After taking some time away from the spotlight, Liam Payne is back and preparing to release a whole new album for the first time since 2019.

The former One Direction star has been teasing new music with lead single, Teardrops, but it seems actual tears went into the making of it.

In a new behind-the-scenes video shared by Liam, the heavily tattooed 30-year-old gets emotional and even cries as he records the song.

‘There were definitely a lot of teardrops shed in making these records and for the first time you really get a picture of what it was like for me each day of making this record,’ he explained in a voiceover.

His friends rush to hug him as he wipes away the floods of tears before the video cuts to clips of him laughing as they write and create in the studio.

The upcoming track will be Liam’s first solo offering in a while, with his album LP1 released in 2019, and his most recent single, Sunshine, released in 2021.

Liam Payne shed tears over his latest single (Picture: Liam Payne/TikTok)

He has not released new music in several years (Picture: Liam Payne/TikTok)

The star took time out over health concerns (Picture: Liam Payne/TikTok)

Liam continued: ‘This album literally is that whole last year for me. How I was feeling on those days is each record. It was a snapshot of that day.’

Days before he had released a sneak preview of the new song, a slow love ballad ‘born from many [tears]’ which sees Liam hit some high notes.

‘Teardrops are falling down your face again, cos I don’t know how to love you and I am broken too,’ he sings in a studio recording booth.

The Strip That Down hitmaker has gone through a tough year with a health scare forcing him to be hospitalised while on holiday in September last year.

He had been at Lake Como, Italy, for his anniversary with his girlfriend Kate Cassidy when he was diagnosed with a kidney infection.

He had been hospitalised over a kidney infection (Picture: Liam Payne/TikTok)

Now Liam is back in the studio and releasing his new single (Picture: Liam Payne/TikTok)

Even before the trip, Liam had told fans he was having some health issues as he postponed his South American tour, saying he was devastated he couldn’t perform.

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Ex-girlfriend Cheryl, 40 – with whom he shares six-year-old son Bear – was said to be ‘trying to support him’.

By October the dad-of-one was feeling better and spotted in Paris with his girlfriend on a romantic trip before heading to Ireland to work on his new project.

In his new video, fans commented on how well he looked but were devastated to see him crying, as Bea Fernandes said: ‘Liam crying breaks my heart 💔’

‘It hurts my heart to see him in tears,’ shared a One Direction fan account while another fan account wrote: ‘Who made my baby cry??’

Fans were excited to see his return (Picture: Liam Payne/TikTok)

Liam hasn’t released music since his LP1 album in 2019 (Picture: John Phillips/Getty Images for BFI)

However, many were hyping up the singer as Nine wrote: ‘I am so incredibly proud of you Liam!!💗 Can’t wait for the album!!💧💗💗.’

‘Wait he’s looking so healthy 🥺,’ another fan, going by kireikeu, had written on his song sneak peek.

Kathy Hansen added: ‘I’m so proud of his recovery. He looks really good 😊.’

To finish his promotion video of the new single, Liam added: ‘So you can even help someone through a tough time, help somebody celebrate something.

‘That’s really what I want to get across in this record and that’s the best part I guess about my job.’