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Post by Deleted on Feb 9, 2016 9:06:09 GMT -5
Gaz doesn't really post that much about Noel, it just looks that way from this thread because people on this forum presumably would be a lot more interested in stuff relating to Noel than a lot of other stuff he posts... Also he gets asked questions about the shelved album/Noel collaborations a lot more than other stuff, so it's not surprising that he'll keep talking about it whilst people are still asking questions
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Post by defmaybe00 on Feb 9, 2016 9:51:58 GMT -5
Gaz doesn't really post that much about Noel, it just looks that way from this thread because people on this forum presumably would be a lot more interested in stuff relating to Noel than a lot of other stuff he posts... Also he gets asked questions about the shelved album/Noel collaborations a lot more than other stuff, so it's not surprising that he'll keep talking about it whilst people are still asking questions I know I was joking,I see he usually replies to comments under his posts,although he still sounds a bit salty about the whole thing...but that's understandable
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Post by skinfullofdope on Mar 5, 2016 5:49:19 GMT -5
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Post by mossy on Mar 5, 2016 7:40:37 GMT -5
Are the Right Stuff versions in there the 3D remixes?
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Post by matt on Mar 5, 2016 15:55:10 GMT -5
Wow, it's been about 7 years since that Falling Down remix!!!!
According to many critics, and fans of Noel himself, that and The Right Stuff are the best things he's done in recent years. Arguably so.
Anyway, the tapes obviously haven't been destroyed as AA have copies of them - the hunt for them is on! Would make a great Indiana Jones movie - basically one dripping with LSD, heck it can't be as bad as the last one!
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Post by The Escapist on Mar 5, 2016 16:18:09 GMT -5
Wow, it's been about 7 years since that Falling Down remix!!!! According to many critics, and fans of Noel himself, that and The Right Stuff are the best things he's done in recent years. Arguably so. Anyway, the tapes obviously haven't been destroyed as AA have copies of them - the hunt for them is on! Would make a great Indiana Jones movie - basically one dripping with LSD, heck it can't be as bad as the last one! It would make a great Mighty Boosh episode:
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Post by mossy on Apr 21, 2016 8:20:23 GMT -5
Alright, this post will probably set a record for the longest ever, sorry for that…Anyway, leaving all the mutual accusations and bashing between Noel and the AA (in person of Gaz Cobain) aside, I’ve basically just tried to compile a proper recording sessions guide including supportive quotes form the involved parties. I’ve read through all the various press articles on the lost album since 2011 I could find very carefully, and especially Gaz’ Facebook ramblings too, and just put the relevant information together without much thinking…I had the impression that this topic really needed some kind of summary, as there’s always the same questions and speculations arising whenever it brought up again (no offence meant, by the way). Thanks to everyone involved in this thread and the other discussions that dealt with the subject and particularly the ones that had posted links to news articles, interviews etc., especially to mossy and The Crimson Rambler! Oh, and this is by no means complete or free of errors, you’ll notice the quotes are sometimes quite contradictory. Please feel free to add and correct. After all, I’ve just tried to put the focus on the actual music to find out what really was recorded by Noel and the AA/by the AA for Noel/by Noel without knowledge of the AA. So there you go… Dusty Attic Productions, Kent, UK – Fall/Winter 2009 until late 2011 Producers/Writers: Gaz Cobain, Brian Dougans and Noel Gallagher Recording Engineers: James Stone, … • Ballad Of The Mighty I [possibly titled “The Mighty I”] • Broken Arrow [?] • Crimson Rambler • Dream On [?] • Everybody’s On The Run • Freaky Teeth • If I Had A Gun… [2 versions] • Record Machine • Shoot A Hole Into The Sun [released on the b-side of the “Dream On”-single] • Soldier Boys And Jesus Freaks • Stop The Clocks • (Stranded On) The Wrong Beach [?] • Teotihuacan • The Death Of You And Me [Short snippets can be heard at the start and end of the official AKA…What A Life! video] • The Mexican [revised version released on “Chasing Yesterday”] • The Right Stuff [revised version released on “Chasing Yesterday”] • The Song Doesn’t Remain The Same • What A Life! [?] [Remix found on the b-side of “Everybody’s On The Run” was mixed after the main sessions and was not intended for the album] • … Other musicians possibly involved - “11 musicians” were involved according to Gaz Cobain (the following lists the extended AA band members; names and descriptions courtesy of the AA MySpace): Dave Sanderson - Owl vocalising and conga rhythms of the ancients Gary Lucas - His Guitarness.... [confirmed] Alisha Sufit - Voice from the Magic Carpet Stu