Super-fans mixed with the world’s media outside the CasaSur Hotel in Palermo Hollywood, an up-market suburb of Buenos Aires just hours after the death of One Direction star Liam Payne, 31.
The neighborhood is used to a different kind of buzz – it’s the fashionable bar and restaurant district of Argentina’s famed capital, where locals and tourists usually dine on steak and sip Malbec into the small hours.
Tonight, fans lit candles, placed flowers then spontaneously burst into song – somber, downbeat versions of the band’s biggest hits, including a moving version of The Story of My Life. It was imbued with fresh poignancy, given the boy band member’s own story has been cut tragically short at such an early chapter.
The chorus of the song faltered as fans – mostly young women in their twenties who’d grown up with the band in their teens – could be heard crying and comforting each other. They gathered around a makeshift row of candles placed at a tree in front of the hotel, inside which Payne had fallen to his death from a balcony only hours earlier.
Whatever problems or allegations Payne was facing in his life hadn’t deterred super-fans from travelling across the city to pay their respects.
Brunella Pucci, 25, was one such Argentinian fan. She travelled several suburbs to CasaSur tonight because she wanted to be among other fans, and share in the emotions of those who’d also grown up with Payne and supported him through his recent difficulties.
“When he died, so many of my friends and family sent me a message – it was like someone from my family had passed away,” she told news.com.au.
“One Direction has been a big part of my life for 14 years – I was 11 when I first listened to them. It’s crazy, it’s unbelievable what’s happened, just really shocking.
“I knew he’d come here to support his bandmate Niall in his solo concert. He was also here in May for Louis’ concert, so he’s been here twice this year. My best friend and I went to those concerts,” she said, and explained the Argentine pair met learning English – in part by listening to One Direction songs.
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“So many of us made friendships through being fans of One Direction. That’s why Augustina and I are here – we’re friends because we bonded over them as little kids,” she said.
“Liam was supposed to do a show here earlier this year, but had to cancel for health reasons. I guess now we know why.”
Vanessa Alejandra, 20, was walking with her best friend nearby when she heard the news. “My cousins were huge fans and they were messaging me saying ‘you have to go, you have to see what’s happened and tell us’,” she said.
“None of us can believe it really happened here – it’s so crazy.”
I’ve lived in Palermo Soho – the suburb next door to Palermo Hollywood – for a year now, and this is the first time I’ve seen anything like this. Usually when crowds gather and sing together in Argentina, it’s for one reason and one reason only – football.
Being British myself, it’s always notable when any UK star lands on Argentinian soil. Our two countries have a complex relationship since the Falklands War – so much so, when Paul McCartney was performing here last week, he declined to wave a Union Jack flag for fear it’d offend the crowd. Such a move was described as a “big statement”.
Nevertheless, even when Argentinians discover I’m British by birth (but Australian by choice), they’re usually warm and friendly, even making jokes about the Falklands, cheekily saying ‘Malvinas Argentinas’ (“the Falklands belong to Argentina”). So, Liam Payne is likely to have experienced an equally warm reception if his experience as a Brit in Buenos Aires was anything like mine.
Palermo Hollywood is an area popular with digital nomads, tourists and locals. I’ve never seen so many news crews from around the globe descend onto one of its leafy streets.
One Argentine news crew, hearing my British accent, grabbed me for their own interview which they said they’d later subtitle.
“Can you believe this happened here? He’s really famous in your country, right?” they asked.
It reflected the shock apparent in the air as sobs and singing continued around me. At one point, a noisy drone soared above, interrupting the solemn pop songs being sung as if they were church hymns.
“Have some respect, take it down,” other journalists said from behind their cameras, before it landed and was packed away.
Hali Wu, 22, moved to Buenos Aires two weeks ago from New York City. He now lives a block away from the CasaSur Hotel.
“I’ve been spending a lot of time around the neighbourhood – it’s both super calm and full of life – full of people peacefully sitting outside socialising in the many cafes and restaurants nearby,” he said.
“It’s not really a place you expect to see anything major happening.”
He walked to the hotel at 7pm, very soon after Payne had died.
![At one point, a noisy drone soared above, interrupting the solemn pop songs being sung, and journalists said to “take it [drones] down.”](https://nypost.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2024/10/scenes-outside-buenos-aires-hotel-91751276.jpg?w=1024)
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“It felt like a fever dream,” he said.
“We were all standing around saying, there’s no way Liam Payne died, here, an hour ago. There was a lot of sadness and huge disbelief.
“For my generation who were born in the early 2000s and grew up in the 2010s, One Direction was such a big part of our childhoods. They were icons where I grew up in California.
“Liam had talked just last year about how sobriety had saved his life after his substance abuse issues – and helped him become a better father. So to see the exact place where this has happened is just so heartbreaking.”
Blocks away is a museum dedicated to a woman also forever associated with a famous balcony: Eva Peron, whose notable balcony speech is captured in the film Evita as she sings Don’t Cry For Me Argentina.
Today, it felt like Argentina was crying below a very different balcony, which will now go down in history for very different and tragic reasons.