Matty Healy Appears To Apologize During Concert Amid Reported Taylor Swift Split

The 1975 singer spray painted the word ‘sorry’ while opening up a show for his band in Dublin, Ireland, and it sparked many responses from fans online.

Matty Healy, 34, got his fans’ attention when he appeared to apologize during a recent gig in Dublin, Ireland. The singer, who reportedly recently split from Taylor Swift, was filling the opening spot for his band, The 1975‘s show, after the original opener, Caroline Polachek, had to pull out due to an illness, and gave the crowd a bit of performance art. After he walked around the stage at St. Anne’s Park for a bit, he eventually stood in front of a white backdrop and proceeded to spray paint the word “Sorry” in big letters as his bandmate Jamie Squire sang a cover of Leon Russell‘s “A Song For You.”

@sgrly

Sorry? #attheirverybesttour #mattyhealy1975 #the1975

♬ original sound – S

After stepping back for a moment and examining what he painted, Matty walked back up to the white backdrop and added a question mark after the word as the crowd cheered. He wore a black jacket, jeans, black boots, and headphones over his ears during the memorable moment and seemed to be taking in everything that was going on. He didn’t explain why he wrote “Sorry?” but didn’t really need to as many people speculated reasons after several clips of his time on stage made their way online.

Some online users speculated that he could be apologizing to Taylor, whom he was romantically linked to from early May until early June, while others thought he was apologizing to his critics, who have publicly called him out for some of his past controversial comments about various issues and people. One of the most talked about comments was one he made in 2016, two years after he was first rumored to date Taylor and seven years before he reportedly really started dating Taylor. The open and honest musician, who was recently spotted at several of Taylor’s Eras Tour shows, admitted he feared losing himself in a relationship, especially if it was someone as famous as the “Lover” singer.

“If I had gone out with Taylor Swift I would’ve been, ‘F****** hell! I am not being Taylor Swift’s boyfriend,’” he said during an interview with Q magazine (via Entertainment Tonight). “You know, ‘F*** THAT.’ That’s also a man thing, a de-masculinating, emasculating thing.”

His words brought on backlash, which included him being labeled “misogynistic,” shortly after he said them and again this year, when he and Taylor were seemingly dating. The talented musician took to Twitter and explained his words in a series of now-deleted tweets, just days after the interview went public. “Now I may admit to being an idiot on occasion, but I am not a misogynist,” he wrote on March 18, 2016. “This suggestion makes me really sad.”

“I was for a very short time immersed in a celebrity world that I found confusing and scary,” he continued. “At that time, I had fears of being ‘somebody’s boyfriend’ (remember this is all speculation as we never dated!) before even being recognized for my music or presence as a person in my own right. Now I don’t pride myself on being more intelligent, or worldly, or wise, or progressive, or even regressive than the next man but I DO pride myself on being honest.”

“I was being HONEST about all the thoughts, feelings, and situations that come along when people ASSUME you are dating the most famous woman on the planet. I am telling you from experience it’s an all-consuming whirlwind and something that for me elicited a lot of self-exploration,” he concluded.