Liam Payne honoured in emotional tribute at 2025 BRIT Awards: “Tonight we celebrate his legacy”

nme.com:

BRIT Awards honoured the late Liam Payne in an emotional tribute last night – see the footage below.At yesterday’s ceremony, comedian and actor Jack Whitehall, a friend of the late One Direction star, returned to host the show for the first time since 2021.

Towards its end, he told the audience at London’s O2 it was time to honour “a very special person who meant so much to so many of the people in this room and to millions of you around the world.”“Last October, we woke to the devastating news that Liam Payne had tragically passed away,” he said.

The pop singer tragically died on October 16 last year, after he fell from a third-floor balcony at the CasaSur Palermo Hotel, with the Argentinian prosecutor’s office sharing at the time that his cause of death was due to multiple traumas and internal and external bleeding.“He achieved so much in the short time that he was on this earth, and was not only a supremely gifted musician, but an incredibly kind soul who touched the lives of everyone he came into contact with.

We have so many amazing memories of Liam here at the Brits, so tonight we celebrate his legacy, look back and remember the remarkable Liam Payne.”A video montage featuring footage of Payne on tour with One Direction and his family then played, soundtracked to the band’s ‘Little Things’.