Noel Gallagher
Noel Thomas David Gallagher is an English musician, singer and songwriter. Gallagher is the primary songwriter, lead guitarist and a co-lead vocalist of the rock band Oasis. After leaving Oasis, he formed Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds. Gallagher is one of the most successful songwriters in British music history, as the writer of eight UK number-one singles and co-writer of a further number one, as well as the sole or primary writer of twelve UK number-one studio albums. He is widely considered to be one of the most influential songwriters in the history of British rock music, cited by numerous major subsequent artists as an influence.
Gallagher began playing the guitar at the age of twelve, and became a roadie and technician for Inspiral Carpets when he was 21. He learnt that his younger brother Liam had joined a band called the Rain, which Liam subsequently renamed to Oasis; Liam invited him to join the group as manager. After rejecting the offer, Gallagher agreed to join the band, on the condition that he would take creative control of the group and become its sole songwriter and lead guitarist.
The band's debut album, Definitely Maybe, was a widespread critical and commercial success. Their second album, Morning Glory?, reached the top of the album charts in many countries, and their third studio album, Be Here Now, became the fastest-selling album in UK chart history. Britpop eventually declined in popularity, and Oasis failed to revive it, though their final two albums, Don't Believe the Truth and Dig Out Your Soul, were hailed as their best efforts in over a decade. In August 2009, following an altercation with his brother, Gallagher announced his departure from Oasis. He went on to form Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds, with whom he has released four studio albums.
Oasis's time was marked by turbulence, especially during the peak of Britpop, during which Gallagher was involved in several disputes with Liam. Their conflicts and wild lifestyles regularly made tabloid headlines. The band had a rivalry with fellow Britpop band Blur. Gallagher himself was often regarded as a pioneer and spearhead of the Britpop movement. Many have praised his songwriting, with Beatles producer George Martin calling him "the finest songwriter of his generation". Conversely, he was voted the most overrated guitarist of the last millennium in a 1999 poll, which he named as the accolade he most enjoyed receiving, and the ninth-most-overrated ever in a 2002 listener survey.
Early life
Noel Thomas David Gallagher was born on 29 May 1967 in the Longsight area of Manchester, to Irish Catholic parents Peggy and Thomas Gallagher. Aside from Liam, he also has an older brother named Paul. Shortly after Liam's birth in 1972, the family moved to Ashby Avenue and then Cranwell Drive in the Manchester suburb of Burnage. As the eldest child, Paul was given his own bedroom while Noel had to share his bedroom with Liam.Described as "the weirdo in the family" by Liam, he was known to be a daydreamer and a loner who was often reclusive due to his unhappy childhood. Both he and Paul were beaten regularly by their father, who was an alcoholic. In the documentary Supersonic, Noel quipped that his father "beat the talent into him", and that he had never acknowledged or discussed the abuse with a mental health doctor or in a therapeutic setting. Both he and Paul struggled with stammers which were made worse by their father's abuse and were resolved with weekly sessions in four years of speech therapy.
In 1976, Peggy acquired legal separation from Thomas, and in 1982 she left him, taking her three sons with her and continuing to raise them alone as a single mother.
As teenagers, the Gallagher brothers were regular truants, often getting into trouble with the police. When his mother took a job in the school canteen, Gallagher ensured that he stopped by to visit her during lunch before skipping the rest of the day. He was expelled from school at the age of 15 for allegedly throwing a flour bomb at a teacher, though he has since said that he did not do it and that he was merely present in the classroom when it happened. He used to hang around with the Manchester City hooligan firms Maine Line Crew, Under-5s, and Young Guvnors in the 1980s, and received six months' probation at the age of 14 for robbing a corner shop. It was during this period of probation, with little else to do, that he first began to teach himself to play guitar, a gift from his mother. He would play his favourite songs from the radio, and was particularly inspired by the debut of the Smiths on Top of the Pops in 1983, performing their single "This Charming Man". He later said that, from that day on, he "wanted to be Johnny Marr". He also appeared for Manchester Gaelic football team CLG Oisín at Croke Park in Dublin in 1983.