Rowe and Antony Argiros - the lost chords Baluji Shrivastav and Jonathan Mayer- sitar, tablas and the Om Mikey Rowe and Rainy Moor - Analogue Overlords of the Vintage Keys and Hammond Dimension Virgil Howe - Drum Circle of One [confirmed] Kez Gunes - the Pulse of the Lower Frequencies Edd Keene - Upper Chakra Flutes Dianne Harris - Woman with burning vision As so often since the aborted/unreleased DIV sessions, Terry Kirkbride was involved recording the drums as well. This is proven by the only studio footage that has surfaced so far, showing the recording of Shoot A Hole Into The Sun: This is apparently the only image proof of the AA and Noel together in the studio: SUPPORTIVE QUOTES ON THE RECORDED SONGS: "no the one you're thinking of that we DID do was ' the song doesn't remain the same ' unfortunately that one was scrapped cos it was the quietest revolution of all time" (in reply to someone asking whether they were involved in Whilst the Song Remains the Same) "WHAT A LIFE ...we never chose it for our album cos we never liked it &.it was.just a remix after the event" “I agreed since most of our time had been spent writing the 4/5 new trax the Right stuff / Shoot a Hole / Crimson Rambler / MEXICAN so mixing had fallen by the wayside .”“this prompted me to spend another week being much more OUT THERE ,eventually creating 'SHOOT A HOLE 'when i already had two great versions of IF I HAD A GUN...”"[Teotihuacan] was brought forward for our consideration..."(Excerpts of posts from Gaz Cobain on his Facebook) Noel mentioned in early promo interviews for his “regular” debut that the 3 singles from that album (The Death Of You And Me, If I Had A Gun, What A Life) would be reworked for the AA album. Can’t find a direct quote unfortunately, but definitely can recall reading it a couple of times. Here’s Noel possibly referring to the AA version of Ballad Of The Mighty I: "Take the Ballad of the Mighty I. Pure dance tune. For some time I’ve had a slower psychedelic version of that song with conga’s, very 1969. In in the back my mind I had the idea to make it lighter, a bassline played by my engineer Paul Stacey and a drum beat was added. They give it the needed energy. Then Johnny Marr did his thing and he really made a twisted disco tune."(Oor magazine, January 2015, Thanks to General Dread, @mimihopps and Mean Mrs. Mustard for translating) He had also mentioned that Ballad Of The Mighty I was indeed recorded with the AA in the BBC Mastertapes interview in December 2014 James Stone, one of the recording engineers at Dusty Attic referred to Ballad Of The Mighty I on Twitter (@dustyatticpro) in early 2014: “@je_suisNatalie What happened to the Noel & Amorphous Androgynous album? That is what I want to know.” “@grantyh @je_suisnatalie he shelved it. I was one of the recording engineers on the album. Amazing songs, real shame. Mighty I is a killer” “noel has told hotpress ireland he sent amorphous androgynous if i had a gun,soldier boys and jesus freaks,everybodys on the run,record machine and stop the clocks. he said that soldier boys instrumental break went from 40 secs to 4mins and goes from rock to reggae to krautrock! (…) but he says that only 3 or 4 tracks from high flying birds will appear on amorphous album with 10 new tracks!”I couldn’t find a transcript or scan of this interview that originally appeared in Hot Press magazine in August/September 2011, so I had to quote user “rickrock79” from the official NGHFB forum. www.noelgallagher.com/old/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=1193Funnily enough, The Right & The Mexican originally weren’t even supposed to be on Chasing Yesterday. The Right Stuff was originally supposed to be b-side in a longer instrumental form, The Mexican wasn’t even on the original running order and was just added to lighten things up after the “emotionally heavy” (can’t find the exact Noel quote) songs that preceed it. THE CHRONOLOGY OF THE NONE-RELEASE (in the words of Noel Gallagher) “The album’s [due in early/mid-2012] got 18 tracks on it. Some of it’s Vaudeville, some of it’s actual space jazz, some of it’s Krautrock, some of it’s soul, some of it’s funk… and that’s just the first song. It’s the furthest out I’ve ever been, put it that way.” (Album announcement/press conference, 6th July 2011) “It sounds a bit like Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon. The sound is similar to High Flying Birds, but more psychedelic and tripped out. It’s not an electronic project. People are jumping to that conclusion because Amorphous Androgynous used to be an electronic outfit. I’m not even sure what the album’s title is going to be yet. I’m just fucking about with the mixes now. When will it be out? In my head, next summer. But if High Flying Birds is a success, then not until next winter.”(Spin, September 2011) www.spin.com/2011/09/qa-noel-gallagher-solo-lp-oasis/"I've got a break in the middle of this tour in July, so now the plan is to do something then, and then to finish it off after the tour in October. So it might come out at the end of the year, but it's more likely to be next year now. […] I set the benchmark pretty high with this record [Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds], and I'm not just putting [out] a record for the f**king sake of it. At the moment it's not a great record – so it won't come out until it is."