The three Oasis songs Noel Gallagher considered “everything I wanted to say”
Is it musically cheating to say that Oasis has a signature sound? I mean, if your signature sound just involves taking your favourite records from classic rock and playing them again, can it really be yours or just a love letter to your influences? Sure, Oasis has been guilty of pulling from one too many people in the past, but Noel Gallagher considered three songs the most indicative of what the Britpop legends are all about.
When the band first got started, though, it wasn’t clear whether they would have been going for more than a few days, let alone still be relevant for years at a time. They had their booming live sound, but it probably isn’t promising when you’re playing a juggernaut like ‘Columbia’, and people start filing out of the club before the song’s even over.
Once Noel started to really dive into writing songs, ‘Rock and Roll Star’ was the thesis statement for the rest of their career. The song had the same swagger that usually came out of 1960s rock, and while Noel may have written every word, no one could have delivered the track quite like Liam, having the menacing tone in his voice that ripped through everyone’s speakers.
Noel didn’t just want to talk about being a rock and roll star all the time. A song like ‘Cigarettes and Alcohol’ may have said more about the band than even Noel probably wanted to admit, but it wasn’t until he sat down to write the song ‘Live Forever’ that everything changed. Sounding like a long-lost Beatles song, this was Noel’s masterpiece not named ‘Wonderwall’, assuring himself and his bandmates that the songs would far outweigh any of them.
As far as Noel was concerned, those three songs are the real core behind what Oasis was all about, saying, “I’ve pretty much summed up everything I wanted to say in ‘Rock ‘n’ Roll Star,’ ‘Live Forever’ and ‘Cigarettes & Alcohol,’ after that, I’m repeating myself, but in a different way”. If that’s all he wanted to say, he’s made a pretty penny out of lyrically phoning it in for the rest of his career.
Throughout What’s the Story Morning Glory, Noel grew exponentially as a songwriter, putting together melodies that suited the songs perfectly, like ‘Don’t Look Back In Anger’. Then again, if ‘Champagne Supernova’ was any indication, his lyrics took a slightly more psychedelic slant for the next few years, usually telling a story or just filling out whatever he needed to fill the verse.
Still, all three of those Definitely Maybe tracks have held up over the years. Some of the production may sound a bit dated, all things considered, but no one’s going to ever get tired of songs about living the life of a rock star or wanting to run as fast as you can to make sure your name is remembered long after you’re gone.
That might be down to the band’s debut being much more punk rock than anything they made afterwards. It may have been bold of them to call their shots as one of the greatest bands to walk the Earth, but that kind of narcissistic naivety hasn’t really lost its lustre 30 years after the fact.
