Liam Payne's solo music inspired by Usher and The Weeknd, says Ryan Tedder

New information about Liam Payne’s solo music has come to light from OneRepublic frontman Ryan Tedder, who has teased the star’s solo sound will be “high quality pop”.

Liam is the last of One Direction to release solo music and Ryan has been lucky enough to listen to to it ahead of its release.

Asked to describe Liam’s music, he said: “If you took ‘Story of My Life’ and turned it into an album, that’s kind of Niall [Horan]’s direction, right? Zayn [Malik] obviously went R&B and urban. Harry [Styles] is classic Britpop; Mott the Hoople meets Robbie Williams – that lane. I like Louis [Tomlinson], but he’s the one I’ve talked to the least.

“Funnily enough of all the routes that people have taken, the one lane that was left wide open was straight pop. So Liam is pop and doing it in a fantastic fashion. He has a killer voice. There are elements of stuff I like from Usher, there’s stuff that’s edgy like The Weeknd … it’s all over the map – it’s pop.

“It’s really high quality. I’ve only done one song with him that I did with Stargate.

“I’m cutting another song with him next week. The other one that [Zancanella] did with J Kash, it’s my favourite record I’ve heard. If it’s not a hit I need to clear my ears out – it’s so good.”

And the One Republic star – who worked with Liam on some of the tracks from his forthcoming album – also teased details about the first single off the LP.

He added to Newsweek: “I’ve already done a song with Liam [Payne] and I’m actually recording a second song with him next week. His stuff is spectacular.

“Another one of my writers, Noel Zancanella, who I did a lot of the Taylor Swift stuff with, and some of the Adele stuff that didn’t make the album, he has a huge record on the Liam album.

“It’s a dance record. I personally think it’s the biggest one on the album. I’ve heard about three records. I know what the first single is and there’s a lot of fame attached to the first single, I’ll say that.”

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