(NME, February 2012) www.nme.com/news/noel-gallagher/62040"Well, yes, it's recorded but it's not mixed. And whether it'll ever see the light of day or not, I don't know. There's a lot of work left to be done. A lot of work. I just did my bits in the studio and left it up to the Amorphous Androgynous to artistically direct it. And unfortunately for everybody, they've not finished it."(AZ Central, April 2012) “The second album [with Amorphous Androgynous] ended up having to be scrapped. (…) I don’t think it will come out. I’m pleased with the songs. The songs that I did when I was in the studio—I’ll probably re-record them. But the moment has passed, I think. Do you know what I mean? When you have records, there’s a window before their moment passes. I’ve already moved on from that Amorphous Androgynous thing. I’ve written a bunch more songs since then, so I’m afraid—unfortunately—the success of this album killed that one. I wasn’t planning on being on tour for 15 months. Well, it was a record that contains songs that weren’t conventional songs. It wasn’t verse-chorus-verse-chorus. They’re a bit trippy and a bit floaty. My songs, in general, they don’t really rely on the mix. They’re all written on acoustic guitar. They’re as good with me just singing them into the microphone in the style of Bob Dylan as they are with a full band. The High Flying Birds album didn’t rely on the mixes. The songs were there. This was a record that—absolutely, 100 percent—relied on the mixes, because they weren’t songs, so to speak. They were grooves and, you know, there weren’t many chords in them. And the mixes weren’t fucking right. And unfortunately, I didn’t have time to go back in and remix it. And now I’m too fucked. I’m fucked. I’ve been on the road for 15 months. I am fucked.”(AV Club, October 2012) www.avclub.com/article/noel-gallagher-on-going-solo-and-working-with-hipp-87837“But for all the great ideas on it… I was in the middle of a tour, that last album had blown up, the mixes weren't right. And by the time I got back off tour I was just like, 'I'm not fucking putting out another record, I can't be arsed'.” The former Oasis man added that track 'The Right Stuff' from his upcoming album 'Chasing Yesterday', which began its life on the Amorphous Androgynous album, is "vastly different from the first one." He said: "The [song] in this record is vastly different from the first one, which had a lot of noodling and fucking about. It's become quite psychedelic, jazz, fucking whatever you wanna call it."(NME, January 2015) www.nme.com/news/noel-gallagher/82326#bjLMHifyr830Cd0A.99“Oh yeah, Shoot a Hole Into the Sun. That was amazing and it was the one good thing that came out of that record. On this record, The Right Stuff was born out of that project – but what's on the album is completely different. If I played you what was done by Amorphous Androgynous, you'd barely recognise it. We were doing a completely different track that's never come out, which right at the end had those three chords as an outro thing. I didn't think anything of it and went back to the studio the next day, and they'd looped those three chords and I played drums and put a bit of a beat on it. I wrote a song around that. When it came to this album, I thought that the idea was good, but the execution wasn't very good – so I re-recorded it, got a saxophone player. [It was] the same with The Mexican, which came out of another tune which I started played the riff of. It had a bit of a vibe.”(entertainment.ie, February 2015) entertainment.ie/music/news/Interview-entertainmentie-speaks-to-Noel-Gallagher-Part-1/347042.htmTHE GENESIS AND DOWNFALL OF AN ALBUM (according to Gaz Cobain) “Between 2009 and 2011, I was obsessed with Noel Gallagher. During that period, we spent four weeks in the studio with him. The rest of the time it was just Brian [Dougans, the other half of AA] and me, in control of the budgets, all the music and the musicians. We got in Gary Lucas from Captain Beefheart’s Magic Band and Virgil Howe, son of Steve Howe of Yes, to give an idea of how far-out we were going.”(The Guardian, May 2015) www.theguardian.com/music/2015/may/07/noel-gallagher-oasis-amorphous-androgynous-too-afraid-to-be-weird“We spent two years working on what was supposed to be the solo album with Noel.”(musicfeeds.com, April 2015) musicfeeds.com.au/features/amorphous-androgynous-gaz-cobain-talks-working-with-noel-gallagher-paul-weller-ian-astbury-more/ “…he recorded another album, which did straight version, in exactly the same order as ours…” “…he actually recorded another album in secret that also completely copied our track order…”(digitalaudioreview.net, April 2015) www.digitalaudioreview.net/2015/04/noel-gallaghers-lost-amorphous-androgynous-album/“He basically came out when we'd been making an album for about a year and a half, and he said: 'I'm not releasing one album, I'm releasing two.' That was the first time I heard about it, and I'd been working on his record for a year and a half, and I didn't even know that he'd been recording the same stuff that we were doing in a straight form. I mean, we were the only people who had ever made him improvise on the spot, and we wrote backing tracks for him. Both of those tracks [The Right Stuff & The Mexican] - we wrote the backing tracks, we worked on them for six months waiting for our moment to come, and we finally get him to come to the party. He writes some lyrics and some basslines, and do you know who he thinks wrote those tracks?”Interviewer: “Noel?” “Yes, him. On his new record, we are co-producers - we're not even writers.”