McFly’s Tom Fletcher Shares His Memories of Liam Payne

ODE

Reflecting on the death of Liam Payne at the age of 31, McFly band member Tom Fletcher says the band saw themselves in One Direction when they first worked together. He also called for more to be done to protect young artists in the music industry.    Tom and other British celebrities were attending the 2024 Pride of Britain Awards at the Grosvenor Hotel in London on 21st October.  Report by Burtonj. Like us on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/itn and follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/itn

Transcript

00:00Hello sir. Hello, you've got me on my own, I've lost Danny.

00:03Is that alright? He's welcome to join at any time.

00:05He can jump in, yeah.

00:06Hey, welcome to the Pride of Britain Awards. I understand I imagine you've been here before,

00:09so you know what to expect in terms of inspiration and tears perhaps?

00:13Yeah, we've been many times. It's the 25th Pride of Britain Awards and it's 21 years of McFly

00:18and I think we've been coming pretty much every year since being a band

00:21and it's always such an honour to be invited, it's an amazing night

00:24and yeah, you come away feeling, there's lots of tears but you generally come away

00:28with a sense of overwhelming pride. So yeah, it's an amazing night and I'm very glad to be back.

00:33It's a night where we can be inspired by the British public.

00:35Can I ask who has inspired you in 2024?

00:38Oh, that's a good question. Who's inspired me? I think my kids probably.

00:41My kids are I guess my biggest source of inspiration.

00:45How are they doing that specifically? Just proud of them, constant pride beaming at them?

00:50Yeah, well I think they inspire me in many ways. I mean quite specifically,

00:53they literally tell me what books, I write children's books and they not only inspire me

00:57but tell me what I need to write these days. So it's quite specific, detailed inspiration

01:02and they're quite adamant with it as well.

01:06I could very much see a scenario in 2025 where McFly should be supporting Oasis

01:11during their massive tour and I've seen many a headline but is that something

01:15which you could see yourself? I know that, you know, whether it does or doesn't happen

01:19but would you be up for that?

01:20Hey look, Danny I think in particular would be well up for that.

01:25I'm not sure how Oasis would feel about it but I think that would be amazing.

01:29I think just wouldn't be morbidly fascinated to know what they would say about that.

01:33Yeah, I know. Who knows? I don't think we'll ever know.

01:36To change the tone slightly if I may, we in the music industry have kind of

01:41had a humbling week, you know, with the news of Liam Payne happening

01:44and it started conversations about how we protect young artists in the music industry.

01:48What were your thoughts when you heard it I guess?

01:52Yeah, obviously it's been an incredibly tough week.

01:54We worked with Liam, toured with him, wrote songs and so yeah,

01:59it's really, I mean, just heartbreaking news and yeah, I think,

02:03I absolutely think more needs to be done to protect young artists

02:06and so I really hope that this can start that conversation

02:12and yeah, obviously I think everyone's just in shock still.

02:17Can I ask what were your, obviously you've worked with him over the years

02:20and toured with him, what were some of your fond memories I guess of being with him?

02:24We had some great memories. I mean, you know, all of the boys were so lovely to work with,

02:29especially back in the day when they were really young and fresh and new to the business.

02:33They reminded us a lot of ourselves and it was a great honour for us to get to,

02:38you know, work on their albums and then tour with them.

02:41So yeah, we had some great memories.

02:43Thank you for indulging me there and enjoy tonight as well.

02:45I really appreciate you. Thank you.

02:46Cheers mate. Take care.

Category

Transcript

Recommended