Oasis: The Truth

by Tony McCarroll

With this in mind, we headed out onto the stage. Liam was extra menacing that evening. The audience stared back, at first unsure, then unable to remove their eyes from the frontman. We played and we were tight, but the set was pretty uneventful. After we had finished, Liam went out front to see Noel and ask him what he thought. ‘Fucking shit,’ came the reply.

  Liam returned backstage, his fringe still stuck to his forehead with sweat. He was deflated after his brother’s cutting two-word review. Then BigUn entered the room, smiling. ‘Hey, your kid fucking loved that,’ he said with a laugh. Liam looked at him quizzically and asked, ‘How do you figure that?’ BigUn then told Liam that Noel had been engrossed, excitedly telling his girlfriend just how much potential the band had. Noel just couldn’t bring himself to tell Liam that. That news changed Liam’s mood instantly and we were back on track. This was the norm from Noel, who seldom showed any positive emotion towards Liam. It seemed that Noel was also impressed with the rhythm section. We all knew that he was itching to join in, but we decided to let him sweat. We were sounding tight and definitely had our own unique sound. We also knew that Noel had a couple of songs he had written, which would give us a grand total of seven. It was the perfect match and one that Liam had longed for. But it was fun to make Noel sweat. The Noel version of events – which sees him joining armed with a clutch of hit records already penned, assuming the nickname ‘the Chief’ and immediately starting to dish out orders – is utter nonsense.

  Bonehead’s brother, Martin, was a much more serious man than Bonehead. Then again, everyone was more serious than Bonehead. Luckily for us, though, Martin had a job fitting out recording studios. His grammar school education had seen a much better return than Bonehead’s. Martin had negotiated a deal for us at Out of the Blue studios in Manchester city centre. If we could plaster a few walls for them. they would give us enough use of the facilities to create a four-track demo.

  Liam couldn’t make it, so the following week me, Bonehead and Guigs turned up in the Bonemobile – a Mazda 1800 pick-up truck that had a moulded plastic roof. Bonehead had painted this roof in a Jackson Pollock-like style, as a tribute to the Roses. It drew some very strange looks. We gave even stranger looks back. We had to plaster three walls and as this was Bonehead’s trade, he took charge. After a couple of days’ work, the owner checked the job and said he was happy; we had our recording time. I was surprised, because I noticed the spirit level that Bonehead was using had no bubble in the middle. Nothing was ever quite what it seemed with the man.

  Liam had mentioned that Noel still kept hinting at joining us. He said each time he did so, he would ask him why he wanted to join such a shit band. Noel would mumble some kind of reply, but he’d never admit he thought we were good. I thought Noel joining would be a good thing. I hadn’t really seen him since he had joined the Inspiral Carpets. In fact, no one really saw Noel after he joined the Carpets. I also felt that Liam was pushing for him to join our outfit not only to be his bandmate but I suppose to be his brother.

  During a chat one lunchtime in Piccadilly Gardens, I sensed he seemed to be skirting around something, until finally he came out with: ‘Why don’t we replace Guigs with our Noel?’ My first reaction was surprise, because Liam was a Spartan and I didn’t expect that of him. My second reaction was to get angry. Controlling my temper, I reminded him that it was Guigs who had first set up this outfit. To Liam’s credit, he looked guilty, and almost immediately backed down and apologised – unusual for him. I suggested a compromise.

  ‘Why don’t we have Noel join as lead guitarist?’ I said. As that was his instrument of choice it made sense. Liam’s guilt instantly evaporated; now he was animated. ‘I’ll go and tell him where we are recording,’ he replied. Liam was incredibly proud of the work we had done and was genuinely thrilled about Noel getting to work with us. I thought I had made the best decision of my life and good times lay ahead. I told Liam to speak to Bonehead and Guigs first before speaking to Noel. He agreed and ran off with an excited look on his face. It was the best of decisions, it was the worst of decisions.

