An Emotional Shawn Mendes Pauses Concert to Pay Tribute to Liam Payne

An emotional Shawn Mendes paused his live performance in Brooklyn to pay tribute to Liam Payne.

Mendes, 26, addressed the viewers on the Paramount Theater on Friday, October 18, and stated the information of Payne’s dying two days earlier than felt “utterly devastating,” based on social media footage discovered on-line. 

“I acquired to satisfy Liam a few occasions, and he was a fantastic soul and his eyes gleamed, it was stunning,” the singer-songwriter instructed the gang. “It’s about grieving these we miss with tears and it’s additionally about celebrating them and who they had been and what they left on this world and I simply need to take a second to ship a lot like to him wherever he’s up there. Liam, we love you. The world is crying for you, brother, and we’re all praying in your son and your loved ones. I miss you. This one’s for you tonight, Liam, from all of us.”

Billboard reported Friday that Mendes adopted his remarks with a efficiency of his new music “Coronary heart of Gold,” which he devoted to Payne. The music’s refrain consists of the lyrics “You had a coronary heart of gold / You left too quickly, it was out of your management/ Beneath your pores and skin and bone / You had a coronary heart of gold.”

Us Weekly confirmed that Payne died at age 31 on Wednesday, October 16, after falling from a resort balcony in Buenos Aires, Argentina. The singer sustained a cranial fracture and different severe accidents that had been too extreme for emergency remedy. He was pronounced useless on the scene.

Payne leaves behind 7-year-old son Bear, whom he shared with ex-girlfriend Cheryl Cole. 

Shawn Mendes speaking about Liam Payne and dedicating ‘Coronary heart Of Gold’ to him tonight at #ForFriendsAndFamilyOnly Brooklyn 💛 pic.twitter.com/ohSljOUvVb

— The Mendes Updates (@TheSMendesUpdt) October 19, 2024

“As I attempt to navigate this earth-shattering occasion and work by my very own grief at this indescribably painful time, I’d prefer to kindly remind everybody that we’ve misplaced a human being,” wrote Cole, 41, breaking her silence through Instagram on Friday. “Liam was not solely a pop star and celeb, he was a son, a brother, an uncle, a pricey good friend and a father to our 7-year-old son. A son that now has to face the truth of by no means seeing his father once more.”

Payne and Cole dated from 2016 to 2018 after initially assembly in 2008 whereas Payne was a contestant on The X Issue UK. On the time, Cole — who’s a member of the woman band Ladies Aloud — was a decide on the collection. Payne returned to the present two years later in 2010, when Simon Cowell famously put him along with Zayn Malik, Harry Types, Niall Horan and Louis Tomlinson to kind One Path. 

Cowell, 65, took to Instagram on Friday to replicate upon a gathering he had with Payne final yr the place they “reminisced about all of the enjoyable occasions we had collectively. And the way proud you had been to be a dad. After you left, I used to be reminded that you simply had been nonetheless the candy, type boy I met all these years in the past.”

He added of Bear, “He has your smile and that twinkle in his eyes you will have. He shall be so happy with all the things you achieved. And the way you achieved it.”