by Paolo Hewitt
Melody Maker were the first to highlight it. Two days, after the Observer appeared, they reported that Noel had brought the whole Blur I Oasis clash down to new levels of indecency. This was picked up by the rest of the media, and the story grew and grew.
Meanwhile, Sawyer, prior to flying to New York for a holiday, had been contacted by Melody Maker, who, she claimed, misquoted her. On her return, she spoke with Oasis’s press officer Johnny Hopkins who said she should write a rebuttal to them. This she did, which they then pulled apart.
‘I couldn’t do anything right at that point,’ she says.
She also totally refutes Noel’s later statement that he retracted the comment directly after saying it. ‘If he had then I would either have not written it or pointed out the retraction.’
Miranda described Noel’s mood throughout the interview as ‘jovial’. ‘Whether he was drunk or not I couldn’t tell. It was a phone interview that took place at six in the morning over here and because of the phone lines it was hard to tell.’
Jovial or not, by the time he got back to England, Noel would have another public row to defuse.
Japan was a good place to be when the news came through. If anything, the audiences were even wilder now that they had Oasis records to play in their bedrooms. One fan stencilled a picture of Peggy and her three sons that had appeared in the UK press across her shirt, and two others sported the new Manchester City shirt, even though the season had only just begun.
The band played five nights in Tokyo at three different venues. Two at the Club Citta, one at the Liquid Room, two in the Garden Hall. After one of the shows, two girls arrived backstage with pills and powders.
The band plus followers returned to the hotel and partied all night in the swimming-pool, managing by five o’ dock in the morning to have an irate manager informing them that they were banned forever from his hotel. Liam had removed every emergency exit sign he came across; sixteen of them were discovered in his room.
Then it was on to Osaka and two triumphant nights in the Imperial Hall. They then boarded a plane for London, knowing full well that on their arrival home, Noel’s AIDS comments would be whipping up a storm of bad publicity.
The Terrence Higgins Trust, an organisation dedicated to helping people who are HIV positive, said they were ‘deeply shocked’.
At the London Lighthouse HIV hospital, spokesman Ben McKnight took a cooler approach, agreeing that the comment was insensitive, but adding, ‘This is just them whipping up more publicity rather than thinking of how people might be affected.’
Damon and Alex from Blur refused to comment, and Oasis moved quickly to limit the damage. Noel released a press release apologising for his remarks, stating, ‘As soon as I said it, I realised it was an insensitive thing to say and immediately retracted the comment. I was horrified to find the journalist concerned chose to run with it. Anyone who knows me will confirm that I am sympathetic towards the plight of HIV carriers as well as being supportive of the challenge to raise awareness about AIDS and HIV. Although not being a fan of their music, I wish both Damon and Alex a long life.’ After that, things began to cool down.
When Noel returned home that Wednesday afternoon he was to find a message on his answer machine asking him if he would be available to be photographed with The Stone Roses for a potential NME cover. The story would be based around a unique venture that Oasis, prior to their departure, had agreed to participate in.
The project was the Help album, a record that would raise cash for the victims of the Bosnian War and attempt to enter the record books by being recorded, produced and distributed within a week. The idea came from Tony Crean at Go! Discs Records.
Stunned by the phase of absolute brutality that the war in Bosnia had now entered into, Crean had been galvanised into action. His idea was to secure the services of young British bands who would all enter studios from midnight on Sunday 3 September and deliver a finished track by Monday the 4th. Midnight was the deadline.
The master tapes would be cut and flown to pressing plants on the Tuesday and manufactured as cassettes on the Wednesday. They would then be flown to Polygram’ s distribution centre in Chadwell Heath on Thursday and distributed to the shops on Friday, ready to be put on sale on that Saturday.
Such a mission had never been attempted before and its success lay totally with the full participation and professionalism of those involved.
On hearing the photo request, Noel jumped a cab to photographer Steve Double’ s studio in London’s East End. He was in a good mood that day. Alan McGee had taken on Meg and given her a job as artist liaison. Now she had something to get up for in the mornings.
