Three years. That is how long Liam Payne went between singles. “Teardrops,” released on March 1, 2024 through Capitol and Hampton Records, ended the gap that began with “Sunshine” in 2021, a track from the Ron’s Gone Wrong soundtrack.
The song was written by Payne, ‘NSync’s JC Chasez and Jamie Scott, a longtime collaborator. Rolling Stone said the track looks back to the late-90s sound: a somber, twinkling guitar behind big pop production. It was billed as the lead single from a planned second studio album.
Payne described the song in a statement. “‘Teardrops’ is about the vulnerability of heartbreak and the challenge of overcoming those moments,” he said. “This song marks the start of a new beginning, there’s lots more to come in 2024.” Scott called the sessions behind it a “year-long process of self-reflection.”
A rough stretch
The past couple of years have been turbulent for the former One Direction singer. In 2022 he appeared on Logan Paul’s podcast and made loaded comments about his old bandmates, Zayn Malik in particular. Fans pushed back hard. Payne apologized, and later said the episode was one of several reasons he checked into a sobriety treatment program.
“My own frustrations with my own career and where I kind of landed, I took shots at everybody else, which is wrong,” he said in a video last July. He also said he had “become somebody who I didn’t really recognize anymore.”
He then laid out plans to tour again in September 2023, but postponed the dates after a kidney infection. He was briefly hospitalized in Italy last year.
His debut album, LP1, came out in 2019 and included “Strip That Down” with Quavo and “Get Low” with Zedd. “Teardrops” turned out to be the last single released in his lifetime. Payne died that October.
Sources
- 1D Meets 'NSync as Liam Payne, JC Chasez Team Up for New Song 'Teardrops'
- Liam Payne Releases First Single In Three Years
- Teardrops (Liam Payne song)
Sources
- Teardrops (Liam Payne song) – Wikipedia
- Liam Payne Drops New Single 'Teardrops' Co-Written With JC Chasez
