Or, Oasis without Noel. And which one was he? The one with the eyebrows? The one who fought all the time? The one with the Beatles fixation? Okay, that isn't helping. He was the one with the guitar and supposedly, the talent. I guess he must have been the most difficult one as well, since the rest of the band sided with Liam and has hung around to quickly stick out this new disc.
Noel was the writer, so now that task falls to Liam along with Gem Archer and Andy Bell. The trio's task was to come up with songs as good as the ones on the last few Oasis albums. AHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Well, that wasn't too difficult. Actually, one hopes they could do a better job, and in fact, they seem to have, or at least this is a lot more interesting than... ah, what was the name of any of the last few Oasis albums?
While there's no Wonderwall, this is a pretty good rock band album, with it's influences obvious, as they always have been with Oasis, Noel-led or not. There are Beatle moments galore, mostly middle-period psychedelic ones. The cut Wigwam is Rain-soaked, for instance. There's just as many moments that suggest Wings though, and the more poppy Stones, and basically the heyday of British studio rock. What's new here is some fresh ideas from the new writing trio, and perhaps they are now a group more willing to dabble in fun. There's no overriding attempt at heaviness here.
It's a decent disc from a group most North Americans never really cared about, and certainly didn't expect much else from. We didn't live through the great Britpop wars of the mid-90's, and have little residual respect for the bloodied veterans. For us, the Fighting Gallaghers were simply Charlie Sheen with accents. For me, the thing that has stood out about the group has always been Liam's voice. Noel's been unable to lead the group into anything but nostalgia for a decade, so with the relative quality of this album, his departure must be considered positive. Beady Eye - the name sucks, but the band surprisingly does not.
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