Former One Direction member Louis Tomlinson has both debuted his first song as a solo artist and performed live on his own for the first time, only days after his mother died of cancer.
Johannah Deakin died on Wednesday morning (local time) after battling an aggressive form of leukaemia.
Tomlinson chose to proceed with the scheduled X Factor performance on Saturday as a tribute to his mother, alongside producer Steve Aoki.
It's believed the song, called 'Just Hold On', was written for Ms Deakin, and the lyrics are particularly poignant in the wake of her death.
"It's not over until it's all been said / It's not over until your dying breath," Tomlinson sings in the song's second verse.
"So what do you want them to say when you're gone? / That you gave up or that you kept going on?"
Tomlinson was visibly emotional after the performance and X Factor judge Simon Cowell praised his bravery for performing so soon after Ms Deakin died.
"Your mum was so proud of you Louis, and she was so looking forward to tonight, she's watching down on you now and you've done her proud," Cowell said.
Tomlinson is the third member of One Direction to go solo, after Zayn Malik left the band to pursue his own music and Niall Horan released his own single earlier this year.
Newshub.
