world. Who was in your corner? Rest in peace my friend,” she said.
Osbourne was a judge on the first three series of The X Factor from 2004 to 2007, but was no longer a part of the show when Payne appeared in the competition.
She returned to the show in 2013, 2016 and 2017.
Payne rose to fame as a teenager, first appearing on The X Factor at the age of 14 in 2008.
He returned to the show two years later, when judge Simon Cowell created One Direction by matching Payne with Zayn Malik, Louis Tomlinson, Niall Horan and Harry Styles.
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While the group came third in The X Factor that year, they went on to become one of the most successful boy bands of all time, selling some 70 million records since their formation in 2010. The band went on a “hiatus” in 2016.
Reflecting on his meteoric rise in a 2019 BBC interview, Payne said he had been “very confused about fame when it all happened”.
In the same interview, he spoke about his “erratic behaviour” at the time the band broke up. “I was partying too hard,” he said.
After the astronomical success of One Direction, Payne found his solo career harder to maintain.
In 2023, the singer was forced to cancel his solo tour after being admitted to hospital with a “serious kidney infection”.
Osbourne is not the only person to take aim at 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”.
He wrote on X: “Fame can be very damaging especially in today’s world. Lots of money. Nobody to help.”
And Katie Waissel, who appeared on the X Factor in 2010 alongside One Direction, has long campaigned for better support for those who appear on TV.
She spoke to the BBC last year about the “obscene amount of pressure” she felt under as a contestant on the show.
