One Direction? You're kidding. Coldplay? No, seriously. Here holding forth on hot topics of our times, the high-flying half of Oasis' fractious fraternity is GQ's Icon Of The Year
Ask Noel Gallagher whatever you want, and he'll tell you whatever he thinks. And upstairs at the Groucho - over three bowls of miniature sausages and a plate of chips - the 46-year-old is in full flight.
On One Direction: "F***ing idiots. Bless 'em. Bless 'em, but f*** 'em at the same time."
On backstage riders: "I've seen seeds in Coldplay's dressing room. F***ing seeds! Where's the parrot?"
On radio promos: "Why have I got to be there at seven in the morning? Who's listening at f***ing seven in the morning? C***s, that's who's."
On the Brit Awards: "You can be sat at a table with a load of people from an insurance company. 'Where you from? Classical label?', 'No. AIG.' 'Well, what the f*** are you doing here?'"
Rock star, philosopher, multi-million-selling, Ivor Novello Award-winning songwriter - and slightly grumpy dad - Noel Gallagher is GQ's Icon Of The Year.
Danny: Noel. You're completely in charge. What's the first commandment in the Church of Gallagher? A rule we'd all have to live by?
Noel: [Long pause, thinking.] People shouldn't start work before 10 o'clock in the morning. People shouldn't work weekends unless they work in the service industry and they're getting paid double time. Thou Shalt Not Work Weekends. I don't like workaholics. Don't f***ing trust them. Why are they working? I don't trust busy c***s. That's how wars start: busy f***ers. If terrorism had a weekend off, eventually they'd have a year off. Eventually they'd go, "F*** this - blowing up shit? Football's on." Thou shalt not be arsed.
What would you ban?
I don't like litter. I like that Singapore thing. You know - you get caught dropping litter you get your head chopped off. I'd have a bin on every street corner. If you're going to buy a doughnut, eat the f***ing doughnut. Don't have a bite and then chuck it on the floor. Eat the f***ing doughnut.
Who would you ban?
The root of all that is bad in the world. All religious and political preachers.
Isn't your wife religious?
She has been known to attend church.
That's one of the first signs.
I've never seen her do it. But you know when you see these people standing on soapboxes banging on about religion or politics, or worse - when they're combining the f***ing two? Really? If you're thinking that anything written in a book 2,000 years old bears any relevance to anything these days...
What would be our Bible, then?
I only read factual books. I can't think of... I mean, novels are just a waste of f***ing time. I can't suspend belief in reality... I just end up thinking, 'This isn't f***ing true.' I like reading about things that have actually happened. I'm reading this book at the minute - The Kennedy Tapes. It's all about the Cold War, the Cuban Missile Crisis - I can get into that. Thinking, 'Wow, this actually f***ing happened, they came that close to blowing the world up!' But... what f***ing winds me up about books...
This is already the best sentence I've ever heard.
...is, like... my missus will come in with a book and it will be titled - and there's a lot of these, you can substitute any word, it's like a Rubik's Cube of shit titles - it'll be entitled The Incontinence Of Elephants. And I'll say "What's that book about?" And she'll say, "Oh it's about a girl and this load of f***ing nutters..." Right... so it's not about elephants, then? Why the f*** is it called The Incontinence Of Elephants? Another one: The Tales Of The Clumsy Beekeeper. What's that about? "Oh it's about the French Revolution." Right, f*** off. If you're writing a book about a child who's locked in a f***ing cupboard during the f***ing Second World War... he's never seen an elephant. Never mind a f***ing giraffe.
Why are album titles different? Why don't you call yours Some Songs That I've Written, then?
Because people who write and read and review books are f***ing putting themselves a tiny little bit above the rest of us who f***ing make records and write pathetic little songs for a living.
Thing is, I write books, and...
Hey. I know you write books and all that shit. I'm just saying. The winner of the Pulitzer Prize [for fiction]. What a c***. Whoever that is, has got to be. I don't get it. Book sellers, book readers, book writers, book owners - f*** all of them.
Book owners?
Yeah. And I own books! But about shit that happened. That's what I'm talking about. Fifty Shades Of Grey? Fifty shades of s****. I'm not having it. Novels... how could you read that? Do you write novels? Don't tell me you write novels.
I've written a novel.
What was it about?
About a guy who sees a girl...
Here we go. Already the shittest book of all time.
...and he finds her camera and...
But you know that doesn't happen in real life! You know that never happens! Sounds like that film about the yellow Rolls Royce.
