Q&A With Tony McCarroll In Manchester Later This Month With All Funds Donated To The Salford Lads Club
Date: Sunday 24th November 24th at 18:00
40 early bird tickets at £25 on sale now! (Remaining 60 tickets will be £30).
£150 VIP Option includes a personally signed skin and sticks from Tony and front row seats.
Note – The Q&A is at 6pm but the club will be open from 1pm with various bands and entertainment, including a Manchester Music Exhibition in the main hall.
For more details click here.
Tickets Go On General Sale Today For Oasis' South American Tour
Santiago, Chile – 11am local time CLT
Buenos Aires, Argentina – 12pm local time ART
The venues and dates are
Estadio Nacional, Santiago, Chile - 19th November
Estadio MorumBIS, São Paulo, Brazil - 22nd/23rd November
On This Day In Oasis History...
On November 13th 2000, Oasis released 'Familiar To Millions' it was available on six formats: DVD, VHS, Double CD, Double Cassette, Triple Vinyl and MiniDisc.
It's from their concert on July 21st 2000 at Wembley Stadium, watch 'Gas Panic' from the release below.
On November 13th 2006, Oasis released the 'Stop The Clocks' EP.
Noel Gallagher Has Made A Six-Hour Ambient Mixed Version Of Oasis' 'Champagne Supernova'
It will features in 'Zoë Law: Legends' exhibition that opens on November 29th.
An Oasis Special From Record Collector Is Out This Month
A special Oasis edition from Record Collector is available to buy on November 26th.
You can pre-order the magazine here, as soon as more details are published about the magazine I will post them.
Alliance' By GLOK / Timothy Clerkin Is Out Now
Andy Bell recording under his electronic alter ego GLOK, and the producer and Insult to Injury label boss Timothy Clerkin have joined forces for Alliance, a brand new seven-track album released by Bytes on November 8. The collaboration finds Andy and Tim with their freak flags flying, working in a freewheeling environment where nothing was off limits, with influences ranging from Death in Vegas and Boards of Canada to James Holden and New Order.
They already knew there was chemistry — Andy and Tim were introduced by Bytes when the label suggested Tim as a participant for the Dissident Remixed album, which was put together in 2019. Tim delivered a killer rework of ‘Projected Sounds’, turning the Neu!-meets-Steve Reich original into a tripped-out, slo-mo acid house wonder; ‘Voodoo Ray’ for the shoegaze generation. They later met in person at the funeral of Andrew Weatherall (whose influence can be heard in every groove of the album) and kept in touch.
The catalyst for the album was Tim finding an old Les Paul in a case that hadn’t been touched for years. It was still in tune (albeit a rather odd tuning) and Tim posted a short film of himself playing it on Instagram. Andy was into what he heard “and said I should make it into a song,” Tim explains. “I asked if he’d like to do it as a collab and it snowballed from there.”
“We didn’t discuss much in the way of direction,” says Andy. “I was having quite a creative spell at the time, to me it felt like making music was keeping me sane but when I think back, it was actually making me more insane, just in a different way.”
“It was all done remotely,” Tim continues, “firing ideas back and forth between 2020 and 2021 while I was in Amsterdam and Andy in London. I think people will probably think that I did the synths and Andy did the guitars, but we actually played a pretty equal amount of both! That’s one of the reasons I love it, it’s a proper collaboration, where we both tried new things and nothing was off limits.”
“I handed control over to Tim for the production side,” Andy reveals. “My role was coming up with, and recording, musical ideas — and playing on his ideas. I’m not entirely sure who played what on what tracks, it all goes into the Clerkin blender and amazing music comes out!”
Amazing is an understatement. The woozy ‘Empyrean’, which combines the analogue-decayed production of Boards of Canada and the ethereal vocals of ‘Xtal’ from Aphex Twin’s Selected Ambient Works 85-92 with a fizzing behemoth of a synth line, is a fitting way to open the album as it was the first track they worked on together. “It’s basically a Timothy Clerkin remix of a demo I sent him,” Andy explains. “I can’t get enough of it. To me, it’s one of the best tracks I’ve ever been involved with since I started making music.”
