Wayne Coyne: ‘Once you’ve had a gun to your head, petty things don’t bother you’

I have a seagull nesting outside my kitchen window. It seems quite chilled, so I’ve been playing some music to help it cope with impending motherhood. Which Flaming Lips album best complements the seagull birthing cycle? Cleggatemyhamster

Gosh, it’s hard to say, because not many of our albums are mellow all the way through. If I was a seagull, maybe I’d find The Terror comforting. It’s got a warm hum, a bit like a refrigerator. My wife is pretty mellow, so when she gave birth, we didn’t listen to anything specific. I’d put the Alexa speaker on her pregnant stomach and sing to the baby, although I’ve no idea if they care when they’re in there.

What is the biggest animal you could clingfilm to a lamp-post with no help and no brute force? I reckon a giraffe. JAMIEOH

A small elephant? I wouldn’t recommend wrapping any live animal to a post. We did use a dead pig’s head the very first time we played Los Angeles, in 1985. We put a wire through its ears and my younger brother Mark – the singer at the time – wore it like a necklace. We did it again in Dallas a week later and had to carry it in a portable icebox so it wouldn’t get too smelly.

What’s going through your mind when you roll around in your giant hamster ball? Do you roll around in it every day? What happens if you need the toilet? hhhhssss, DeJongandtherestless and LeaderOfTheFree

I don’t use it around the house because it’s too big to fit through the door, but I do rehearse in it in the yard. On stage, I’m still self-conscious that everybody is looking at me, so when I’m in my space bubble, I feel more relaxed, even though it’s sweaty. You can last about three hours before you run out of air – we’ve tested.

I don’t know if it’s adrenaline, but you rarely need to pee on stage. It’s the same with sneezing: your fight-or-flight mechanism kicks in. There’s only been a couple of times I’ve had to perform with diarrhoea, yet I’m still to sing half a set then shit my pants. I remember Lollapalooza, 1994, where Nick Cave – with his great baritone roar – was struggling. We joked that he’d better really clamp down on the loud notes. I noted his performance was a little more reserved; not his insanely manic self. I asked him afterwards: “Did anything slip out?” but he said no.

What’s the most surprising thing you’ve seen at one of your gigs? JallenDM

We used to carry 25 furry costumes with us; we had 12 or 13 people dancing on each side of the stage. One couple asked if they could pee inside the costumes. I thought: “Of all the weird things you can ask of the world, that’s fairly harmless.”

What other album might you like to cover? Pacifico

Since I’ve had my own studio at my house, we’ve done the Beatles’ Sgt Pepper, Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon, the Stone Roses’ debut … We’ve talked about doing Portishead’s first album, and a record by the Silver Apples. Who would I most like to cover a Flaming Lips album? Well, who wouldn’t want to hear the Beatles do Soft Bulletin, Radiohead do American Head, or Billie Eilish cover Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots?

What were the expressions on your record company’s faces when you suggested Gummy Song Skull: four songs on a USB drive buried inside a gummy skull? thecristeainstitute

We also embedded a USB drive inside an actual human skull; 14 were made available. You can’t buy human skulls unless you’re a doctor or something, but this distributor guy here in Oklahoma City owed me a favour. We were between contracts with Warner Bros, so we did the most wacko stuff possible, simply because we didn’t have to get permission.

You recorded my mathematician husband, Thorsten Wörmann, as the voice from beyond on your 2009 album, Embryonic. As you know, he passed in 2019. I just wanted to say that working with you was one of his life’s highlights. Thanks for giving him, and me, that super memory. AmiAbroad

He was so gracious and vocal as to how much he was enjoying it at the time, which was a great relief because you never know what people think. It’s such a beautiful, bizarre record, so his voice really adds to those six or seven tracks. I did know that he’d been ill, so it’s wonderful to hear from you, Mrs Wörmann. Thank you so much for sending in your question.

We were also robbed at Hemi’s Pizza – around the corner from Long John Silver’s seafood restaurant in Oklahoma – where three guys held you up at gunpoint as a teenager. Did your near-death experience contribute to your desire to go avant garde? Steve1us and favrion23

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?” Once you’ve stood with a gun to your head and thought: “Well, I’m…