At the studio, Noel had his photo taken with Ian Brown, Robbie Maddix, who had recently joined the Roses, and Sice from The Boo Radleys.
The musicians were then interviewed by NME’s Mark Sutherland. Noel didn’t mention Sutherland’s recent poor review. Instead, they all spoke of their concern about the war but, unlike the Red Wedge movement of the 1980s which had inadvertently placed musicians in politician’s clothes, they professed to having no solutions, just plain human compassion.
The following Sunday, Oasis entered the Maison Rouge Studios in Fulham just before midnight. Already, Liam and Noel had fought over the recording.
‘What song are we doing?’ the band has previously asked Noel.
‘Remember how we played “Fade Away” at the Borderline? Like a ballad? That’s the song. And I’m singing it.’
Liam, naturally, had to fight him on that one and after the squabble was over, Liam agreed to supply backing vocals, and the band, with Johnny Depp guesting on guitar, laid down a beautiful version of the song. Lisa M. sang backing vocals and Fran Cutler provided the ‘And you know that’ which ends the record. By five o’clock, they had left the studio, Noel with the tape in his hand.
Crean hadn’t only got the likes of Portishead, The Levellers, Radiohead, Suede, Neneh Cherry, Manic Street Preachers, Blur, The Charlatans and The Chemical Brothers to contribute, he had also swung it for Paul Weller to enter Studio Two in Abbey Road and record the Beatles’ song ‘Come Together’.
In the preceding week, Weller had written a letter to Paul McCartney telling him about the project, offering an open invitation to attend the session.
It was precisely where Noel was heading that day. He told Liam about the arrangement but his brother said, ‘Arsed’. ‘If I meet Macca, I meet him. But I’m not going out of my way for him.’
Noel showed up at Abbey Road, the studio where his most favourite group ever had conspired to make some of the most riveting and far-reaching pop music of our times.
There was enormous doubt as to whether McCartney would show but at two in the afternoon, suddenly, he was standing there with wife Linda. Later, he played electric piano, bass and sang backing vocals. He also taught Weller’s band a song he had written the day before but there was no time to record it.
About an hour after his arrival, Noel put down his guitar part in the small control-room that had recorded nearly every Beatles’ song. McCartney to the right of him, Weller to the left, the subsequent film of this moment not only symbolised British pop in the 1990s, but also Noel Gallagher’s musical journey. There would never be another day like it.
Soon after, Noel left the studio and hurried over to Radio One to preview ‘Fade Away’, and publicise the album. Then he returned to Abbey Road, finally heading for home at around midnight.
It was as if he, the good Catholic boy, was now publicly atoning for all his sins.
They put Plan B into action on Monday 28 August. The tabloids (not the music press) announced that Oasis would play the Earls Court Arena, London on 5 November 1995.
The seating would be removed to allow an audience of 20,000 people. Ticket prices would be held at £14 per head.
Blur’s biggest show to date had taken place that summer at London’s Mile End stadium with an audience of 17,000. Oasis tickets would go on sale the next day.
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bsp; The following night Noel called Marcus for an update on sales. He was told that demand was so heavy, Oasis would now play two nights at the venue. Forty thousand people would see them. They would be Europe’s largest-ever indoor shows. It put a smile back on the band’s faces.
They then sat back to await the reviews for Morning Glory, each one of them expecting praise to shower upon them like golden pennies from heaven. But in that turbulent summer of 1995 nothing would go as planned.
To begin with there was a major problem with ‘Step Out’, the song that clearly lifted the verse from Stevie Wonder and Henry Cosby’s song ‘Uptight’. It had been sent over to America for clearance, and the songwriters had come back demanding a massively high royalty rate. The song, which had been chosen to open side two of the album, was swiftly removed. However, this was at such a late stage that Creation had already sent out CDs containing the song. (These CDs are now highly-valuable collector’s items, as are the white labels of ‘Columbia’, ‘I Am The Walrus’, ‘Acquiesce’, and Brendan Lynch’s mix of ‘Champagne Supernova’.)
