Kliph Scurlock discusses his departure from The Flaming Lips, says he was fired

02 May 2014, 18:47 | Written by Robby Ritacco

(News)

(The Flaming Lips)

One month back, it was announced that long-time Flaming Lips drummer Kliph Scurlock had left the band. Now, Scurlock has stated that he was in fact fired from the band by frontman Wayne Coyne for openly criticizing Christina Fallin (a friend of Coyne and daughter of Oklahoma governor Mary Fallin). Specifically, Scurlock spoke out against her attitude toward Native American culture.

Back on 6 March, Fallin posted a photo of herself in a Native American headdress to Instagram. After receiving some social media blowback, she and her band Pink Pony issued an official statement apologizing, asking that Oklahoma’s Native American community “forgive us if we innocently adorn ourselves in your beautiful things.”

In early April, The Flaming Lips officially announced that Scurlock was leaving the band. Talks of tension between Scurlock and Coyne over Fallin’s media backlash and her subsequent apology spread across various blogs and forums, but still no official reason for the departure was announced.

Now, Scurlock has spoken to Indian Country Today Media Network about the incident, stating that he “was fired for telling Christina to go fuck herself after her lame-ass ‘apology’ when people got upset at her stupid headdress photo.”

Of course, there’s a lot more discourse involved in this situation. For more info, check out the Indian Country Today piece here as well as a timeline and roundup of the relevant details from Gawker here.

Update: Scurlock has sent Pitchfork a more detailed account on the situation, which you can read on their site here.

Update (again): Lips members Wayne Coyne and Steven Drozd have responded on Twitter, with Drozd (@stevendrozd) tweeting “This Lips/Kliph bullshit has gone too far. We parted ways because of the usual band musical differences. The rest has been blown way out” and Coyne (@waynecoyne) tweeting the image below.