Look at a picture of all five members of Oasis during their imperial phase. Just pick any photo – they’re all the same. Up front there’s Liam, exuding little brother energy; behind is Noel, scowling slightly; then placed at random around them are three men who look like they’ve wandered into the back of shot en route to the chippy.
They were the least likely bunch of rock stars you could ever imagine. And yet their return has been probably the biggest story in British pop for the past decade.
Although, let’s be clear: the version of Oasis which reacquaints itself with the public this summer is a Frankenstein’s monster of Oasises, v1.0 through 4.0. They’ve got a brand new drummer – for about the fifth time in their history. There is no Guigsy on bass, the man who ranked his interest in being in the biggest rock band of their generation behind Manchester City, cricket, Doctor Who and marijuana (in Noel Gallagher’s opinion, as per the 2016 documentary Supersonic). But really, all that ever mattered was the Gallagher brothers.
They detest each other, they love each other, and despite doing things like trying to batter each other with cricket bats or launching dustbins at each other, they somehow managed to make some of the most enduring tunes of the past 30 years together.
They also made some of the least enduring tunes of the last 30 years, lest we forget – just think of the limp psychedelia and sludgy rock of the noughties, where decent singles ended up teasing dreck like Standing on the Shoulder of Giants and Heathen Chemistry. You had to be a real hardcore fan to make excuses for their work then, but I made an effort and found moments deserving of second listens even there. I’d already invested too much time in working my way through the Oasis guitar songbook on the Noel-inspired Epiphone I’d saved up for. Did I have a parka? Yes, I had a parka.
So that effort through perhaps the most depressing time to be an Oasis fan – too old to be really exciting, still trudging around stadiums rather than letting their legend grow – qualifies me, I think, to assess their back catalogue. These are their 17 best songs, ranked – and in the interests of balance, five of their most honking stinkers. And no, “Wonderwall” isn’t in the best of list.
17. “The Shock of the Lightning”, 2008
Even during the slightly moribund Noughties – during which time they had four number ones, by the way – there were flashes of something thrilling. This is the only evidence that they ever even liked krautrock pioneers Neu!, but what a way to distill it down: motorik beat, stormy vibes and a nod to Magical Mystery Tour.
16. “Morning Glory”, 1995
Sometimes Oasis songs which are transparent nicks from other artists show up in sharp relief exactly what it was Oasis did so well. Where its inspiration, R.E.M.’s “Orange Crush” is a tense, jangling thing full of air and shade; “Morning Glory” is pummelling and claustrophobic, the cluster headache and paranoia setting in after another night “chained to the mirror and the razor blade”.
15. “Listen Up”, 1994
One of Noel’s first run of tunes – about yearning to get away from the grotty circumstances you find yourself in – this was squirrelled away as a “Cigarettes and Alcohol” B-side. Its deeply lovely bridge is top drawer; the chords tumble downwards while Liam yelps defiantly that he’s “gonna leave you all behind”, before twisting and leaping upwards.
14. “Fade Away”, 1994
The raw, Buzzcocks-influenced side of Oasis only really hung around for Definitely Maybe and its B-sides, of which this is that era’s pick. Childhood and the compromises you make as you grow out of it were fertile writing ground for Noel at the time; you can feel his excitement and anger in the thrash.
13. “Columbia”, 1994
It’s a bit odd, given that the Gallaghers were regulars at the Hacienda during its peak and worshipped the Stone Roses, that Oasis had so little to do with dance culture. Except, that is, for this. A straight four-to-the-floor beat appears out of a fog of disembodied voices, like it’s fighting its way past the smoke machine toward the DJ booth, while Liam sings: “I can’t tell you the way I feel, because the way I feel is, oh, so new to me”. It’s a lolloping rave-era tribute that’s also genuinely threatening; you can feel the Second Summer of Love curdling.
12. “Cast No Shadow”, 1995
Written in honour of The Verve’s frontman Richard Ashcroft, these lyrics about a man who has trouble appreciating what he has and expressing how he feels – some of Noel’s best – could just as well apply to Noel himself. This might be one of Liam’s best vocal performances, too, keening and pained under the steeliness. It’s a poised, swooning thing.
11. “Whatever”, 1994
As straightforwardly pretty as Oasis ever got, this was a fair crack at the 1994 Christmas No 1 slot (it ended up at number three; East 17’s “Stay Another Day” took the crown). It’s a deeply beautiful irony that Noel was obliged to share songwriting credits with Neil Innes for its similarity to “How Sweet to be an Idiot” by his Beatles spoof band the Rutles.
10. “Talk Tonight”, 1995
Pissed off at the rest of the band’s dismal attempts to crack America in 1994, Noel took himself off to San Francisco to fume and wonder whether to break the band up. He didn’t, but he did end up writing three gorgeous quasi-solo tracks on the back of it. This bullish but heartbroken acoustic olive branch is as close as he ever got to sounding like great hero Neil Young.
9. “Half the World Away”, 1994
This is the pick of those tunes inspired by that lost weekend in San Francisco. Careworn and sighing, “Half the World Away” is the sound of feeling like you desperately want to get away.