‘It was a bit of a nothing track,’ Noel told Loaded magazine. ‘If I could go back now I’d definitely swap “Rockin’ Chair” for it, but we had to make a snap decision and I was wrong.’
On 30 September NME and Melody Maker ran full-page reviews of the album. They weren’t what was expected. John Robinson in the NME wrote that the album felt like ‘the morning after the night before’. He railed against what he perceived to be a deliberate shift in Noel’s songwriting, away from fast furious rock ‘n’ roll towards a rock classicism, and ended by saying that the album contains ‘tales of a group that has peered over the edge and could lose their footing... Ultimately a nervous peek through the curtains, not a bold rise and shine’. He gave it seven out of ten.
David Stubbs at Melody Maker was much harder, more scathing. ‘Now we realise that the reason they are inarticulate is that they are not very bright’, was one of his opening salvos, before going on to call the album ‘occasionally sublime but too often laboured and lazy’, finishing with, ‘Oasis are fallen, fallen short of the stars. They sound knackered’.
Worse was to come in Vox when Steve Sutherland complained that the album contained ‘too much Paul Weller and too little John Lydon, too much Noel, not enough Liam’, before concluding, ‘Measured against The Great Escape, Blur are better’.
And so it continued.
‘A wasted opportunity if you’re being generous,’ wrote David Cavanagh in Q. ‘A shot in the foot if you want to be more melodramatic.’
The most favourable reviews were to be found in the quality newspapers such as the Independent and the Guardian. Marcus also pointed out to the band that the UK reviews were more than nullified by the rave notices that had started to pour in from Europe.
The band were surprised by the reaction. All five of them had been playing nothing but the album songs for weeks and they were sharp enough to know what was good and what didn’t work. It would only be Liam, later on, who would point out that their fast recording pace sometimes left songs feeling too rushed or, worse, made them miss opportunities to play and sing them better.
It was generally agreed that for the next album they would take their time, but they still harboured few doubts about Morning Glory. They were immensely excited about it. Indeed, Bonehead had got himself barred from the Swiss Cottage Hotel when he climbed up on to the roof in the early hours and blasted it out for all the residents to hear.
He was staying in London because Oasis were back in the studio, continuing from where they had left off on the Sunday to record two new songs as B-sides. They were ‘Round Are Way’ and ‘The Masterplan’.
After the basic recording had finished, Liam, Alan White and Guigsy then travelled to Paris to conduct interviews whilst Noel stayed with Owen in the studio mixing the songs.
Security guard Ian Robertson accompanied them. It was here that he and Liam clashed really badly, when he entered the singer’s room to drag him out to a press conference. As Liam had company, he didn’t take too kindly to the intrusion. All day, he brooded over Robbo, as he was known.
‘All I know,’ Guigsy says, ‘is that later on I was in this bar doing an interview. It was about ten at night and Liam started kicking up about something. So he got off and as he walked by, he was like, “You can fuck off as well, dickhead.”
‘Then about three hours later he comes back in going, “You fucking dicks,” and he’s got a coat on but no shirt. His coat was open and he was bare chested and he’s going, “You fucking dicks, fucking nobs,” so I just got off. I was like, “I’m going home, I’m not doing any press.” So the next morning, I refused to do any more interviews and went home.’
About a week later, Liam called Guigsy and apologised. Ian Robertson, meanwhile, had been relieved of his duties.
‘I spoke to Noel about it,’ he said, ‘and Noel said, “I agree with you but he’s my brother.” I have to go with him. And that was that.’