  It was good to see Noel. It had been a while and we were catching up over Jack Daniel’s in The Square Albert boozer. He told me about his girlfriend Louise, who worked for a music promotion company. He was deliriously happy when speaking about her, which I thought was a good sign. After Jack Daniel’s had become friendlier with us, I began to notice a few more changes in Noel. He seemed surer of himself than he had before. I guessed his time with the Carpets had broadened his horizons, but it wasn’t just that. He looked physically different. I’d seen the look before. A pale look. He had been whitened by a chemical snowstorm, so to speak, and had lost weight he could ill afford to lose. His newly found confidence also left him with an opinion on just about everything. It was as if he had morphed into his big brother Paul without gaining the stature or the girth. The jibes still came thick and fast and his face would literally crease with laughter. We talked about the band and how great a musician Bonehead was. He told me he had a few songs of his own that he wanted to slip in. He was genuinely excited, though, and was desperate not to step on Bonehead’s toes. We headed off to the rehearsal room together and I felt it was good to have him back.

  We plugged in and started playing. Noel stood looking intense in the corner of the studio, nodding his head in time to the music. The large white, woollen jumper he was wearing made him sweat profusely. He picked his guitar up and started to lay down some backing riffs for ‘Take Me’. No one had asked him to, but it felt right. After the session we all welcomed him onto the good ship Oasis and he suggested that we start rehearsing at The Boardwalk. The Inspiral Carpets had a permanent berth there and a small rehearsal room had just become available. We all agreed. It seemed that, without any questions asked, Noel had integrated himself into the group as our lead guitarist. It felt good. There was never going to be a problem with us liking Noel as a person, as we already knew him. And as for Noel, I reckon he realised he had just found himself the perfect vehicle for his songs.

  The cellar room at The Boardwalk resembled a dungeon. New mould grew over the old mould on the damp brick walls and there was a puddle of water where the concrete floor dipped in the middle of the room. I reminded myself not to plug anything into a wall socket. We decided that the place needed brightening up and so the following week we set about whitewashing the walls. Me and Liam stole two tins of bright white from B & Q in Ancoats and the four of us set about slapping it on the walls. We then had to stick posters up to break up the colour a bit, as we would all have been suffering from snow blindness otherwise. We also painted a Union Jack on the wall as a tribute to The Who. Noel wouldn’t turn up until after the work was completed, but then offered to brush up in return.

  We were rehearsing twice a week. Thursday and Sunday. Noel was still working for the Inspirals, so did not attend regularly. It wasn’t the initial rush we’d been expecting. When he did attend, though, he brought with him three songs: ‘Must be the Music’, ‘See the Sun ‘and ‘I Better Let You Know.’ The first two were a disaster, with the nature of the songs not sitting with the style of our music at all. Within a couple of days, though, we’d met on ‘I Better Let You Know’. The song suited my lazy drumming style and the dancing wall of strings from Bonehead and Guigs. Liam looked comfortable delivering the lyrics in his own unique way. Noel would go through the songs he had written and sing them acoustically. He would then run through the bass chords with Guigs as myself and Bonehead went to work on the drums and guitars. That was one method we had for creating the songs. We would also jam for hours, and record the sessions, then sit down afterwards and review the tapes in the hope that we could pick a particularly catchy riff or killer melody. The sound that Noel came with was akin to that of Johnny Dangerously, aka Johnny Bramwell, later of I am Kloot. He had also taken to dressing like him. Noel had a fixation with Johnny that would lead to him writing such songs as ‘Take me Away’. But I suppose if you’re gonna be fixated with someone, Johnny Br
amwell is a good place to start. I’ve always admired Johnny’s songwriting skills and consider him an unsung Mancunian genius.

  It was a fine period of my life. The fact I was playing music always made me feel good. To be in a band with the kids I had grown up with made it all that more special. Noel had begun to offer little bits of advice that he had picked up from his duties in the big, bad world of the music industry. It was as if we had an advantage over any other band due to our closeness. At that time, other bands had been listening to our ramped-up rehearsals, which literally shook the door to the room. Noel’s ability to draw upon others’ tunes was evident even in those days and if he heard anything worthwhile from another room it would be developed as a new piece for us. We would sit and giggle mischievously on the other side of the door while BigUn would deal with any problems. This led to a number of altercations with the other bands sharing The Boardwalk. One evening we opened the door to find a note sellotaped to it. ‘Find your own fucking riffs,’ it read. We immediately banged on every door in the place, but no one was willing to admit to leaving the note. Don’t blame them, really. Our aggressive, up-for-it attitude was evident for all to see.

