The Oasis album Noel Gallagher admits “doesn’t f*cking stand up”
Following the meteoric success of Oasis’ album What’s The Story (Morning Glory), the group were swept up a wave of creative bliss. With confidence that any creation they put forward continue turning to gold, the Manchester band believed the highs would last forever. However, in the years following the release of their third album, Be Here Now, Noel Gallagher has disowned the material.
Most of the self-indulgent LP was written by Noel while he was on an A-list holiday at Mick Jagger’s villa in Mustique in 1997, joined alongside Johnny Depp and Kate Moss. At the time of recording Be Here Now, Oasis were firmly under the tabloid microscope and sought solace in substances to escape the chaos. However, their reliance on drugs only heightened their problems, but it did help them create the definitive cocaine album.
Ahead of the album release, Oasis released the head-turning lead single, ‘D’You Know What I Mean?’ which heightened the public’s anticipation further. Staggeringly, the record sold 424,000 copies on the first day of release alone in the United Kingdom, making it the fastest-selling album in British history.
Few albums divide opinion as much as Be Here Now, and Noel has been personally leading the hate campaign against the record. Speaking to Q in 2017, Gallagher explained his reasoning: “In the studio, it was great, and on the day it came out, it was great. It was only when I got on tour that I was thinking, ‘It doesn’t fucking stand up.'”
He continued: “I sat in the studio for a full week and the tapes didn’t grab me at all. Don’t get me wrong, I sign a shitload of those records every year,” he continued. “People are prepared to have stand-up rows with me in the street: ‘I fucking love that album!’ And I’m like, ‘Mate, look, I wrote the fucking thing. I know how much effort I put into it. It wasn’t that much.”
Meanwhile, in the documentary Return To Rockfield, Gallagher addressed the kind reviews Be Here Now received from the media, which he believed were undeserving. In his mind, the music critics were scared of another backlash after previously slating Oasis’ previous album and, as as result, didn’t want to repeat the same mistake.
Gallagher said: “I mean it goes to prove that really, journalists, they know fuck all. They had to second guess everything after Morning Glory, cos they’d got it so wrong. That’s why when Be Here Now came out, which isn’t a great album, it got 10/10 everywhere, it didn’t get one bad review, because they didn’t want to be made to look like dicks again, and they were, because it’s not half the record Morning Glory is. After that, they properly hated us after that, cos they didn’t understand us.”
One person who still adores Be Here Now is Liam Gallagher, who believes Noel only dislikes the album because it reminds him of his failed first marriage. The singer told Vulture: “I’m not bringing people up, but there are a lot of sheep out there, aren’t there? And if the main guy [Noel Gallagher] says, ‘Oh, it’s fucking this and that,’ a lot of people not using their own minds say, ‘Yeah, I agree.’ If Noel had said it’s the best thing ever, I’m sure it’d have gotten a different fucking reception. The reason why he didn’t like it is because it reminds him of a not-so-good time with his ex-wife. That’s fine. That’s his prerogative.”
There are flickerings of genius on Be Here Now, but the drop-off in quality from Oasis’ first two albums is stark. From this moment onward, the Mancunians could still produce the occasional magical track, but they sadly never made another classic album.