(The Quietus, May 2015) thequietus.com/articles/17837-amorphous-androgynous-garry-cobain-on-noel-gallagher“...[Noel] expected us to join the suffering masochists that hang around him , contributing without credit ( like the 11 musicians ( mostly friends of mine ( sorry again guys ! ) but even a couple of Noels friends he brought in ( I say 'friends' but it was me who rang them personally to explain and apologize )who's credits mysteriously disappeared from the sleeve of DREAM ON / SHOOT A HOLE ( didn't quite fit the picture of solo career maybe ) DESPITE us delivering them months in advance of the deadline for our sleeve art credits ?)
everything was amazing but it needed bigger mixes- we agreed since we'd spent way too much time writing new tracks ( the Right Stuff/ the Mexican/ Shoot a Hole plus a coupla others ) to be able to mix to the fullest....so it seemed a good plan....he went on tour with the other album and gradually realized he couldn't be arsed...”
„We took on his songs( apart from the new ones we wrote ) in pretty much their natural flow ( bar the odd extended Intro / instrumental break or freak out here and there ) as soon as you get near to his song he just doesn't 'get it 'and wants it guitar / bass / drums so your best bet is just gratuitously fucking with it - turn it into new songs . He's very impressed / wowed by that .I never wanted to do that cos actually the songs I chose I liked but just wanted more colour and depth and imagination ( and groove at points ) . Once he decided to secretly record his straight versions and ours was a 'radical remixes ' album ours was kinda fucked cos he overlooked to tell us of any such plan and therefore he wouldn't want to muddy the water with other 'competitive ' versions of the song . In other words , radical remixes suits him cos they don't threaten his version ...“ „Hence the only things he's released by us are either radical or completely new ( but in my opinion nowhere near the best stuff - our 2 mixes of IF I HAD A GUN ( before a 3rd - SHOOT A HOLE was done out of embarrassment he kept comparing our 'shit ' album to DARK SIDE OF THE MOON ) are possibly my favourite.“
„To be honest... the biggest disappointment for me in all of this is that in the end our material was just cherry picked to give him obscurity credibility when actually the best things we did ( imo )were actually perfectly measured songs flowing ( not abstracted ) but very creatively produced... something i believe which would have been loved by his fans hungry for a little expansion but also non-believers .....“(Gaz Cobain’s Facebook, 2015) And last but not least… GAZ COBAIN ON REMIXING CHASING YESTERDAY „…oh and by the way we were remixing the whole of CHASING YESTERDAY before we realized what was happening with the Right Stuff and the Mexican......not quite so clear cut now is it ?“
„The dissolution of that particular job ( free rein to remix an alternative CHASING YESTERDAY all agreed , contracts drawn up, ready to sign ) was us asking 'awkward' questions about' the right stuff 'and 'the MEXICAN ' in terms our writing credits.“
„…our CHASING YESTERDAY would have included us finalizing our original versions of both songs [The Right Stuff/The Mexican]“
“we chose RIVERMAN as one of the 8 we WERE working from Chasing Yesterday album but no way did it start our album - closed it ( or should I say what we had in mind closed it )”
“Don't worry Noel I got them all including multitracks for all your solo albums including Chasing Yesterday ... How the hell we were remixing his latest 'opus ' when we're so 'shit' is beyond me unless”(Excerpts of posts from Gaz Cobain on his Facebook) Bumping this post cos I just enjoyed rereading it. Muchos respect to asimarx
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Post by mossy on Apr 21, 2016 11:02:28 GMT -5
They've said that SAHITS is the least representative track of the album. That's more of a remix and was done in reaction to all of Noel's "Pink Floyd on mescaline while surfing and playing African nose flute" comments. They said the main meat of the album is just Noel's songs with a bit more colour and that they tried to meet him halfway, so it's not really that out there, maaan. I would totally say that as well if I had made SAHITS and it got a lot of shit Did it really get that much shit? Can't imagine The AA being that bothered by some comments from the more Luddite end of the Oasis fan spectrum. They've definitely produced more song-based stuff, see Weller's White Sky or their own High & Dry. I see no reason to doubt Gaz's comments that the entire Noel album is more song-based than SAHITS. That's a terrible acronym isn't it? Sounds like a sexually transmitted disease. Eurgh, you've got a really bad case of Sahits there I'm not going near you...
