Liam Payne not a fan of Harry Styles' Sign of the Times

Liam Payne is not a fan of Harry Styles' new solo music, insisting it's not a genre he would listen to.

Styles recently released his debut track, Sign of the Times, and while Payne is proud of his former One Direction bandmate for pursuing his solo passions, he admits the material is not quite his taste.

"It's not something I'd listen to, but I think he did a great job of doing what he wanted to do," he tells Music Choice. "That's the way I'd put it best, I think, I think the funny thing is, (Harry) would say the same thing about me because he doesn't really listen to hip-hop music, whereas it's like my song's more (Tyga's) Rack City and his song is more of a different era to something I'd listen to, I guess."

Styles recently opened up about the meaning behind his new song, revealing it is about a dying mother's final words to her newborn after a difficult childbirth.

"Most of the stuff that hurts me about what's going on (in the world) at the moment is not politics, it's fundamentals... Equal rights. For everyone, all races, sexes, everything...," he told Rolling Stone magazine last month (Apr17).

"Sign of the Times came from (the perspective of), 'This isn't the first time we've been in a hard time, and it's not going to be the last time.' The song is written from a point of view as if a mother was giving birth to a child and there's a complication. The mother is told, 'The child is fine, but you're not going to make it.' The mother has five minutes to tell the child, 'Go forth and conquer.'"