Liam Payne opens up about alcohol dependency as he thanks Russell Brand for helping him kick the habit

Liam Payne has opened up about his past struggles with alcohol dependency and how comedian Russell Brand played a part in him kicking the booze.

During an interview with This Morning presenters Phillip Schofield and Holly Willoughby, the former One Direction star revealed that he “had a thing with drink” and thanked “a guy called Chip Somers” for helping him get sober.

Read more: Liam Payne admits becoming a dad at a young age 'spooked him out'

“I was sober for about a year and visited Russell Brand. We went down to meetings together,” he added.

“As ‘Strip That Down’ came out, I was almost as afraid of success as I was failure, which isn’t a comfortable place to be in life because you’re not really sure what you’re doing,” Payne noted. “For anybody who’s having a problem with mental health, the best thing to do is speak to someone.

“We’re all as crazy as the next person.”

Payne went on to detail how he would get “very lonely” and how, despite how difficult it was to go 12 months without a drink, he knew it was necessary.

“Many things in my life went up, but many things went down at the same time,” he said. “It was about pressing that reset button and ­realising you could cope without it.”

This isn’t the first time Payne has spoken out about how embarking on a solo career had a negative effect on his life sometimes.

Read more: Liam Payne feared One Direction success would kill him after 'losing control' of his life

In a recent interview with The Guardian, the 26-year-old recalled: “Doing a show to however many thousands of people, then being stuck by yourself in a country where you can’t go out anywhere – what else are you going to do? The minibar is always there. I just hid it very well.”

He also admitted to taking an epilepsy drug to help calm his “erratic” behaviour, noting that it would often cause him to forget his own name when exposed to certain lighting.