Of ‘AmigA’, Andy says, “A few of the tracks led me into a kind of Pagan, pre-Christian headspace. ‘AmigA’ is kind of like an ancient prehistoric rave at a Stone Circle — I’m just gutted Tim took off all of my grunting noises!” This is proper head music, a thick swirl of pastoral acoustic guitars, Ghost Box-style vintage synths and angelic harmonies.
Tim got his friend Beth Jeans Houghton, aka Du Blonde, to provide vocals for ‘Nothing Ever’, which is a hit single in waiting. It’s a fuzzed-up, scuzzed-up, dazzling indie-dance banger, with Beth’s lip-curling vocal a perfect fit for Andy and Tim’s music.
There are echoes of Death in Vegas in tracks like ‘Scattered’ and ‘The Witching Hour’, where 1960s counter-culture rock mixes with psychedelic electronics. Fans of baggy will be at one with both of these tracks, where the sweat, throb and frenzy is reminiscent of live at the G-Mex-era Happy Mondays (circa-1990), with Weatherall and Oakenfold at the controls. Of the vocals on ‘Scattered’, Andy says: “I was just talking, I genuinely felt very scattered. I don’t know what to do when asked to provide vocals, I don’t see myself as a singer at all, so I thought I’d chat instead. It was very free and open, our freak flags were flying!”
And RIDE fans will be delighted as the future Balaeric classic ‘E-Theme’ opens with a guitar riff not a million miles away from ‘Vapour Trail’, underpinned by the laidback breakbeat that adorned many an indie-dance track in the early-90s, smeared rave synths and swooning vocals. It’s a moment of pure bliss and one for the 3am dancefloor.
The artwork is by the Nottingham-based illustrator Nick Taylor, with the geometric yet soulful cover image influenced by the record sleeves of the abstract artist Josef Albers, as well as Andy’s request that it should be “the opposite of AI”.
The album is out now on various streaming sites and available in store.
Predictions For The First Oasis 2025 Gig In Cardiff
It still doesn't feel real. Even though the money (a lot of it) has flown out of bank accounts, new dates have been added, and the cogs and wheels of the rumour mill still spin, it's still hard to imagine what those first moments will look like in Cardiff in July when Liam and Noel walk on stage together for the first time in 16 years.
In my mind, the template they had nailed by 2009 won't be far from what we can expect for 2025. So, here's my best guess as it stands:
Imagine it's about 8:45pm, the PA is blasting out tune after tune, and the atmosphere is already better than most actual gigs. Then the lights go down. Every speaker in the stadium blasts out the drums of F*cking In The Bushes, and the sky turns to pints. At some point, because you can't see a thing on the stage, the noise of the 70,000+ people reaches deafening levels, so you know the band are on stage. You've never experienced anything like it, but the people on stage look as calm as they would be queuing at the post office.
Guitars are on, knobs and leads checked, then tick...tick...tick-tick-tick-tick...the opening burst of Rock 'N' Roll Star'. If they start with anything else they're mad. The stadium goes off. 16 whole years since the feedback faded from I Am The Walrus at V Festival, Oasis are back on it. If you get a bit emotional when the chorus kicks in, that's fine, you should. Song 1 dies down, then without a word, the opening guitar line to Lyla. This tune was written to fill stadiums, and for reasons only musicologists could explain, is the ultimate second-song-in-the-set tune. The tempo and rhythm were seemingly created for people to pogo to. The drop with the guitar solo is always immense. Rock 'N' Roll Star into Lyla. Perfection. It was always banging. Then next, trust me, they're going to play Acquiesce. Bit of feedback after Lyla, people try and get their breath back, but then it comes. That opening guitar, draped over feedback, launching into that wall of sound that only Bonehead and his guitar are capable of producing. Liam two-footing the first verse. Noel comes to the mic, and the roof lifts off the stadium. F*cking imagine that.