As teenagers, the Gallagher brothers maintained limited contact with their father and secured jobs in construction, but the relationship between father and sons continued to be tempestuous; Gallagher said, "Because we were always arguing, we'd still be working at nine o'clock every night." Having left his father's building company, he took a job at another building firm sub-contracted to British Gas. He sustained an injury when a heavy cap from a steel gas pipe landed on his right foot. Following a period of recuperation, he was offered a less physically demanding role in the company's storehouse, freeing up time for him to practise the guitar and write songs. He said he had written at least three of the songs on Definitely Maybe in this storehouse, including "Live Forever". He later called the storehouse "The Hit Hut" and claimed the walls were painted gold. Much of the late 1980s found Gallagher unemployed and living in a bedsit, occupying his time by using recreational drugs, writing songs, and playing the guitar.
In May 1988, Gallagher met guitarist Graham Lambert of Inspiral Carpets during a Stone Roses show. The two became acquainted and Gallagher became a regular at Inspiral Carpets shows. When he heard singer Steve Holt was leaving the band, he auditioned to be the new vocalist. He was unsuccessful, but became part of the band's road crew for the next two years. He struck up a friendship with monitor engineer Mark Coyle over their love of the Beatles, and the pair spent soundchecks dissecting the group's songs.
Around the time of his work with the Inspiral Carpets, Gallagher—who had already begun writing his own songs—answered an advert in a local newspaper asking for a collaborator and to record some demos. These recordings were Gallagher's first steps into recording his own music.
Career
Oasis
In 1991, Gallagher returned from an American tour with Inspiral Carpets to find that his brother Liam had become a singer with a local band called the Rain. He attended one of their concerts at Manchester's Boardwalk but was unimpressed by the group's act. After rejecting an offer from Liam to be the band's manager, Gallagher agreed to join the band, on the condition that he would take creative control of the group and become its sole songwriter. According to another source, Noel told Liam and the rest of the group after having heard them play for the first time: "Let me write your songs and I'll take you to superstardom, or else you'll rot here in Manchester". His control over the band in its early years earned him the nickname "The Chief".In May 1993, the band heard that a record executive from Creation Records would be scouting for talent at King Tut's in Glasgow. Together, they found the money to hire a van and make the six-hour journey. When they arrived, they were refused entry to the club because no one notified the venue that Oasis had been added to the bill. The band eventually secured the opening slot and played a four-song set that impressed Creation founder Alan McGee.
McGee then took the Live Demonstration tape to Sony America and invited Oasis to meet with him a week later in London, at which point they were signed to a six-album contract. Gallagher has since claimed that he only had six songs written at the time, and has put his success in the interview down to "bullshitting". McGee believes that when they met, Gallagher had fifty or so songs written, and merely lied about how prolific he had been following the contract. Richard Ashcroft was so impressed with Oasis during the time that he invited them to tour with his band the Verve as an opening act.
Gallagher said he wrote Oasis' first single, "Supersonic", in "the time it takes to play the song". "Supersonic" was released in early 1994 and peaked at No. 31 on the official UK charts. The single was later followed by Oasis' debut album Definitely Maybe, which was released in August 1994 and was a critical and commercial success. It became the fastest-selling debut album in British history at the time and entered the UK charts at number one. Despite their rapidly growing popularity, Gallagher briefly left Oasis in 1994 during their first American tour. The conditions were poor, and he felt the American audience—still preoccupied with grunge and metal—did not understand the band. Gallagher stated that his early songs, especially "Live Forever", were written to refute grunge's pessimism. Tensions mounted between him and Liam, culminating in a fight after a disastrous gig in Los Angeles. Having effectively decided to quit the music industry, he flew to San Francisco without telling the band, management or the crew. It was during this time that Gallagher wrote "Talk Tonight" as a "thank you" for the girl he stayed with, who "talked him from off the ledge". He was tracked down by Creation's Tim Abbot, and during a trip by the pair to Las Vegas, Gallagher decided to continue with the band. He reconciled with his brother and the tour resumed in Minneapolis.
