ZAYN MALIK SPEAKS OUT ABOUT THE REAL REASON HE LEFT 1D FOR THE FIRST TIME AS HE COVERS THE FADER 

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The time has finally come and after months of waiting for him to break his silence following his decision to quit One Direction, Zayn Malik is back and ready to begin a whole new chapter in his career.

Currently getting ready to release his solo album early next year, Zayn\'s not only decided it\'s time to tease the first snippet from new song \'Befour\', but has landed the cover of The Fader, taking the opportunity to speak openly and frankly out about all sorts, including what really led him to leave 1D.

Explaining that he\'d been feeling that maybe it was time to go for a while, Zayn says that it came down to a realisation that perhaps he wasn\'t making the type of music that could make him happy after all, and that he needed to seize the opportunity and make a change in order to be happy.

In the interview he also talks about what the situation with him and the rest of the band is like now and explains that they\'ve not really been in contact, but that he spoke to Liam for the first time a couple of weeks ago and they\'re on pretty good terms as a result, and are even talking about making some music together next year.

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"I\'m actually quite easy, a happy-go-lucky sort of guy," Zayn says, explaining that he\'s not sure how he ended up becoming seen as the \'mysterious one\' within the dynamic of One Direction. "But there was a lot of situations that were almost created to make me be portrayed as the mysterious or quiet one. I guess that\'s just something that people buy into, and it helps them sell things. It\'s a product that\'s already designed, and it sells."​​

One of the things that did frustrate him was not being able to express himself musically in the way he wanted and Zayn tells the magazine: "There was never any room for me to experiment creatively in the band. If I would sing a hook or a verse slightly R&B, or slightly myself, it would always be recorded 50 times until there was a straight version that was pop, generic as fuck, so they could use that version. 

"Whenever I would suggest something, it was like it didn\'t fit us. There was just a general conception that the management already had of what they want for the band, and I just wasn\'t convinced with what we were selling. I wasn\'t 100 percent behind the music. It wasn\'t me. It was music that was already given to us, and we were told this is what is going to sell to these people. As much as we were the biggest, most famous boy band in the world, it felt weird. We were told to be happy about something that we weren\'t happy about."

So was there one moment that sparked his decision to leave halfway through the On The Road Again Tour? Apparently not and according to Zayn, it was more that it was a long time coming.

"I guess I just wanted to go home from the beginning," he says. "I was always thinking it. I just didn\'t know when I was going to do it. Then by the time I decided to go, it just felt right on that day. I woke up on that morning, if I\'m being completely honest with you, and was like, \'I need to go home. I just need to be me now, because I\'ve had enough.\' I was with my little cousin at the time—we were sat in the hotel room—and I was just, \'Should I go home?\' And he was like, \'If you want to go home, let\'s go home.\' So we left."

Now that he has had the chance to work on his own solo music for the first time, he explains that it\'s been a pretty eye-opening experience and he\'s loving being able to do whatever he wants.

"It\'s not hard," he explains. "To me, it\'s like I stood in front of a canvas for about five years, and someone said like, \'You\'re not allowed to paint on this canvas.\' I\'ve got the paint, I\'ve got the fucking brushes, and I can\'t get it on there. Now someone removed the plastic and was like, \'Alright, you can now paint.\'

"A big part of why I left the band is I made the realisation that it wasn\'t actually about [being the biggest] anymore," he says, unconcerned at the thought that he might not have the same level of commercial success outside the band. ​

​"It wasn\'t about the amount of ticket sales that I get. It was more about the people that I reach. I want to reach them in the right way, and I want them to believe what I\'m saying. I\'ve done enough in terms of financial backing for me to live comfortably. I just want to make music now. If people want to listen to that, then I\'m happy. If they don\'t want to listen to it, then don\'t fucking listen to it. I\'m cool with that too. I\'ve got enough. I don\'t need you to buy it on a mass scale for me to feel satisfied."

"I\'m working every day now, but I\'m working on music that I enjoy," he adds. 

Were there any parts of One Direction\'s music that he enjoyed? Apparenly that\'s beside the point, because these days it\'s more about making music that he as a 22-year-old - opposed to the 17-year-old he was when the band started out - finds to his own tastes.

"That\'s not music that I would listen to," he says. "Would you listen to One Direction, sat at a party with your girl? I wouldn\'t. To me, that\'s not an insult, that\'s me as a 22-year-old man. As much as I was in that band, and I loved everything that we did, that\'s not music that I would listen to. I don\'t think that\'s an offensive statement to make. That\'s just not who I am. If I was sat at a dinner date with a girl, I would play some cool shit, you know what I mean? I want to make music that I think is cool shit. I don\'t think that\'s too much to ask for."

So where do things stand with 1D and are they still in contact?

"I spoke to Liam about two weeks ago," Zayn says, making us think once again of his promise that they\'ll all be \'friends for life.\' 

"It was the first time I\'d spoken to him since I left the band, and I rung him, and he wanted to talk. He said that he didn\'t understand it at the time, but he now fully gets why I had to do what I did. He understands that it\'s my thing, that I had to do that, and that basically he wants to meet up and sit down and have a good chat in person, and he wants to do some music and work on some stuff aside from being in the band, which we always wanted to do anyway."

WELL. That\'s a lot to take in, isn\'t it? Drop us your thoughts in a tweet over @Sugarscape way please.

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