From here, I reckon they slow things down a tiny bit, with Some Might Say. Pure singalong. They didn't play it at all for the last few years, but Liam brought it out a few times in his solo gigs. With Liam singing better than he has in years then surely it's time to give this one a spin. After that, whilst everyone's still buzzing from the opening, the band launch into Cigarettes And Alcohol. Lager tornado. Seems unlikely we'll get much of the original line up, but even seeing Noel, Liam and Bonehead on this will be quality. 30 years after Alan White screwed up the ending on the bootleg Cardiff Supernova (one of the all-timers that recording!), hopefully he'll get another go in the Welsh capital!
At this point in the olden days, Noel would probably get on the mic to give Liam a rest, so let's assume here he's going to do a couple of tunes. Everyone needs to get their breath back or get in a drink, so Half The World Away is ideal for that. Even if Liam sang it on the Definitely Maybe tour, there's no way Noel doesn't sing this. Same with Step Out, but could be wrong. So Noel will stay on, and do either Little By Little or The Importance Of Being Idle here too. One of these later tunes, I'm going to predict will swap out across the tour.
Liam's back on stage, and the temperature is jammed straight back up to maximum. Almost certainly Gem's in the band, so he's going to launch into that Morning Glory riff, and the place goes off again. This will be probably one of the very few guitar solos Noel plays alongside Slide Away, Live Forever and Don't Look Back In Anger, and for all the quality guitarists Liam had on his tours, no one was able to play those solos like Noel. A truly underrated guitarist. I'm going to throw in a bit of a wildcard here, a fan favourite. Could be one of about 20 tunes, but it's something like:
- Columbia
- Bring It On Down
- Roll With It
- D'You Know What I Mean
- Stand By Me
- Step Out
- Go Let It Out
- Fade Away
At this point, the band take a breather, and I reckon you're going to see an orchestra on stage, like in the 1996 shows. It will be the same set too; Cast No Shadow, Wonderwall, Masterplan maybe a later tune here that has that accompaniment: Stop Crying Your Heart Out, I'm Outta Time?...
This bit of the gig is something Oasis could ever do, where most bands play their hits at the start, maybe drop in something everyone knows in the middle when there's a lull, then go out strong on the encore, there was never any dull part of an Oasis gig. The opening was electric, then you'd get the singalongs and some of the best moments of the night in the middle, then the ending was always mindblowing. Assuming they'll keep to that framework next summer, they'll probably close out on a couple of massive tunes like Slide Away and Champagne Supernova. This could be something the orchestra or a choir sings on (Noel's BBC set with a choir on Slide Away was unbelievable). There's no chance in the world they'll do this, but it would be incredible to see them play Champagne Supernova like they did 96-98 with the extended outro. Won't happen though.
After Champagne Supernova, they'll go off, say goodnight, thank everyone for coming. My bet is they do four tunes, like they used to, something old and upbeat like Supersonic, then Live Forever, the standout of Noel's last tour, but probably back to the old arrangement. Don't Look Back In Anger for sure will be second to last, then they'll do a cover to end the gig. Liam mentioned Come On Feel The Noise on Twitter, which I just can't see, although that would be epic. I can't see them doing My Generation again, so maybe something new, or ideally, they'd play a song they made their own 30 years ago; I Am The Walrus.
So, here's my prediction then:
Rock n Roll Star
Lyla
Acquiesce
Some Might Say
Cigarettes & Alcohol
Half The World Away
The Importance Of Being Idle / Little By Little
Morning Glory
Wildcard
Cast No Shadow
Wonderwall
The Masterplan
Slide Away
Champagne Supernova
Supersonic
Live Forever
Don't Look Back In Anger
I Am The Walrus
Honestly, can you imagine seeing them play that live? All those tunes? I'd give everything I own to see them play one of them. Still can't believe this is happening.