8. “Acquiesce”, 1998
For all that Oasis is about the dynamic between Noel and Liam, there are scarcely any proper duets between them. This bolshy B-side brings them together: Liam snarling devilishly that he “only wants to see the light that shines behind your eyes”, Noel the angel on the other shoulder, reminding them that “we need each other”.
7. “Cigarettes and Alcohol”, 1994
Liam howls, voice dripping with disdain, “Is it worth the aggravation to find yourself a job when there’s nothing worth working for?” – and a star is born. If “Morning Glory” showed off what Oasis were actually doing musically when they nicked other people’s stuff, “Cigarettes and Alcohol”’s crunching, thunderous rip of T. Rex’s “Get It On” showcased the attitude that made them what they were. Yeah, we’ve nicked “Get It On”. And what?
6. “Supersonic”, 1994
Written while waiting for first (generally maligned but undoubtedly powerful) drummer Tony McCarroll to work out how to play “Bring It on Down”, “Supersonic” came together in minutes. It’s about the swagger and the intimidating gibberish which Liam manages to topspin into something unnerving, but it’s also about that shift with the line “but before tomorrow” which served notice of Noel’s extraordinary melodic ear.
5. “Live Forever”, 1994
If Noel’s lyrics for Oasis love songs tended toward the obscure much of the time, he was always very direct about the power of friendship, and the magic of a bond that you can’t explain to anyone outside of it (“We see things they’ll never see”). More than any other Oasis tune, this is one that feels like you’ve heard it a thousand times before, and yet keeps its urgency intact.
4. “Rock ‘n’ Roll Star”, 1994
The final part of that triangle of songs that said everything Noel ever wanted to is, from first note to last, an absolute blast – the sound of five young men who are still convinced that nothing could possibly be more fun than being in a band with their mates. A demo which included a bagpipe interlude was perhaps wisely shelved.
3. “Slide Away”, 1994
For all the pint-launching and mad-fer-it silliness that Oasis came to mean, it was their balladeering that cemented them as a rock ‘n’ roll band in whose hands, as “Don’t Look Back in Anger” later put it, people would want to place their lives. “Slide Away” was the Definitely Maybe deep cut that became an essential. As it opens out into the chorus – “Now that you’re mine…” – the bruised but hopeful romantic side of the band finds its highest peak.
2. “Don’t Look Back in Anger”, 1996
Like most Oasis songs, “Don’t Look Back in Anger” is sort of about nothing, and sort of about everything. Childhood memories (“Stand up beside the fireplace, take that look from off your face”) and lifted witticisms from John Lennon’s audio diaries (“You said the brains I had went to my head”) tumble around, and there’s something about a girl called Sally. But the meaning is all there in the sound of it: stately verses, ratcheting bridge, and Noel’s best ever grab-your-mates-and-scream chorus. Anyway, here’s “Wonderwall”…
1. “Champagne Supernova”, 1996
Obviously it isn’t “Wonderwall”. No song in the Oasis back catalogue channels the day-drunk buzz of their peak like “Champagne Supernova”: dreamy and wistful, then piledriving and heart-rending. And in its Paul Weller-assisted guitar solo, and swooning harmonies, it is the direct link back to British pop’s finest guitar bands – which they had always intended to be. In the best line he’s ever written, Noel nails the woozy, scrambled nostalgia Oasis had channelled musically, and which a new generation of fans would come to feel during their 16-year absence: “Where were you while we were getting high?”
And their worst…
5. “Fade In-Out”, 1997
The big misconception about Be Here Now is that Noel lost his songwriting nous in a blizzard of cocaine. He didn’t quite; the songs on Be Here Now are quite “Will this do?”, without being heinous – just way too long and way too loud. “Fade In-Out” is the huge exception. It’s dreary stuff, and nearly seven minutes of it. Johnny Depp guesting on slide guitar is the final insult.
4. “Sunday Morning Call”, 2000
Any number of listless turn-of-the-millennium tracks written after the effective break-up of the group could have made this list – let the sluggish, dreary “Sunday Morning Call” stand for all of them. So bad Noel insisted it not be listed on the Stop the Clocks singles compilation, it’s a secret track instead. Frankly, even that is too good for it.
3. “Hey Now!”, 1995
The title makes this sound a lot more exciting than it is. Bridging the two halves of (What’s the Story) Morning Glory, “Hey Now!” is a slightly seasick thing, skidding about on the deck only to, having found its feet, lapse into the plod that would become their Noughties trademark.
2. “Little James”, 2000
I know it’s easy to dunk on Liam’s first songwriting effort. But lord above, if we can’t say that this paean to his young son is a catastrophe then there are truly no certainties left to us. At least he did “Songbird” too.
1.“Roll With It”, 1995
The deep tragedy of The Battle of Britpop (along with Noel wishing Damon Albarn and Alex James would, erm, catch Aids and die) was that “Country House” and “Roll With It” were so far from the best they could do. “Roll With It” in particular is thin, flyaway stuff: no wit, no grit, and lyrics that sound like they’ve come from a Jehovah’s Witness leaflet.
Had it been a straight fight between “Morning Glory” and Blur’s “The Universal”, that would have been a proper heavyweight contest. Doubtless, if Oasis roll out “Roll With It” at Heaton Park, pints will be launched.
