Wayne Coyne Apologizes to the Arcade Fire

Wayne Coyne Apologizes to the Arcade Fire
After launching perhaps the biggest indie rock feud of 2009 so far, head Flaming Lip Wayne Coyne has made an apology of sorts to Arcade Fire.

As previously reported, Coyne laid into the Montreal band back in March, telling Rolling Stone that Arcade Fire are "pricks, so fuck 'em." Arcade Fire front-man Win Butler responded with a pretty level-headed retort (which included lines like "I hope I was less of a 'prick' then telling Rollingstone that a bunch of people I don't know at all are really assholes") and now Coyne has provided his own little retraction.

In a recent interview with Entertainment Weekly, Coyne said he wished the incident "never happened," adding that "I didn't necessarily mean it about the people in the Arcade Fire. I meant it about the guys that were running their stages at a couple of festivals. I wish whatever had been said wouldn't have been taken as such a defiant statement from the Flaming Lips, because it wasn't."

When asked if Coyne would care to apologize to Arcade Fire, he replied, "I would. I really feel bad about it. I like enough of their music. The idea that I'm somehow against them... I'm not!"

As Pitchfork points out, Coyne's defence of "I was talking about the dudes running their stages" does come across as a little odd, considering he originally said, "Whenever I've been around them, I've found that they not only treated their crew like shit, they treated the audience like shit." However, even a little retraction is better than no retraction.