File:EpiphoneSupernova.jpg|thumb|upright=0.7|left|Gallagher first played a customised Sheraton guitar with Union Jack paintwork—commercially sold as Supernova—in late 1995 during the Morning Glory? Tour.
Gallagher followed up the debut in 1995 with Oasis' first UK number-one single in "Some Might Say". This preceded their second album, Morning Glory?, released later that year. Though it suffered initial critical apathy, the album became the second fastest-selling album ever in the UK, entering the UK album charts at number one and peaking at number four on the US Billboard 200 chart.
The success of Oasis and his newfound fame and fortune were not lost on Gallagher, and both he and his brother became famous for their "rock and roll lifestyle". They drank heavily, abused drugs, fought fans, critics, peers, and each other, and made celebrity friends such as Ian Brown, Paul Weller, Mani, Mick Jagger, Craig Cash, Kate Moss and Johnny Depp. Gallagher spent extravagantly, buying various cars and a swimming pool despite the fact he can neither drive nor swim. He named his house in Belsize Park in London Supernova Heights, and his two cats "Benson" and "Hedges" after his favourite brand of cigarettes.
Oasis went on to have greater success with their next two singles, "Wonderwall" and "Don't Look Back in Anger", charting at number two and number one, respectively, the former becoming their sole top 10 hit in the US. Originally, Noel had wanted to take lead vocals on "Wonderwall", but Liam insisted on singing it. As compensation, Noel decided he would sing lead vocals on "Don't Look Back in Anger". 1995 also saw Gallagher play two songs for the charity album Help!: "Fade Away", accompanied by friend and Oasis fan Johnny Depp and Depp's then-girlfriend Kate Moss; and the Beatles' 1969 hit "Come Together", along with Paul Weller, Paul McCartney and others in a supergroup called Smokin' Mojo Filters. He began collaborating with the Chemical Brothers, Ian Brown, the Stands, the Prodigy and Weller, amongst others. Gallagher became so influential that a June 1996 NME article argued that "if Noel Gallagher, the most successful songwriter of his generation, champions a group, then said group are guaranteed more mainstream kudos and, quite possibly, more sales. And since Noel has taken to championing only five or six groups, then it's a powerful cabal he's promoting." The NME article grouped the bands Gallagher praised, including the Boo Radleys, Ocean Colour Scene, and Cast, under the banner of "Noelrock". John Harris typified these bands, and Gallagher, of "sharing a dewy-eyed love of the 1960s, a spurning of much beyond rock's most basic ingredients, and a belief in the supremacy of 'real music'".
In March 1996, Gallagher and his brother Liam met their father again when the News of the World paid him to go to their hotel during a tour. He left for his room, later commenting "as far as I'm concerned, I haven't got a father. He's not a father to me, y'know? I don't respect him in any way whatsoever". In August 1996, Oasis sold out two nights at Knebworth, playing to over 250,000 fans. Following the worldwide success of Morning Glory?, Be Here Now became Oasis' most eagerly anticipated album to date. As with the previous two albums, all the tracks were written by Gallagher. After an initial blaze of publicity, positive critical reviews, and commercial success, the album failed to live up to long-term expectations, and public goodwill towards Be Here Now was short-lived. The album was ultimately regarded by many as a bloated, over-indulgent version of Oasis, which Gallagher has since blamed on the drug-addicted state and indifference of the band at the time. While the album was a recordbreaker, selling 813,000 copies in seven days, Gallagher has been critical of the album's popularity, saying: "Just because you sell lots of records, it doesn't mean to say you're any good. Look at Phil Collins."
