Wayne Coyne Wants Billie Eilish to Cover The Flaming Lips

Let’s talk covers, shall we?

Wayne Coyne, frontman for The Flaming Lips, revealed that he would love to hear Billie Eilish cover one of his band’s albums. More specifically, though, Coyne said “who wouldn’t want to hear…Billie Eilish cover ‘Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots’?” The singer/songwriter for the Lips made this announcement in an interview with The Guardian while responding to curated fan questions.

Coyne also touched on the possibility of The Flaming Lips doing more cover songs themselves. “We’ve talked about doing Portishead’s first album (Dummy), and a record by the Silver Apples,” he said.

On a very different note, Coyne also discussed getting robbed at gunpoint as a teenager in Oklahoma. 

When a fan asked the frontman if his near-death experience influenced his avant-garde music, he responded, “I do think it made me less afraid to do things in the name of art. I now think: ‘what harm is going to happen if I make a bad record?’”

He continued to share how his experience of being robbed at gunpoint shaped his life. “Once you’ve stood with a gun to your head and thought: ‘well, I’m gonna die,’ the petty things don’t bother you. It definitely shaped my fierceness—if that’s the right word,” he said.

Coyne continued to discuss how growing up with robberies near him shaped his childhood. “I did get the feeling that these guys had robbed a couple of places, but all we saw was a brief police report. Aged 16, 17 I assumed everyone must nearly die two or three times growing up. Only later in life did I realize that’s not normal.”

You can catch The Flaming Lips in action at The Big Climate Thing Festival on September 16-18. Check out tickets for the festival HERE.

Photo credit: Blake Studdard/Warner Records