Lewis Capaldi denied there is any bad blood between him and Taylor Swift after speculation of tension arose when they both appeared on The Graham Norton Show earlier this year.
Capaldi, 29, set the record straight on KIIS FM’s “Kyle and Jackie O Show” on Thursday, December 11, after cohost Jackie “O” Henderson referenced the U.K. talk show saga. In October, Swift appeared on Graham Norton to promote her recently released album, The Life of a Showgirl, while Capaldi performed his single “Something in the Heavens.”
Capaldi’s new EP was also set to drop at the time, but when Norton asked him about it at the time, the singer replied, “Uh, yeah, I was told I wasn’t allowed to talk about it.”
After the episode aired, TikTok users speculated that Swift and her team had something to do with Capaldi not being “allowed” to talk about his music so as not to steal the spotlight from the “Opalite” singer.
“I’ll use a word here. That’s hogwash,” Capaldi said as he addressed the rumor on the radio show on Thursday. “I saw a TikTok about that. And it’s a woman being like, ‘Taylor did this, and she’s evil,’ and this and that. And I’m going like, ‘That’s completely made up.’”
Capaldi also shared the real reason behind his hesitancy to discuss his music on Graham Norton — and it had nothing to do with Swift.
“Basically, my EP hadn’t been announced yet. So, I was told by my label, ‘Don’t tell people before you go on,’” he explained. “Not like a, ‘You can’t tell people.’ It was like, ‘It’s not been announced yet, so don’t tell people.’ And then we went on Graham Norton, and Graham said, ‘You’ve got this new EP coming out.’ And I was like, ‘Oh, I thought I wasn’t meant to mention it.’”
Capaldi went on to explain how Swift innocently got roped into the ordeal by making an innocuous comment.
“Then I think because Taylor had asked, ‘Who said that?’ I think people thought, well … the TikTok I saw was a woman, some lady speculating,” he said. “So, I think she thought that was what [Swift] was thinking. But that was complete bulls***. I can swear. It was complete f***ing bulls***.”
During the interview, Capaldi also gave an update on his relationship with Justin Bieber after the pair previously hit it off at a party in Los Angeles before the “Lonely” singer “ghosted” him.
“Double tapped me. Which is fine. I’m fine with that,” Capaldi said before joking, “I haven’t thought about it every single day since.”
The “Someone You Loved” singer joked he was “needy” when it came to his potential friendship with Bieber.
“I became anxiously attached to Justin Bieber,” he continued. “Everyone else I’d avoid. But for Justin, I was needy. I needed that. But, yeah, I haven’t heard from him. I don’t know if he’s seen the thing. Listen, if I’m Justin Bieber and I got a text from Lewis Capaldi, I’m double tapping. I’m not responding.”
He concluded, “But we’ll always have that magical night together. We’ll always have that moment.”
