During a promotional interview in September, the month before the album was released, Noel spoke about the rivalry with Damon Albarn and Alex James from Blur, and was quoted in 17 September edition of "The Observer" saying he hoped "the pair of them would catch AIDS and die because I fucking hate them two." Although Noel recanted and said that AIDS is no laughing matter, the quote caused a storm of controversy, with Noel having to write a letter of apology; he later confessed that "my whole world came crashing down in on me then". However, in an interview with "The Guardian" in 2005, Blur's guitarist Graham Coxon explained that he bore no malice towards Oasis. "At least they were outright about it. They weren't pretending to like us and then slagging us off, which is what we'd been used to. In that way, I quite appreciated them."