In July the lads from Manchester return with “Heathen Chemistry,” which experiments with three songs written by Liam Gallagher. NEWSWEEK’s Bret Begun talked to the not-exactly-G-rated Noel Gallagher about the upcoming album, his love of technology, brother Liam, Radiohead’s Thom Yorke-and those people at Sony.
NEWSWEEK: One British reviewer called “Heathen Chemistry” a “vast improvement on the last two Oasis offerings.” What were the problems with “Be Here Now” and “Standing on the Shoulders of Giants”?
Noel Gallagher: There wasn’t much wrong with “Standing on the Shoulders of Giants.” It was very thought out, and the more you think about rock and roll, that’s when the inspiration starts to disappear. Maybe we just experimented the life out of it. This one, it was like, “Let’s get all the favorite guitars, all the favorite amplifiers and just go for it.”
The Times in London gave it a 7 out of 10.
I’d of given it 81/2.
Does it bother you that the album’s been leaked to the Internet? Sony’s not happy.
I’m actually quite pleased that it bothers Sony. It’s their own fault. They invented the software in the first place. I say to them, “F-k You. If you hadn’t invented the MP3 player or the f-king software to download the s-t, it wouldn’t have f-king happened. If you didn’t invent CD burners, if you didn’t mass produce them and sell them, people wouldn’t download the music.”
I saw in a recent interview that you were attacking bands that use Webcams in the studio and write Web diaries.
It’s just nerdy, isn’t it? Who’s gonna sit there all day and go, “Ooooh, look! There’s [Radiohead lead singer] Thom [Yorke]! Ohhh, look what he’s got on!” F-king get a life.
Your relationship with your brother and the band has been notoriously stormy. If a lot of that is behind you, what helped you bury the hatchet?
I don’t do drugs and he doesn’t drink so much. Liam’s got more things to concentrate on. He’s got two kids, he’s got his songwriting, he’s got the band. Maybe three, four years ago he just had his drinking, which he concentrated on heavily-and he was f-king good at it.
Your brother reiterated recently that you guys are still the greatest rock band in the world. Are you? What, today, makes Oasis distinctly Oasis?
Music should lift people out of their daily lives and take them somewhere else for three minutes. Not ram home to them how s-t the world is, because it’s not. Sometimes life is very, very f-king good for people. We like being rock stars. Whereas people like-and I keep coming back to Thom Yorke-he just seems so miserable. You feel like going up to him and saying, “Why don’t you just stop and go f-king live in a monastery somewhere where nobody will photograph you, nobody will interview you, you don’t have to do videos, you don’t have to do f-king nothing.” For every whinging rock star, there’s a guy working on a construction site thinking, “Well, f-k you! I have to work at 6 a.m. in the f-king morning. In the rain. Work my fingers to the bone for like 500 f-king dollars a week, and you are making millions of dollars and you’re still not happy?” I think that’s an insult.
OK, what about some other bands like Travis and Coldplay and Starsailor.
I like Travis. I absolutely adore Coldplay. Starsailor is appalling. The guy sounds like he’s been strangled. None of these bands seem to have heard of Chuck Berry. It’s all jingly-jangly with acoustic guitars and piano here and there. It’s like, “Throw a bit of f-king ‘Johnny B. Goode’ in for us, for f-k’s sake. Can we dance?”
What about the Strokes?
The Strokes and Black Rebel Motorcycle Club: they’re young and they play guitars and they wear black leather jackets and they’ve got long hair. It’s so important for kids to get away from this f-king speed metal/Slipknot/System of a Down/f-king rubbish about the blackness of life and the darkness of the future. Sing about girls and drinking.
Are you interested in hearing what some college kids had to say about you guys?
Oh, yeah, go on.
A student at Brown University took an informal poll. Here’s what one student said. She said: “I remember one girl in high school adopted a British accent and talked like that forever more because of Oasis. During a field trip, the teacher played it and it was like the closest thing to class unity we ever had. It was incredible and the whole class was together singing it and smiling, laughing, taking pictures.”
I think that’s really special. If people get like that to music, then I’m glad it’s my music. That’s fantastic.
Here’s another college student: " ‘What’s The Story (Morning Glory)’ is one of my favorite early-’90s albums, but I’m not sure I’d want to hang out with them."
I would understand that. I listen to John Lennon’s music on a daily basis, but I’m not sure I’d like to hang out with him, either. You can tell him for me I wouldn’t wish him to hang out with us either.