After completing their work at Maison Rouge, the band then started rehearsals at Brixton Academy for the upcoming UK tour. The call was for five that evening but by seven o’clock, Guigsy had failed to show. The band were used to late appearances but that was usually Liam’s forte. Guigsy was the solid one, the guy who swept up behind them, who remained in the background with his big spliffs but kept a careful eye on everything. He totally understood the band’s psychology, knew their character traits. It was him who could calm a situation, cool down tempers. It was Guigsy who could sit there and faithfully predict how someone was going to react at least five minutes before they did. It was Guigsy, good old dependable Guigsy with his laid-back demeanour, and his encyclopaedic knowledge and passion for football, his wisecracks, and an ability to find flaws in people’s arguments and gently pull them apart, who acted as a real antidote to the mayhem. But cross him or the band just once and then his temper would flare and he would defend his friends, his family to the last, just as he had done on the ferry to Amsterdam.
And while everyone had been waiting for either Noel or Liam to crumble under the stress of their complex, fiery relationship, it was Guigsy who woke up on the first day of rehearsal and literally couldn’t drag himself out of bed. His body had given up on him. His nerves were shot right through. Every time he even thought about a bass guitar a feeling of abject sickness erupted in his stomach.
He stayed in bed, closed his eyes and slept for twenty hours straight. Then he went round to Marcus’s house. It was Friday. Guigsy told him, ‘Look, if I can’t get out of bed I can’t tour, therefore I can’t be in the band so you’ll have to get someone else.’
At first, Marcus thought he was severely hungover.
‘No, no,’ Guigsy insisted, ‘You don’t understand. I can’t physically do it. It’s not that I don’t want to be in the band, I literally can’t be in the band.’
Then he left to see a doctor and Oasis were forced to handle another major crisis.
Late that night, as they lay in their beds, they heard the words on the wind creeping through their windows and into their minds, telling each and every one of them, that they were finished now, the game was over. Now they would slowly descend to whence they came and they would do so with the eyes of the world upon them. As they listened, their collective fists clenched tighter and tighter.
By their own admission, they had completely taken their eyes off Guigsy. Maybe alarm bells should have gone off the day Alan White joined and he saw the bassist badly shaking as he lifted the glass to his mouth. Or maybe they should have taken more time out.
‘There was hardly any daylight between the Definitely Maybe campaign and the Morning Glory campaign,’ Marcus admits. ‘I knew that, but that was part of the whole thing, to get across that this band was a phenomenon and not just some band putting albums out now and again. And Guigsy wasn’t ready in his mind to go out full-on as you have to be to do it. And he had enough guts to come round and tell me.’
The focus wi
ll always be on Noel and Liam. Those are the two that people look out for, keep their eyes upon. They are also the ones that the media make a bee line for, rushing past the others to get to the source.
Guigsy, Bonehead and Alan White never had a problem with that. For them, just to be part of such an important band, their names now enshrined in musical history, was enough. They each knew their worth and what they brought to the table. They knew that they were working with an exceptional songwriter and a unique singer.
In tow with these two, they had travelled the world now, experienced life to the full, gained financial security and made homes with their loved ones.
Guigsy, by his own admission, will tell you, ‘I am not a great bass player but somehow my playing fits into this band and that’s how it is.’
But now his body had failed him. On the first day of rehearsals, it refused to move. On the second day, he went to the doctor’s. It was important that he did so. Unless Oasis supplied a genuine doctor’s certificate, they would be liable for thousands of pounds by cancelling the tour.
‘I had this disease,’ Guigsy reveals, ‘where it means you’ve got no radiator in your system, there’s no cooling system. It’s something that you’re born with. It means your blood pressure goes up and up and up, and it just stays there, it doesn’t come back down.
‘So doing things like cocaine, sends it further up until your body can’t take it anymore. Your body’s working too fast inside and you just crumble. Which is basically what happened. But it took some time to find out.’
With Ruth and his family away in Manchester, after being examined Guigsy travelled North to spend time alone in the house he had grown up in. Since gaining success, he had been pleading with his mum to move to new accommodation, an area where nobody knew what her son did for a living. The house had already been burgled once. But all they took was a selection of Guigsy’s CDs. Weird. But it was a pointer, he would tell his mum, of what was to come. Teresa McGuigan stood firm. I’ll move if I want to, she said.
Guigsy spent a couple of days in the house, totally alone. Then he returned to London.