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Post by andymorris on Apr 21, 2016 13:14:15 GMT -5
Good recap of the whole thing. Thanx I'd like to point out that 90% of the songs mentionned would have sounded shit with AA rework. Not that they are terrible producers (they have their sound), but in this case, it's Noel's songs that are simply too poppy for that kind of treatment. Shoot a Hole is the good example of a disaster in the making. That's probably one of the reason why it didn't work. It would have been a boring record. I don't know why Noel is desperately trying to sound "out there" (man), his musical style is definitely not made for it. They've said that SAHITS is the least representative track of the album. That's more of a remix and was done in reaction to all of Noel's "Pink Floyd on mescaline while surfing and playing African nose flute" comments. They said the main meat of the album is just Noel's songs with a bit more colour and that they tried to meet him halfway, so it's not really that out there, maaan. Yeah but their whole catalogue sound samey, so It wouldn't have been tooo different (man). Noel's songs are meant to be underproduced, doesn't mean it should sound always the same. it's a kind or production that can meet many style : acoustic, rock, lo-fi, jazzy... etc But his songs need to breath to exist. When you add too much studio stuff, it sounds bad. That's why i'm really fearing for the next one, coz Noel's strength is his biggest weakness : he's got a unique style of songwriting. It's like if Dylan tried disco or rap, it wouldn't work. Noel can't adapt his flow, his melodies. They exist for themselves and when you add salt and pepper on it, there comes the indigestion. Let's hope i'm wrong though and the next one is mind blowing (man).
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Post by mossy on Apr 21, 2016 13:17:58 GMT -5
They've said that SAHITS is the least representative track of the album. That's more of a remix and was done in reaction to all of Noel's "Pink Floyd on mescaline while surfing and playing African nose flute" comments. They said the main meat of the album is just Noel's songs with a bit more colour and that they tried to meet him halfway, so it's not really that out there, maaan. Yeah but their whole catalogue sound samey, so It wouldn't have been tooo different (man). Noel's songs are meant to be underproduced, doesn't mean it should sound always the same. it's a kind or production that can meet many style : acoustic, rock, lo-fi, jazzy... etc But his songs need to breath to exist. When you add too much studio stuff, it sounds bad. That's why i'm really fearing for the next one, coz Noel's strength is his biggest weakness : he's got a unique style of songwriting. It's like if Dylan tried disco or rap, it wouldn't work. Noel can't adapt his flow, his melodies. They exist for themselves and when you add salt and pepper on it, there comes the indigestion. Let's hope i'm wrong though and the next one is mind blowing (man). Yeah I'd love Noel to do a stripped back acoustic album. Something like Beck's Sea Change. Or even just a stopgap live album like Weller's Fire & Skill - IIHAG & EOTR would benefit from that.
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Post by andymorris on Apr 22, 2016 6:09:07 GMT -5
Yeah but their whole catalogue sound samey, so It wouldn't have been tooo different (man). Noel's songs are meant to be underproduced, doesn't mean it should sound always the same. it's a kind or production that can meet many style : acoustic, rock, lo-fi, jazzy... etc But his songs need to breath to exist. When you add too much studio stuff, it sounds bad. That's why i'm really fearing for the next one, coz Noel's strength is his biggest weakness : he's got a unique style of songwriting. It's like if Dylan tried disco or rap, it wouldn't work. Noel can't adapt his flow, his melodies. They exist for themselves and when you add salt and pepper on it, there comes the indigestion. Let's hope i'm wrong though and the next one is mind blowing (man). Yeah I'd love Noel to do a stripped back acoustic album. Something like Beck's Sea Change. Or even just a stopgap live album like Weller's Fire & Skill - IIHAG & EOTR would benefit from that. Yeah an acoustic or live-like record would be the right direction, but Noel's trying desperately to sound like his 80s heroes. We'll have to wait for him to fail so he gets back on the right track.
