Wayne Coyne Responds to Firing of Drummer Kliph Scurlock | Under the Radar | Music Blog for the Indie Music Magazine
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Wayne Coyne Responds to Firing of Drummer Kliph Scurlock

Scurlock a "Compulsive Pathological Liar"

May 09, 2014 The Flaming Lips

Back in March, longtime drummer for The Flaming Lips Kliph Scurlock exited the band. Last week, Scurlock submitted a lengthy and detailed letter to Pitchfork describing the events that inevitably brought about his departure. According to Scurlock, he was fired for criticizing Christian Fallin, the daughter Oklahoma Governor Mary Fallin, frontwoman for band Pink Pony, and a friend of Coyne, after she posted a photo of herself wearing a Native American headdress online. Scurlock’s account also stated that he “put up with endless verbal (with threats of physical) abuse from Wayne because I absolutely loved the music we were making and playing.”

In a newly published interview with Rolling Stone Coyne has spoken out against Scurlock accusations, calling his former bandmate a “compulsive pathological liar.” In the interview Coyne says “The only thing that we would have to say about Kliph leaving is that he just was not very significant to us. And all the things he’s saying about the reason he was fired, it’s all just made-up lies. He knows we struggled with him for years and it didn’t occur to us that it seemed that significant. I don’t even use the word “fired.” He just doesn’t play drums with us anymore – that’s the way I’d put it.”

Coyne added, “As time went on, he got to be a lazier and more close-minded musician. We didn’t ever really do that much with him. I mean, we would play shows, but he’s not creative. We never wrote songs together. He was a guy that we thought was, I guess, good enough technically that could do stuff in performance. But we know a lot of musicians, so it was not that big of a deal. Anybody who knows him knows what kind of a hateful person he is. I mean, anybody that looks at his stuff could see that most of the bands that we would play with, he despised them. To their face, he would say, ‘You guys were great’ and then 20 minutes later he’d get online and say, ‘These people are a bunch of fakes. They suck.’ That would be almost every band we ever played with. The more that time went on, people would pay more attention to him because of his connection to the Flaming Lips. The reason that it’s connected to the Fallin thing, it’s like, ‘If you’re going to be that hateful, you can’t be associated with the Flaming Lips.’ And that was one of a thousand things that he would go on his Twitter or Instagram or the fake ones that he’s created. That’s what he would do all the time. We would play a show with some bands and the next day, he would say how stupid they are and how much they suck. But after the Christina thing, people brought it to my attention, and it’s like, ‘Dude, he says bad shit about all of our friends.’”

You can read the full interview with Coyne here, where he also talks about the state the band, internet hate, and his upcoming collaborations.

(www.facebook.com/flaminglips)



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