TV & Film
Shaun Ryder baffles TV viewers with ‘bizarre’ UFO encounter story
He stressed that his first encounter happened before he’d experienced hallucinogenics
Shaun Ryder amused the nation this week when opening up about his questionable UFO encounters.
Sitting down with Phil and Holly on ITV’s This Morning yesterday, the Happy Monday’s frontman revealed that he has encountered a number of real-life UFOs throughout his lifetime. A questionable claim coming from the lead singer of one of the most prominent bands from the Madchester era, I know.
But the fifty-nine year old spoke with confidence when he told the hosts about his first ever encounter, which happened at the age of fifteen when he was working as a delivery boy. Probably sensing their scepticism, he assured Phil and Holly that this was years before he’d ‘encountered hallucinogenics’.
Speaking of his second sighting, which occurred in 2013 when he was making a UFO documentary of all things, he said: “I looked out in my back garden and over my apple tree was this big plastic air fix looking wobbly thing that looked like it was hanging in the air on strings because it was moving.
“I’m slapping myself stupid… The way you describe it sounds like the Del Boy of aliens, some ramshackle air fix thing around a tree. How did that get from the far flung corners of the universe?
“To me, it looked like it was made out of plastic.”
And, just when you thought the whole segment couldn’t get any more ridiculous, Shaun then took part in the show’s UFO call-in, where he spoke with members of the public about their own extra-terrestrial sightings.
People branded the episode as ‘TV gold’, with many taking to Twitter to express their joy over Shaun’s ‘comforting’ appearance. One person wrote: “Shaun Ryder hosting a phone in about UFO’s on This Morning seems quite comforting and normal all things considered.”
Another commented: “With the country being in a state of chaos and uncertainty right now, it’s quite comforting to hear Shaun Ryder share his UFO experiences. Gives me a sense of enormous well being.”
And this isn’t the first time the musician has caused on stir with his television appearances: earlier this year, he threw friend and former bandmate Bez under the bus by claiming he once turned down an evening with actress Julia Roberts because ‘he had other options’ and had ‘never heard of her.’
Ouch.