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Post by theseventwenty on Feb 10, 2017 12:24:20 GMT -5
I posted on Gaz's facebook yesterday asking for some more info on this album/project and he wrote an AWESOME piece about it today and posted it up... "Since this is coming up on my feed again ( celebrating its 2 year anniversary 🍸🍹🍾cheers ! And since people are asking about it again it's stirring up some personal stuff and since I only ever mentioned it in passing to one journalist at the end of an interview talking about FSOL 's ' Papua New Guinea ' our demographic readership ain't interested in him ( Noel ) !' being his exact words , little did I know he would pretend this 1 minute conversation was the whole story and sell it to a major newspaper ! Lesson learnt - I then tried to put it right by agreeing to talk to the NME ( as seen below 2 years ago ) who then proceeded to cut out all irksome detail and turn it into ( presumably ) a faux copy of a GALLAGHERzzzzzzx infighting episode which I suppose is proven to be beneficial all round ( careers and magazine sales ) but did little good for the truth or my sanity .... I tried one more time to tell the story but yet again , it got reduced to ' he was too feared to be weird ' which was a good one liner but honestly , really yet again missed the point ... So ... since I've given up on these rags ever being a suitable avenue for telling this story calmly and without misinterpretation or editing it and using it simply as clickbait ...... I'll attempt some final dis( closure ) on this .... Now ..... directly ... The 18 months we spent working on the album with Noel Gallagher was generally a very enjoyable one . Noel loved what we were doing and so did we ! We're very different cats in the studio , him ' unless I say it's shit then I love it !' Me all effusive hand waving and ' play that like its molten heat 😀 or ' pretend you're an actor for a moment ' Him ' don't ever ask me to be a foookin actor again !' Despite intentionally finding his borders and boundaries which is part of my job as a producer ( push and inspire but also find edge of comfort and how he wants to present himself - after all it's his album and he will front it for years ) extreme openness and tolerance of everything is order of the day on our side .... We wanted the best possible version of him that he could be . He loved great music , loved our Monstrous Psych Bubble series and had done some great collaborations so we wanted ( and thought ) we could inspire and achieve all of this ... ... Let's start at the end .... Last I saw Noel was dj'ing his roundhouse aftershow party as the HIgh Flying Birds first album came out . He hugged me , said ' I fookin love you '& then rightly apologized for the deceit of not telling us there was another album he'd created in parallel to ours when for 18 months we'd been expressly told we were working on his main album . To apologize was decent but it could never compensate for the enormity of what a fuck up this deceit was . I don't have the time to elucidate how many ways in which this compromised the work we'd done but suffice to say it pretty much consigned it to the rubbish bin in one stupid stroke y'see we weren't working on way out remixes ( as later everyone envisaged ) no , we were working on the main versions of these songs , a responsibility we took incredibly seriously. It had to be his songs but very imaginatively sonically coloured , this was the centre of it all . He'd also miraculously pretty much adopted the same track list that we'd been working to for the last 18 months on this ' other ' album ( which he obviously knew very well ) and now when you consider we had 70% the same tracks , yes very differently produced but same structure pretty much cos why would we gratuitously restructure his songs if it was his main album ? Would be suicide for everyone so we were loving , this was the job of an alchemist , to be far out but perfectly far in , contained , streamlined , coherent but very imaginative , to accept the language of the greatest sonic pop , to add character but the voice and song had to be centre ! I say 70% the same tracks but luckily we'd dragged him kicking and screaming to write new tracks spontaneously in the studio with us by bringing several original backing tracks to the table that we'd composed . The problem with both these tracks ( later became ' the Right Stuff & the Mexican) is they were brilliant demos but needed refining and we were left to finish them without the vocalist !!!! ie an impossible task but we persevered and used the old technique of GIMME SHELTER / the stones not to mention primals / Monday's / and even rap 😀where the female ' diva ' provides the chorus ... Worked a treat but obviously Noel would have to refine his songs . When the bombshell hit that ours wasn't the main album, that the track order of ours had been copied but reassured by the mighty mouth saying how ' far out ' ours was at the infamous cinema 'not one but two album announcement ' press conference that we watched aghast online at the time, we were left with no choice than to hastily rearrange our album into a different order at the last minute elevating the new ( remember -unfinished )material to pole position to try and present it as the radical alternatives / remixes it was now suddenly being presented ( and shortly marketed ) as . It was an unholy deception , oversight , whatever you want to call it on their account not to tell us & it was practically immediately fucked , we knew it , these weren't remixes ( only Shoot a Hole was a remix and we did that specifically to get something really more out there on the album because despite all our sonic coloring it was hard to transform that first bunch of songs from the mid paced insular strum a thon that they were ( with due respect .) The agreement ( especially now we'd written new tracks for / with him ) was always that he was gonna oversee final mix and be able to refine the new songs and as we stood in the bar at the aftershow with the apology fresh from his lips he continued ' you've done great work , all the arrangements , sounds , everything is good and the new tracks are the best things on there . This albums gonna be great but the next one will be in the top 5 albums of all time cos we'll do the whole thing like those new tracks !' ( **NB / take good note of this because this becomes particularly relevant regarding his new album ) He continued ' but I'm gonna mix it in between my tour dates , we've got a plan , trust me ' I left excited , faith partially renewed .i excitedly recounted the conversation to Brian on the phone from the hotel the next morning . As Noel's tour rolled out , the initial lukewarm reception for his HFB album ( no doubt partly inspired by the anticipation for ours , even he was mildly apologetic about it ' the first one is what you'd expect but the second one , well , that's the furthest out I've EVER been , I can tell you , space jazz , vaudeville rock and cosmic pop ... and that's only on the first track !!) ) gradually transformed into sofa chat shows and gigs and album units began to tot up and gradually ( through the media only never to us directly ) the tone of the ' furthest out I've ever been ' changed into ' can't be arsed ' ' the mixes ain't right , I'm all about the mixes ' until finally when our noise appeared in the media ' it was shit ' and he'd broken the only cd ( gotta laugh ) It was certainly a gargantuan task to complete the final stage and maybe he simply never anticipated how big ( plus I expect his lackies ( sore from their own systemic abuse over the years ( who also wanted to produce his record I might add )made sure he would be well shafted in helping him complete ( probably over exaggerating its complexity and the $$$$ bills required no doubt ) ? Who knows ? ) Anyway , the point being the work never got completed .Maybe the initial fear he had about his solo album needing to be different to satisfy critics and fans had abated somewhat , maybe he just didn't need to extend himself anymore now the other album was gaining acceptance ? Who knows but within the next six months our album died by media ie we were told nothing directly but saw a mounting shitstorm of negativity created in order to finally sack it off . I don't think there are any words to describe how this feels when you've put 18 months of your love and heart into a project . I'd been advised to not cessate AA activity in this time but that's exactly what I did at a time we were going strong , Monstrous Psych Bubble was picking up awards and our own album was in progress & very exciting plus we were picking up lots of remix / production work and gigs too . We'd been paid a reasonable advance for all this work sure , but beyond paying for our mortgages for the 18 months there was no gain , the gain would be in a great album selling worldwide . Producers know the game .... So yes , words can't describe how we felt and yet this was simply the beginning .... Once I'd alchemized my anger at some of the short sighted fuck ups of this and tried to divorce from what we personally ( and career ) stood to lose by the album never appearing I sent Noel ' the Cartel ' our imaginary film soundtrack psychsploitation album which had sampled a few bits from our album with him - I didn't need to ask really ( he would never have recognized the bits anyway ) but yeh why not ? I like the chaos and honesty of sampling and I always like to tell and credit the musicians , it benefits all , hopefully the music is cool plus From my perspective the story of the people and and he was no different so I fully disclosed . He loved it and seemed delighted to be credited for his parts / loops / samples the sessions I sample makes the music what it is ! ' not surprisingly it's fuckin brilliant ' came the text reply. We then started talking via text and I mentioned the new tracks that we'd initially provided which had inspired two new songs in two days from our 'aborted ' album project and he said ' funny enough I've just been working on them and yes they're fuckin ace ' I was delighted artistically but also assumed he'd rightly credit us for our writing and that somehow something positive would come out of it all . I'd also sent him an unholy rant telling him all the ways in which his deceit / oversight ( call it what you will ) / not fulfilling his part of the deal to finish the work had cost us personally and artistically and how how utterly disrespectful it was to anything approaching the artistic process . He took it all in his stride, knowing there was justice in my anger and we pretty much reached a new balance within several emails / texts . Several days later I received a new text saying ' maybe you'd like to do some remixes this time of some of the tracks on