Phil Collins has been making the media rounds in the lead-up to his induction into the Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame as a solo artist next month. (He’s already in there as a member of Genesis.) The latest stop on the circuit was Friday’s episode of Piers Morgan Uncensored, during which he discussed Donald Trump, Oasis, Taylor Swift, Paul McCartney, and more.
Collins’ thoughts on the United States factor significantly into the interview. At the 26:40 mark, when Morgan asks about his songwriting process, Collins suggests he jots down ideas all the time in the hopes that they’ll germinate into new tunes. “I’ve got a song that’s waiting to be written called ‘Fat People With Guns,’ which is about America,” he explains. “And I’ll just write that phrase down so I don’t forget it. And at some point I might — before somebody else does now — I might write a song around it.”
He jumps back into the subject of America at the 36:25 mark. When Morgan asks what Collins thinks of President Donald Trump, Collins replies, “Not a lot.” He recalls watching Trump being interviewed by a prosecutor in the E. Jean Carroll rape lawsuit and finding, “His whole manner is unattractive. Even when he’s saying he did nothing. I think because historically presidents have been eloquent and elegant. You feel like even if you don’t agree with them, you still respect them. But when someone like Trump is as nasty as he is, you end up feeling dislike from him.”
Collins goes on to cite Robert DeNiro’s disdain for the current American enterprise, noting his fear about the state of the country’s governance. “He plays politics like a businessman,” Collins continues. “And it’s not really a business at all. It’s diplomacy. Sometimes you can lose but still come out winning, if you know what I mean. But he sees everything as a deal won or lost. And I think it’s [a] very scary time. It wouldn’t surprise me if he just tries to overrule the two-term rule.”
After nearly dying due to alcohol abuse in early 2024, Collins announced that summer that he was working on his first new music in 20 years, but in early 2025 he revealed he was too sick to make new music. He gave an update on his progress to the Sodajerker podcast over the summer, noting, “I’ve got some things that are finished” and “I’ve got a lot of ideas.” He hasn’t released an original song since the soundtrack to the 2003 Disney movie Brother Bear. He also reiterated to Morgan that he can’t play drums anymore, which has been well established for years. He revealed over the summer that he won’t perform at his Rock Hall induction, although his health has improved.
Also being inducted into the Rock Hall this year are Oasis, whose Noel Gallagher called Collins the antichrist back in the ’90s and can be seen in archival footage from the pre-Definitely Maybe era announcing, “I want the severed head of Phil Collins in my fridge by the end of this decade.” Collins has spoken on the conflict intermittently over the years, and this summer he said he’s looking forward to running into Oasis at the ceremony. At the 39:28 mark in the Morgan interview, the subject of Oasis comes up. Collins says when he sees Noel, “I’m gonna be quite jovial, quite nice to him.” But does he like Oasis’ music? “Not particularly. I prefer to listen to the Beatles.” He continues, “Mick Jagger once said, when someone asked him, ‘What do you think of U2?’ he said, ‘I don’t think of U2.’ And I think that’s really what I think about Oasis.”
As for the band that made him famous, at the 46-minute mark, Collins identifies his favorite Genesis song as “Apocalypse In 9/8.” His daughter Lily Collins’ favorite Genesis song is “pass.” At 48:05 there’s an obligatory discussion of Taylor Swift, who covered Collins’ version of “Can’t Stop Loving You,” calling it “literally the most sad, beautiful song ever.” Collins, who recently identified Swift’s “White Horse” as one of his own all-time favorites. He then says he wishes he’d written Bonnie Raitt’s “I Can’t Make You Love Me.” (Phil, check out our oral history!)
Finally, at the 50:54 mark, he talks about ending his feud with Paul McCartney, which stemmed from a passage in Collins’ 2016 memoir Not Dead Yet describing their conflict at Buckingham Palace in the run-up to the 2002 Queen’s Jubilee concerts:
I had a first edition Hunter Davis book, which was really quite rare. I’d been given it by Jill, Lily’s mom, and I took it to the rehearsal so Paul could sign it. So I was sitting on the side of the stage, and Paul came up with Heather Mills, who he was married to at that point. And I said, “Paul, could you sign this?” And he said, “Oh yeah. Yeah.” And he probably didn’t mean it like it sounded, but he said, “He’s a big Beatle fan is our little Phil.” And I thought, “You asshole.” I couldn’t help it. It’s what I thought.
And I probably made more of it than he meant. And I did make more of it. But when I was writing the book, and I wanted to write about how I felt about certain things… I knew Paul. This wasn’t the first time I’d met him. I’d played on one of his albums. I’d played live with him at the Prince’s Trust. And I’d given him an award at an awards show in London. So I kinda knew him, you know. So I was kinda surprise at that particular tone of reply.
McCartney came across an interview about the book where Collins described this interaction, and he wrote Collins an email describing the account as “sanctimonious,” to which Collins never replied. But a couple months ago McCartney reached out to request Collins’ phone number. He called for advice about donating items to a charity auction, then brought up the altercation, which spurred Collins to apologize for making it a thing. “Obviously this had been bugging him,” Collins says. “Because he likes to be liked, as we all do. Maybe him more than some other people.”
The full interview is viewable below.
