2 weeks Ago By Brendan Kelly, Montreal Gazette
Article content If you’re tired of Oasis, you’re tired of life. It’s impossible to think of a pop-music tour that’s generated as much buzz as the upcoming Oasis reunion, except for those stadium concerts featuring that somewhat popular artist Taylor Swift. Ever since the Gallagher brothers announced earlier this week that they were putting aside their differences and hitting the road for the first time in 15 years, it’s been the talk of the music world and you can’t be on social media without stumbling across endless comments about Manchester’s most famous hitmakers.
I think it’s super exciting, which you might think just makes me a rock fan of a certain age. But my 23-year-old son is just as pumped. This thing cuts across generations.
Partly that’s because Wonderwall is still a song that plays everywhere and with good reason — it really is one of the catchiest songs of the past few decades. When I was traveling across Ireland two summers back, it was quite literally on the set list of every single busker in the country (and there are buskers on every street corner). Sure Oasis had become something of a caricature — okay a full-blown comedy show — by the time Noel Gallagher said in 2009 that he could no longer work with super irritating younger brother Liam.
But those of us who were there at the beginning know just what a great rock’n’roll band they were to start with. If you have any interest in guitar-based rock, you already know that their first two albums, Definitely Maybe from 1994 and (What’s the Story) Morning Glory from the following year are classics, literally splitting at the seams with melodic bangers. Their first show in Montreal, in March 1995, at the old Club Soda on Parc Ave.
is one of those mythical local gigs, right up there with Nirvana at Les Foufounes électriques just days before Nevermind was released in September 1991. I hate to brag — okay I really quite enjoy bragging — but I was at both concerts and the Oasis gig was absolutely epic. My favourite memory of the night is Liam looking out contemptuously at the packed dance floor in front of the stage and muttering about how Montrealers don’t know how to dance.
The excitement around the reunion is definitely maybe because the Gallaghers are among the last genuine rock stars. They’re arrogant, they behave badly, they’ve ingested way too many drugs and guzzled too many drinks, and they live to be performing in front of gigantic crowds. The rock star is an endangered species, for better or worse.
Already in 1997, Noel was telling music critic Eric Siblin, in an interview for The Gazette, that he was bored by life in Oasis. And the albums following Morning Glory were never anywhere near as great as those first two. Early Oasis still matters because it was the sound and fury of working-class Britain, written, mostly by Noel, while the brothers were on the dole in Manchester.
It’s angry, obnoxious but it works because Noel has an uncanny knack for ear-worm melodies and stealing riffs you can’t quite place. Part of my excitement is due to the fact that Liam was absolutely riveting when he played Osheaga seven years ago, the same weekend he dropped by McKibbin’s Irish Pub to jam with a couple of musicians there. Duncan MacTavish, who was a music promoter here back when Oasis was starting out, wrote me this week from London, England where he’s been living for ages and he wondered aloud why he was seeing so much grumbling from Canadian fans about Oasis.
He made an interesting comparison, saying the Oasis comeback is akin to The Tragically Hip re-forming, if Gord Downie was still with us. “The same Canadian demographic would be doing back-flips,” said MacTavish. “The similarity between the two bands and what they meant to their fans is identical.
While the Hip offered storytelling around Canadian life and the human condition, Oasis offered up themes driven by working-class struggles and dreams that gave hope fuelled by defiance. Both offered shows that reached the top rows of the venues they played. And both had anthems that were sung in the streets as people went home from the shows.
And both bands created songs that are ingrained in their home country’s culture.” Another friend, David Ferguson, chef/owner of happening Petite Patrie resto Gus, also wrote to ask where I stood on the Oasis reunion. He’s not Team Oasis.
“I always found their music pedestrian and all sounding the same,” wrote Ferguson. “And not relevant now.” He went to make the valid point that they really haven’t had such a big influence.
“If you look at other bands, like Radiohead, you see their impact,” said Ferguson. “Nirvana is killing it with Gen Z. For the record, I just asked one of my cooks, who’s 18, if he’d ever heard of Oasis.
He asked, ‘You mean the juice?’ We said ‘the band.’ He said ‘nope.'” Well tickets go on sale Saturday for the Oasis Live ’25 Tour of the U.
K. and Ireland and I’m saying here you can expect Taylor Swift-like Internet-breaking to ensue even if the young cook from Gus doesn’t know them from a hole in the Wonderwall. bkelly@postmedia.
com x.com/brendanshowbiz.
