The four Oasis songs Noel Gallagher named as favourites: “Probably my favourite”
In 1994, Oasis opened their discography with the masterpiece debut album, Definitely Maybe. With quaking rock anthems and neopsychedelic excursions, the album posed an accessible summary of late 1980s indie and set a precedent for the ensuing Britpop wave. From here, the Gallagher brothers swaggered through the 1990s, developing their stadium-filling formula through a string of chart-busting singles.
As a hit-making machine, Oasis is primarily judged by its heavyweight sing-along anthems. After all, this is what Noel Gallagher does best. Whether it was the sentimental ‘Don’t Look Back in Anger’ or the foot-stomping ‘Supersonic’, Oasis never failed to incite a unifying rapture among their devoted fanbase during live performances.
Over the past three decades, the Gallaghers have been asked to name their favourite Oasis songs several times. Liam has always vehemently announced that ‘Live Forever’ was his favourite, but what about Noel?
When Noel sat down for an interview on the Australian TV programme The Project in 2021, he was asked the sacred question. “I mean, ‘The Best’ — I don’t know, but the most famous are ‘Don’t Look Back In Anger’ and ‘Wonderwall’,” Gallagher said. “They are the ones that everybody in the world seems to know. Whether they are the best? I don’t know. Everybody would have a personal opinion on that.”
In 2023, Noel appeared on GibsonTV for their ‘The Icons’ series and was asked the same question again. This time, he gave a comprehensive answer, assessing material from Oasis and the High Flying Birds. “The most important ones, I would probably say, are all Oasis ones,” Gallagher admitted. “But my favourite ones would be a little bit different, I think. ‘Black Star Dancing’ is one of my favourite things I’ve ever done, as is ‘Holy Mountain’.”
Moving onto his Oasis catalogue, Noel continued: “‘Live Forever’, because that was the song that changed it all. ‘Don’t Look Back In Anger’ because that’s become like part of the furniture.”
“Probably my favourite out of them all is ‘Supersonic’,” Gallagher claimed, reaching a conclusion. “Because I just wrote it on the spot, in the studio, in about a fucking hour, and recorded it that night in about four hours. It was Oasis’ first single, and it set us on the way. ‘[AKA…] What a Life’, ‘Riverman’, there’s some great stuff, you know? But because my stuff with Oasis is kind of worldwide, culturally significant, my High Flying Birds stuff, they’re always going to get compared to each other, which is unfair.”
While Noel’s choices may have changed over the years, he also has a soft spot for ‘The Masterplan’, the B-side to 1995’s ‘Wonderwall’. In a past interview, the songwriter lamented releasing the track as a B-side but was comforted by the song’s recognition in the 1998 compilation album The Masterplan.
“It’s one of my favourite of my songs because there are certain songs for me that are great, but then there’s a chosen few where you really fucking nail it,” he said. “The words, the melody, the structure, everything, all the playing’s brilliant. And that’s one of them.”
He added: “I remember being with [Creation Records manager] Alan McGee and going, ‘Look, you asked me to write a B-side, and that’s what I’ve come up with.’ And he went, ‘But it’s too good!’ But I was going, ‘But I don’t write shit songs!”
Noel Gallagher’s favourite Oasis songs:
- ‘The Masterplan’
- ‘Live Forever’
- ‘Supersonic’
- ‘Don’t Look Back In Anger’