Gallagher began to have drug-induced panic attacks during this period. His depression and paranoia inspired the song "Gas Panic!", subsequently included on the 2000 album Standing on the Shoulder of Giants. He said he stopped using illicit drugs on 5 June 1998. Gallagher stated in 2001, "I liked drugs, I was good at them. But I'd had panic attacks for about a year and I stopped because I wanted to. After you make the decision, it is quite easy." Of the period between 1993 and 1998, Gallagher said, "I can hardly remember a thing." In a 2020 interview Gallagher said that once, during that period, he ended up in a hospital in Detroit for an overdose, and that the doctors didn't understand the situation because of their misunderstanding for Gallagher's accent. He told about the experience: "You know, imagine having the psychosis and going to a hospital and having to go through a metal detector and someone asking you what's wrong with you? And they don't understand the words you're saying because of your accent. They're just like, 'Okay, I'm gonna go get someone else. Hang on a minute'".
After the hype surrounding the release of Be Here Now had started to wane, critical response to the band became calmer and more considered, leading to a media backlash. In 1997, Gallagher was criticised for attending a high-profile and well-publicised media party at 10 Downing Street, hosted by the new Prime Minister, Tony Blair, along with other celebrities and industry figures who had supported New Labour in the run-up to the general election. Liam and Blur's Damon Albarn declined their invitations, with Albarn commenting "Enjoy the schmooze, comrade". The perception of Gallagher as someone now mixing with politicians and a famous photograph of him sipping champagne with Blair conflicted with the "working class hero" status championed through songs such as "Up in the Sky". Noel Gallagher was also banned from visiting China in 1997 after his solo performance at the Tibetan Freedom Concert.
In 1999, rhythm guitarist Paul "Bonehead" Arthurs quit the band, with bassist Paul McGuigan following soon afterwards. As a result, the fourth studio album, Standing on the Shoulder of Giants, was recorded by just the Gallaghers and drummer Alan White, with Noel playing all guitar parts. He later commented on Bonehead's departure, "It's hardly Paul McCartney leaving the Beatles, is it?". After the recording sessions were completed, Gallagher selected Gem Archer to join in place of Bonehead.
Later that year Alan McGee decided to leave Creation and sold the rest of his 51% stake in the label to Sony. Gallagher took this opportunity to set up Big Brother Recordings, which took over Oasis' distribution in the UK, but Sony imprint Epic Records continued to handle the band's international distribution. Around the time of the album's release, Andy Bell, formerly of Ride, joined the band as bassist. In 2001, Gallagher formed his label, Sour Mash Records, which released records by the likes of Shack and Proud Mary. The incorporation of the label followed Gallagher's debut as a producer, working with Proud Mary on their debut, The Same Old Blues. In 2003, Gallagher received songwriting credits from Girls Aloud's single "Life Got Cold" due to the song's guitar riff being similar to "Wonderwall".
In late 2006, Gallagher toured the UK, Europe, Japan, America and Australia in a series of acclaimed intimate semi-acoustic gigs accompanied by Gem Archer and Terry Kirkbride on percussion. The show proved successful and a further series of sets took place in 2007. March 2007 saw Gallagher perform in Moscow—the first time an Oasis member has performed in Russia. Gallagher dismissed claims that he was planning to embark on a solo career. In early 2007, Gallagher joined the rest of Oasis to collect the "Outstanding Contribution to Music" Award at the Brit Awards 2007.
Gallagher, along with the band recorded their seventh studio album between 2007 and the next year at Abbey Road Studios and in Los Angeles. At the end of the summer of 2008 the band began a tour that lasted 12 months. In March 2009, The Times in conjunction with iTunes released a selection of live recordings by Noel Gallagher taken from his semi-acoustic performance at the Royal Albert Hall on 27 March 2007 in aid of Teenage Cancer Trust. The Dreams We Have as Children features classic and rare tracks from the Oasis canon along with several cover versions of some of Gallagher's favourite artists.
On 28 August 2009, Gallagher quit Oasis after a fight with his brother, Liam. Shortly before midnight, Gallagher posted a statement on his message board called "Tales from the Middle of Nowhere" on the band's website announcing his departure.
The band announced a 2025 reunion world tour in August 2024.