Time Flies.

It’s hard to believe Oasis have called it a day. Their impact on revitalising rock in the UK can’t be underestimated. For fifteen years they never failed to entertain. Along the way they released some cracking albums, namely Definitely Maybe and (What’s The Story) Morning Glory? Don’t Believe The Truth was a late period return to form, and their last, Dig Out Your Soul, wasn’t far behind it. The possible clunker in the cannon could be the third album, Be Here Now. Possibly the most anticipated British album in thirty years, it still polarises fans. Some see it as long winded and over long, others feel the record has revealed a certain charm with the passing of time. As the band call it quits they’ve released a collection of singles, Time Flies 1994  -  2009. You can spring for the twin CD, buy a DVD companion or fork out for the mini-box set which includes two CDs, a DVD of the clips and the band’s last hurrah at London’s Roundhouse on July 21 2009. To celebrate the release we’ve dug through the archives and found this interview with Noel Gallagher that was done shortly before the band’s ill-fated trip to Brisbane in 1998. Liam, allegedly, head-butted a fan in Brisbane and the gig was a shocker with the front man leaving early. The music still sounds great: so enjoy this blast from the past with the ‘Chief’.

After a couple of false starts, the Oasis circus has finally made it to town, touring on the back of their third album, Be Here Now. The album, depending on who you talk to, has sold up to eight million copies worldwide. Despite their personal antics and boorish behaviour, the group is still a big draw.

Noel Gallagher, who nurses an ego bigger than most, is the group’s epicentre. It’s Noel who writes the songs, produces the albums, and carries the grand vision. Apart from manipulating the mainstream media into falling prostate whenever he opens his mouth, Noel’s real gift is his way with a song. Under his belt already are such seminal nineties anthems as ‘Wonderwall’, ‘Live Forever’, and ‘Don’t Look Back In Anger’. He’s also been accused, more than once, of ‘liberating’ other people’s ideas. ‘Stand By Me’ from Be Here Now bears more than a passing resemblance to Bowie’s ‘All The Young Dudes’. There are many others, but don’t write Noel off too quickly. If songwriting was as simple as rehashing old ideas, every kid who ever strummed a tennis racquet would be chalking up number one singles. To his credit, whenever Gallagher has been charged with theft, he always pleads guilty.

"It’s an easy way for me not to talk about the music," he explains in his typical Manchester brogue. "I’m left-handed and I play the guitar right-handed, so I’m dyslexic. So when I write the lyrics, it’s only me that understands them. Someone else has to rewrite them and fill in the words. I find it hard. That’s why I never do guitar magazines. I haven’t got a fucking clue what I’m doing, so it’s easy for me to say I pinched it. It saves me doing interviews. I suppose I’m a bit shy in talking about it, really. I don’t know where it comes from. I think you can be too clever about music. I can’t play piano, but I’ve written about ten songs on piano."

"I think Be Here Now contains some of the best songs of the three albums we’ve done, but I think there’s great songs on all three of the albums. I don’t think there’s been a great album since Definitely Maybe, anyway. That, to me, was the last great British album."

Apart from the current single ‘All Around The World’, Noel wrote the bulk of Be Here Now in only a week. As yet, he hasn’t composed anything for a follow-up album, and can’t see himself writing much more than a note to the milkman before England’s spring of 1999 (after he’s enjoyed Christmas and watched the World Cup). Writing on the road is rarely an option. "I try not to, really. When you’re on the road, you’re never in the right frame of mind to write. I tend to gather ideas on the road. I haven’t been doing much lately; this has been our most intense tour with interviews and things. I’ve done more interviews on this tour than I’ve done in my life. Everyone else in the band is refusing to do them."

When Gallagher gets on a roll with a song, he likes to finish it quickly. If an idea doesn’t eventually morph into a fully-fledged song, Gallagher seldom keeps it around too long. "If a song takes more than two days to write, I’ll bin it. I won’t take two years to write a songfuck that. They either come really quickly, or they don’t come at all. There’s no point forcing these things." "The best time to write for me is when I first open my eyes in the morning. I’ve written some of my best things first thing in the morningthere’s all these things going through your mind. ‘Champagne Supernova’ started like that. ‘In the morning, you’ve had nothing to eat, you’re a bit sleepy, you haven’t watched the telly and you’ve had no time to be influenced by anything. It just comes straight off. You think about what you were dreaming about. I think ‘Some Might Say’ was written very early in the morning. ‘I hone things for about a month. Usually, I’ve got a load of music and a load of melodies, and then I start to write the words at the very end, really. I don’t really like writing lyrics."

Maybe lyrics aren’t his forte, but he did write: ‘Tomorrow never knows/what it doesn’t know too soon’. "I think it’s all about feel," he says of the process. "It’s about the way the song feels, as opposed to what the lyrics mean. It’s like ‘I Am The Walrus’, what does that mean? Absolutely fuck all, but you know what he’s going on about. In some ways, you know what he’s trying to say. I’m not academically trained, or anything like that. I think if I know what it means, everybody else is going to have a grasp at it. I’m as intelligent...or unintelligent as anybody else".

"I got my spark off music between the ages of nine and eighteen. That’s gone now. The only things that inspire me are magazines and television. I’m running out of things to be inspired by. Other people inspire me. Stand up comedians are usually good for lyrics."

For his own listening pleasure, Gallagher is currently grooving to late sixties psychedelic rock, early seventies punk, The Seeds (‘they invented punk rock in 1964’) and Iggy Pop’s seminal group The Stooges.

"We’ve just made a big complex rock record," he explains. "I suppose I’m just getting excited at listening to no overdubs on records. I’m listening to sound. On Be Here Now there must be at least seventeen tracks of guitars. It’s taking the piss, really." "I was twenty-nine when I recorded it - the fucking ego was going out of control. I’m in one of the biggest bands in the world, nobody was there to tell me to stop putting guitars on. I was producing the album as well. Looking back on it now, it’s a bit over the top - but I wouldn’t say it was a mistake".

"The songs are quite long as well. People were telling me I can’t have seven minute singles. You know, they won’t play them on the radio and all. I was drunk in the studio thinking how dare they, don’t they know who I am? I’m Noel Gallagher for Christ’s sake, they’ll play my records."

"I was a year younger. I was drunk and daft in the studio. That’s why all the songs are long. Next time I’ll be taking a more rational approach. I’ll probably get a producer to sit alongside me to tell me when to fuck off home."

Thanks Noel.

"Cheers, mate."

Oasis Time Flies 1994  -  2009 is out now through Sony.

By Sean Sennett

ENDS