  The rehearsals had left my kit in a right state, though. I’d fixed it up enough times, but now reckoned that enough was enough. I needed a new kit.

  It had been four months since our last gig and on 15 January 1992 we were back at The Boardwalk again, with Noel on stage for the first time. We played ‘Take Me’, an acoustic song that was an originally named, erm, ‘Acoustic Song’, and ‘Columbia’ which was in its infancy and had no lyrics. ‘Columbia’ had been born in a late-night jam. When we had reviewed the tape of the session, we had discovered this deep, ominous riff that really had something. The audience at The Boardwalk that night in January 1992 didn’t think so, though, and once again the reception was ambivalent. People talked between songs and laughed at jokes, which was winding Liam up royal. I could see him staring out into the darkness, trying to identify who was showing him such disrespect.

  A few days later, we were standing outside the drum shop on Deansgate, Manchester. Me, Liam and Noel stood staring at the plush red Pearl export kit that sat in prime position in the front window. Everything about it looked fucking great, except the price tag. Six hundred quid. It was a lot of money. As it happened, though, I had just received a tax rebate – probably the largest cheque I’d ever received up until then. Fate was definitely playing its part, as the rebate was also six hundred. Was someone trying to tell me something? I had already promised Paula that the rebate would go on tidying up the house for my new girl, which at the time had seemed fair enough, but now had begun to look like the wrong decision.

  ‘I think you should buy it,’ Noel told me. ‘Look at it as an investment.’

  I explained that the money was already spoken for, which received a withering look from Noel and a rather more sympathetic one from Liam.

  ‘Look, when we are signed you will realise that it was worth it,’ Noel insisted. Fuck it, he’s right, I thought, and we marched in to the shop and bought the kit. This emptied me out and with Noel and Liam already on empty we didn’t even have the taxi fare back to The Boardwalk. We loaded ourselves up, the kit distributed equally among the three of us, and headed off back down Whitworth Street West on foot. I was excited about my new purchase, but not half as excited as an exuberant Noel. ‘It’s a proper fuckin’ kit. It’s gonna make the difference,’ he crowed. We soon arrived back and in no time at all we had the kit set up and I was banging away.

  Rehearsals continued. It was problematic, though, as Noel was still with the Carpets and not around much. Liam was scratching at the dole office every second Thursday as well as valeting cars for BigUn. Bonehead was plastering and getting plastered. Guigs was practising how to roll various styles of reefers and still living at his mum’s. I had to leave my job in insurance and had taken to working for a construction company on Strangeways prison, in Cheetham Hill, completing a refurbishment. The hours were long and hard, but the money was better.

  I was on my way to prison to work one day. It was just after six in the morning and the streets were still quiet. We drove through the city centre. The back of the dark van was filled with the rest of the gang, most still weary from the previous night’s drinking. The drinking had created a strange odour that had become trapped in the enclosed van. Add to the atmosphere the secondary smoke of at least five continual strainers and you had a fucking toxic and suffocating situation. At first I was relieved when the van doors were suddenly yanked open, letting in the grey morning air. Not relieved for long, though, when six heavily armoured policemen pointed pistols at us and started to shout very loudly that we were to put our hands in the air. There had been a spate of bombings by the IRA at around that time, and a dark blue transit van full of Irishmen was, not surprisingly, considered suspicious. One of the older men decided to have a pop at the policemen and started a rant about persecution in a West Country Irish accent that we – never mind the police – couldn’t understand. After the police looked us over they became aware of the stench of stale alcohol, hurriedly shut the van doors and let us proceed.

