AceShowbiz -

Nearly eight months after Zayn Malik left One Direction, his former bandmates got candid about his departure in a new interview with ET Online. The group's remaining members opened up about how they ended up becoming closer than before as a four-piece.

"I think in any field of work when you lose someone on your team, obviously it's hard, but the positive take on the situation is we felt we definitely got closer as a group," said Louis Tomlinson. "We sat down and spoke about it - this is something we all still want to do, so in the end we actually bonded together tighter, I think."

Louis added that Zayn's exit's no longer a big deal for him and the other boys. He admitted that the 22-year-old singer "did have different musical tastes, so that's fine."

Previously, Zayn revealed to The Fader that "there was never any room for me to experiment creatively in the band" because the music he always wanted to create never could never fit the music One Direction was required to record.

"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 f**k, 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," he said.

"I wasn't 100 percent behind the music," he added. "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."