Oh, One Direction. Hearing that name brings back a wave of nostalgia like no other band could do for me. I think about the little girl blaring “What Makes You Beautiful” in her room while wearing a necklace with Zayn Malik’s face on it. The same girl also went to see the One Direction movie — “One Direction: This Is Us” — in 2013 in theaters, with her shirt that had all of their faces blown up on the front.
I always liked Zayn the best, because I wanted to like the “bad boy” and that was the vibe that he gave at the time. Every time I got in the car with my mom, I would pray that they came on the radio and we could sing it together and just be girls and have fun.
When they broke up in 2016, I was in middle school. I was distraught. I thought that they were going to be the band that stood the test of time and never went in separate directions; their name, “One Direction,” seemed misleading to me.
Eight years later, the announcement of Liam Payne’s death has come as a shock to many — he was only 31 years old, with so much life ahead of him. Now, everyone has begun to wonder what’s next. Was the band ever going to come back together and go on a reunion tour? Are they still going to try to make that happen, despite the overwhelming pain of losing their bandmate and friend? Would it be the same without Liam?
As a band member, Payne was never the one out of the group to want the spotlight all to himself. Rather, his passion was in songwriting. One song in particular that fully encapsulates his songwriting ability is “Story of My Life,” which he co-wrote and sang the soul-wrenching lines that truly resonate with the audience.
“She told me in the morning she don’t feel the same about us in her bones / It seems to me that when I die these words will be written on my stone.”
Looking back, this almost seems to be foreshadowing his death — when the band had no idea that he would die at such a young age.
“History” is a song on the album “Made in the A.M.” that was released after Zayn was the first one to leave the group. Payne commented on it to Entertainment Weekly.
“More than anything, the song is about the way the fans and everyone have created this massive thing — One Direction — over the past five years,” Payne said. “Out of [‘History’] comes a little bit of closure for this chapter of One Direction.”
Payne’s words now take on a different perspective for the band — in that they can now reflect on their history going through different seasons of life together: as one band, as separate solo artists and now coming back together and grieving the loss of one of them.
For the band going forward, if they were to come back together and write music, their style would definitely change. Without Payne’s help in the writing process, they may find themselves trying to recreate their sound so they are not constantly reminded of what they are lacking.
If One Direction were to get back together and produce more music without Payne, they would not be the first to do so after losing a bandmate. AC/DC lost Bon Scott and chose to add another member to their band, Brian Johnson. The band then released the album “Back in Black,” Loudwire calling it “one of the best-selling records of all time, and they’ve had an immensely successful career with Johnson since.”
Queen is another example of a band that continued on after losing a bandmate. It did, however, take over a decade for the band to come back and release more music. Instead of seamlessly adding a new member into their group like AC/DC did, Queen did not want anyone to believe that they were trying to replace Freddie Mercury. They simply added onto their name, and they were “Queen + Paul Rodgers” at one point in time.
It says a lot about a band if they are able to come back together and continue doing what they love without one of the people who helped make their dreams come true.
For AC/DC, their band’s success increased by adding someone else. I am sure they did not want anyone to think they were replacing Johnson — but they did not put as much thought into it as Queen did, because they did not change their name. They presented themselves to the public as the same band they had always been, even if they were essentially different.
As I am still a One Direction fan, I still feel like the fans are going to want the band to come back together and go on tour as a result of Payne’s passing. A tribute tour would be beneficial for the healing process for everyone. As Payne was still supporting his friends right before he passed, it would not be out of the ordinary for them to come together and continue to support each other through this season of grieving.
In “Walking in the Wind,” One Direction once sang that it is ok to move along to a new thing in life, because it is truly a small world, so there is bound to be a time where coming back together is feasible. The lyrics they sang then now take on a whole new meaning, as the words could be thought of in terms of their friend’s death.
“But it’s not the end / I’ll see your face again / You will find me / Yeah, you will find me / In places that we’ve never been / For reasons we don’t understand / Walking in the wind.”
What once signified moving forward now resonates as a message of connection through loss. As the band navigates this new chapter, they carry a legacy rich with memories, music and the enduring bond formed through years of friendship.
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