one direction + what death leaves behind

Liam Payne died a complicated figure. He's come into the news– or at least the sort of gossipy, internetty discussions I tend to see a lot of– every few months doing something that people sort of laughed at or cringed at or criticized. I've seen clips of him going on Logan Paul's podcast an unbelievable number of times. In the years post One Direction he's consistently been positioned as the one who is doing the worst without the band. Where the rest of them, on the whole, seemed to be making choices– parenthood, settling into solo careers of varying levels of success– Liam seemed to flounder. Drugs and alcohol haunt a lot of people who became too famous too young and the 1D boys aren't any exception.

Liam Payne has also been accused of abuse and violence toward his much younger former girlfriend. I can't imagine being 19 and being put in that position by any man, much less an older, incredibly famous man. I can't imagine what it would feel like for that man to then die. Some people want the death of an abusive man to be like an albatross off a victim's neck, but I think that's naive.

Those extremely recent allegations loom large over the usual celebrity mourning. It feels like people wrestling with having a natural reaction to a celebrity dying prematurely for the sake of being Right about some other, more virtuous idea. It is more noble to celebrate the death of a man who has harmed a woman than it is to be shocked and upset, or something like that.

But I think the more interesting thing we're seeing is just how much fandom of boybands it's not really about the men in the band at all. I think positive fandom is best understood– and best used– as a facilitator for connection between fans, not about the people behind that conduit. A lack of understanding of that is what pushes people involved in the fandom into dangerous parasociality and people outside of it into judgment when fans overvalue what being a fan of One Direction did for them.

Fandom is usually about you. The things we love, especially at a young age, form our sense of self. Whether that's One Direction or some pop punk band or metalcore or whatever, fandom is about you. Even when the person you're a fan of turns out to have caused harm, the fandom is still about you and the mourning of a celebrity is about you too.

When people go to those nostalgia bait festivals or go to an emo night or an indie sleaze night, what they're trying to capture is some ability to look their former selves in the face. Nostalgia is downstream from fandom and they're both just about you. That's what makes them so profitable.

I think Liam Payne's death just signals to a lot of people that they'll never be able to look at their excited, young selves and that's a sort of mourning. As abuse and violence permeated Liam's reputation there was already a mourning of One Direction as a pure memory, but there is finality in death. There is no room for redemption or change. One Direction wasn't really One Direction without Zayn and a One Direction reunion wouldn't have been a real reunion without all the boys. A reunion never felt that likely, but now looking up at the remaining 4/5 of the band without Liam would feel less like a righteous choice and more like just a pure reminder of what can never come back.

I wrote about my favorite albums of the decade so far in the Endless Scroll newsletter, you can go check that out if you're interested!

Miranda Reinert is a music adjacent writer, zine maker, podcaster and law school drop out based in Chicago. Follow me on Twitter or Instagram: @mirandareinert.  This blog does have a paid option and I would so appreciate any money you would be willing to throw me! You may also send me small bits of money at @miranda-reinert on venmo/on Paypal if you want. As always, thanks for reading!