  A couple of years previously, the inmates at Strangeways had taken control of the prison and staged a 30-day rooftop protest. They were having a rave on the roof. The burnt and smashed prison wings had been redeveloped and fitted with new cells and I had to cement a small fitting into each of them. It took half a day to complete a job and there were 500 cells. All the cells were identical to the last detail and I was becoming bored rigid. I figured I would be at this for the next 18 months. Fuck that. I might as well be in fuckin’ prison. I was sitting having my lunch by the thick wire security fence when I heard someone shout my name. I looked around to see an inmate grinning at me. At first I didn’t recognise him. After a few seconds his smile started to slowly fade, but then mine began as I realised it was a washed-down and shorn Trampy Spike. (The lack of bed mattress hair or stench of urine had thrown me.) He shuffled over to me, looking around furtively. After I’d, ahem, saved his life, Trampy Spike had appeared regularly in the park. He always told people he owed his very existence on this planet to me. I lapped it up. We would all drink together but wouldn’t share a bottle, if you know what I mean. Behind his shabby exterior, Trampy Spike was one of the most educated and enthralling people I’d met. (Not sure if that says a lot for him or a little for me.) He seemed to have experienced a lot and always had a story to tell you. At the time you’d often see various tramps passing through Levenshulme, and they would normally be harassed and poked. They, in turn, would spit and swear and on occasion lash back. Nobody treated Trampy Spike like that. He was highly regarded on the streets by people of all social standings. A community tramp, so to speak. He’d probably get a grant nowadays.

  ‘What the fuck you doing in here?’ I asked him. Trampy Spike was up close to the fence now. His fingers pushed against the steel mesh, making the tips turn white. He whispered back, ‘I was cold, so I lit a fire in a house. For this I was jailed. They might be able to take away my liberty but they can’t touch my soul.’

  As I said, he wasn’t your average run-of-the-mill hobo. He could be a touch dramatic. For an hour, we sat and a somewhat reflective (or maybe just sober) Trampy Spike told me a tale. The story revolved around a boy who was born into a moderately successful family. After a good education he was guided towards a career in the medical profession. While at Manchester Royal Infirmary, he met a girl. This girl stole his heart and taught him much more than any university could. Her curriculum included long, hot summer days near her home in Macclesfield, feeding the down-and-outs from the Saint Vincent de Paul kitchens in Manchester, Led Zeppelin concerts, Greenpeace and herb gardening. He had never experienced anything quite like her. They had planned a trip to Switzerland, but before it could happen she said she had to tell him something. She began to speak, but then broke down and confessed that she had been fighting a bone disease that had been getting worse through
out her life. A recent letter had confirmed the worst and within three weeks the beautiful girl had shrivelled and shrunk and wept, then finally left this life.

  He simply could not accept that this had happened. He began to sleep at her rented flat until the landlord discovered him and had him forcibly removed. He did not go back to the Royal Infirmary or return any phone calls or letters from his family, friends or colleagues. He moved out of his own flat and brought all his belongings with him. He burnt them all at a spot where he and his girl would sit at sunset in the glow of the evening. He steered clear of any places where he was known and slowly he faded from view. He lived off favours from generous strangers and also used the soup kitchens where he had previously helped out. From the low point to which he had fallen, he now found himself looking at those around him differently, and with what he had learned from his girl, he could finally recognise the goodness in people and the happiness in life’s smallest pleasures. This was his way of surviving. Of keeping her alive. After a while, he found he could not face returning to his old way of living. He felt too much hatred and greed and pain was still there.

  When he finished his story, Trampy Spike had tears in his eyes. He wiped them away and the glint returned, as did the smile. He lifted himself to his feet, dusted himself down and winked at me. He then made his way back to the confinement of his cell. The story of all his many years had been condensed into my lunch hour. But something had stuck with me. This penniless tramp, unjustly jailed, with nobody or nothing waiting for him outside, was still happy. And even after this he was not complaining; rather, he was trying to help other people. What the fuck had I got to worry about? In times of hardship or self-doubt, I could think back on that moment to see me through. As he had promised on that freezing cold morning behind the butchers, Trampy Spike did repay his debt.