What's the film about the yellow Rolls Royce?
It's about a yellow Rolls Royce that's passed down through the ages. Becomes a Nazi staff car. Ends up in a garage in f***ing Chippenham.
It's not exactly like that.
Please don't tell me it's called The Tale Of The F***ing Amateur Beekeeper.
It's called Squirrels In June.
You f***ing c***. You're not trying to tell me you called it Squirrels In June, are you?
No, I didn't call it that. But do you like films?
Yeah, I love films.
But films aren't real. Do you sit watching them thinking, "Oh, this didn't happen"?
Well, you've presented me with a dilemma there. But, say, my favourite film, The Good, The Bad And The Ugly... now, that might've happened. The American Civil War - that happened. I guess I don't have the chip in the brain that allows me to... like, if I was to read the book of The Good, The Bad And The Ugly, I don't want to have to invent the character Clint Eastwood plays... I want to just watch him.
You want all the work done for you.
Too f***ing right. Novels and the people who write them, like I say, are putting themselves a few rungs above the rest of us. They're purporting to be intellectual, and... for you to write a book, is for you to say, "I am better than you." My 68 million records beat your one book.
Your album's over in 45 minutes.
Yeah! Done! In and out, put the kettle on. There's just a lot of time devoted to the reviewing and reading of books. More man-hours are devoted to reading about books - not even reading books.
So, as with Hitler, books are out. What would be your idea of hell?
One of your book signings. Or actually, if someone was caught not taking it easy - "You were seen working late on a Friday!" - I would make them listen to Radio 1. Pretty f***ing dreadful. The music is... I can't get my head round pop music [right now]. It all sounds the same. It's all on the same frequency. It all seems designed to aggravate my teeth. You know music that makes your teeth hurt? There's a lack of... soul on Radio 1. I mean, what is going to be the future of chart music? I don't understand it. It's when radio stations start focus groups. They literally go outside their building and ask people walking by, "If I played you this song, what would you think?" and all that. Don't ask the man on the street! He's a c***! That's why he's the man on the street, not the man in the expensive restaurant eating f***ing mini sausages at four in the afternoon! There's great records coming out this year you're not going to hear on theradio. Temples. Jagwar Ma. Great stuff, but it's on a lower level. It's not on the battleground. You have to be in that world to hear it.
And groups like One Direction...
Banal pop music, like One Direction, say... what I think is: everybody's winning out of it. One Direction aren't working in the local f***ing Costcutter, so they're winning. The geezer who's writing the f***ing shit tunes - he's winning. He doesn't even have to leave the studio. He's got f***ing new houses coming out of his ear holes. The record company are winning - 'cos they're all getting their f***ing bonuses at Christmas. The young 12-year-old girls are winning because one day they might actually grow up to give one of them a blow job. They're all winning. No one's losing! The only people who are losing are idiots like me at 9.30 in the morning when you're trying to get the kids out the door for school, and they're f***ing murdering one of Blondie's songs.
Speaking of family, what does your mum think about you and Liam not speaking at the moment?
She's not arsed. We spoke about it once and that's it. How can you be bothered about two grown men in their forties who don't speak to each other? What's she going to do? Order me to call my brother?
Do you miss your nephews, though?
Well, I miss, I guess... when [Oasis] were together, we spent so much time touring that outside of that I never used to see anyone from the band. And I'm not really the jolly uncle type. I'm a loner. A lone wolf. I'd have made a brilliant assassin. Sniper. Sitting in a tree for four months on the off chance. I enjoyed being in a group. But I was never a part of it. I was always off to one side.
Liam was in the papers recently because he tried to ride a dog in a pub.
Liam's got a touch of the Red Indian in him when he has a drink. When the Europeans went to America, they got the Red Indians pissed and bought Alaska off them for a f***ing milk-bottle top. "Wahoo! Firewater!" There's a bit of that in Liam when he's drunk. "Wahey! Let's have a go on that dog!"
Not you, though?
I'm all right when I'm drunk. I wouldn't ride an animal though.
And in this brave new world, who would you build a statue of? Who is the Icon's icon?
It's Les Dawson. You forget how funny he f***ing was. You've heard his jokes so many times before. "Wife's run off with the bloke next door... God, I miss him." Les Dawson, man. Absolute stitches...
Originally published in the October 2013 edition of British GQ.
Source: www.gq-magazine.co.uk
Andy Bell