James Arthur says Liam Payne reached out to him after he ‘publicly struggled’

Former X Factor contestant James Arthur has said Liam Payne reached out to him after he won the ITV reality show and “struggled” to deal with the fame.

Payne, whose pop group One Direction came third during series seven, died at the age of 31 in October 2024 after falling from a hotel balcony in Argentina.

“By no means were me and Liam sort of best mates or anything like that,” he told ITV’s Lorraine.

“I think he was just sort of like… at the time when I came up One Direction were obviously the biggest thing in the world.

“And they were on The X Factor, I think, a couple of years before me.

“And when I won the show and publicly struggled a little bit, he reached out to a mutual friend of ours and requested to have a one-to-one with me and have a chat with me.

“Like I say, although we weren’t close, I’ll never forget how kind he was at that time.

“He went out of his way to be like, ‘I went through this’, and that’s the kind of person he was.

“I didn’t know him really well, but any time I encountered Liam he was concerned with my wellbeing, every time. So it was a shame to see, you know, what happened.”

Prior to his death, Payne had opened up about his journey to sobriety, and how his drinking began when the global mania for the boy band meant they were often stuck in hotel rooms, where alcohol was available.

Arthur has also spoken publicly about his battle with addiction, as well as anxiety.

He appeared on the show to talk about his new album and tour and said his albums have “got more and more personal and more vulnerable”.

A court in Argentina dropped charges in February of criminal negligence against three out of the five people who had been charged in connection with Payne’s death.

At the Brit Awards in March, Payne was remembered with a video montage which showed him with his family, and a clip from his time on The X Factor and then with One Direction, who won seven gongs at the music awards before they split up.

After his band went on hiatus Payne released his debut solo album LP1 in December 2019, which included the songs Polaroid and Strip That Down featuring Quavo, as well as the track For You with Rita Ora.