Hello, hello, it's good to be back
Hello, hello, it’s good to be back
“You gonna wake up then, or what?”
As we launch this new magazine, in the shops tomorrow, it’s exactly 31 years – almost to the minute – since Oasis first sauntered on to the NME stage at the Glastonbury Festival and into the consciousness of the wider world. Up until this point the band had been joyously heralded by the weekly music papers for six months, and available to witness at only around 30 gigs in provincial pubs and clubs. This, then – for a group who had released their debut single six weeks previously – was undoubtedly a big one.
Oasis play for 30 minutes, but from what I recall from watching them out in the field that day, it feels much longer. The performance is poised and spectacularly unhurried, as if they have everything completely under control and are proceeding, from “Shakermaker” to “I Am The Walrus”, at their own serene pace, according to their own plan.
There’s a point during the instrumental break of “Supersonic” where Liam Gallagher stands completely still and simply drinks it all in, for a moment the calm centre of the storm. He reviews the Manchester City T shirts, the massive gathering, the crowd surfing. If he was thinking that he’d arrived in style and on schedule, he wouldn’t have been wrong.
It’s this side of Oasis – the poise, the accomplishment, the bravura self-confidence – that we particularly celebrate in this 172-page definitive edition. There are insightful in-depth reviews of every Oasis album, and of Noel and Liam’s solo careers. There’s an introduction from Liam and an affectionate afterword from Bonehead – and an eight-page foldout miscellany and timeline to complement the story.
Maybe best of all are the archive interviews. Writers from NME and Melody Maker are there throughout the band’s career, but it’s the ones who are there at the start who have the privilege of witnessing the charisma, and accomplishment of a group the like of which they haven’t seen for quite some time.
“Nice one, see you later,” Liam says as he and Noel leave the stage that day. It’s admittedly quite a lot later, but we welcome them back now for all of the same reasons we welcomed them then.
Enjoy the magazine. You can reserve your limited edition hardback here.