the new album, & do what we should have done last time and let's start out knowing this are alternative versions , remixes , do an alternative ep kinda thing ' Knowing our joint ( co written ) tracks are on the album this seemed a great idea and I enthused and the album duly arrived for our inspection . ' Chasing Yesterday ' was good , the sound had character and honesty and he'd finally employed StrangeBoy on lead guitar which we'd also done ( despite them going back years this had never happened before ). To our ears he was one of the greatest guitarists we'd recorded and we've worked with some greats , so over 2/3 days we used him on everything under the sun . This had helped free up the wall of guitar strum very effectively and altogether created more feeling and honesty . We loved ' chasing yesterday ' or more accurately ( I am a producer after all ) I dropped the 'Noel by numbers' cliche tracks reordered those remaining and listened & imagined our version of the album and absolutely loved it !!!! This was gonna put right all the unresolved shit from the first album . I was happy . I just wanted people to hear how good some of this material was and here was a chance to salvage at least the two tracks we'd co written At this stage , the plan for an ep changed to an alternative version of the whole album since there were at least 7 tracks we wanted to remix . These included both of the tracks I've mentioned that we initially wrote and instigated . They were now called ' the Right Stuff ' and ' the Mexican '. He'd finally refined , resolved his initial writing on these and on 'the Right Stuff' in particular had done a great job . 'The Mexican' we were less enamored with since it had stripped all the GIMME SHELTER groovy hipness and towering diva hipness out and most of our sampling & reduced it to a ( clean sounding ) but rather plodding rocker ! Still , all was good since we obviously chose both in our 7 tracks and we'd bring all that stuff back in ! Sweet sweet Jane , this was gonna be good ! His management suggested ' the current market rate for remixing was £500/ track ' so we should receive 4K for this work in total and we looked at the 2 months work ( we'd been given that as a deadline so we were gonna bust ass ) and it was quite obviously taking the piss so I just went straight to Noel and said as much . It was raised to 8 k and then we politely enquired what writing splits we'd be given for both ' the Mexican ' and ' the Right Stuff ' to which we were told we'd just co produced so no publishing as a writer but solely a point royalty for co production which would be cross collateralized against our advance ( meaning unless it sold 4 million ( I kid you not !!) we would receive nothing ! I tried discussing writing versus production differences of interpretation with Noel - he didn't even know the months of writing and plotting on both those tracks that we'd spent let alone countless hundreds of hours working and collaging and conducting sessions with musicians to put them together in preparation for him but he still dismissed it as ' just production '. I will say this , I find it incredibly arrogant that strumming chords and singing some lyrics be considered by anyone as 100 % the song . It's very much the outlook of a guitar man and conveniently misses out the last 30 years of songwriting evolution . Where would Donna Summer be without Georgio's backing or Morrissey without MARR ( but then that's guitars innit so maybe in his world only guitar backing counts ?? Kinda figures but it ain't right ) I must point out that we work similarly with countless other musicians including Mr Paul Weller and not one of them upholds this view and in every instance we are credited and included as writers ( i.e. Receive publishing splits which means we share the revenue when the song is used or played anywhere - this is our very bread and butter when figures like 4K /8k are being bandied about for two solid months work in our fourties both with children ??!!!! ) so this was particularly hurtful especially in light of how ( initially ) reluctant he was to try this approach or in fact , to work on them or to see how important these two tracks were to provide him with something a little bit different to pepper his album . This was solely our initiative to do this and went well outside of our commitments as producer ( we could have just worked on his material and volunteered nothing ? ) I gently persisted in asserting our rights and the fairness to receive publishing in an email over the weekend and on the Monday without warning the remix album was axed and all plans dropped and we were left with the challenge to take him to court which I don't think I would ever do ( time and money plus emotionally what a drain of resource right there ! ) I haven't spoken to him since . I've heard him mention that the main innovation on his next album is that it's all spontaneously written in the studio ? Sound familiar ? NB / I probably won't respond to further questions unless I think it's useful to do so since ' I have nothing further to add at this point ' 🙏🏼❤️❤️🤕 gaz x '"
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Post by theyknowwhatimean on Feb 10, 2017 13:06:26 GMT -5
Argh. Too much text, I can't take it all in.
So has Noel now canned two records AA helped him make - the original follow up to Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds that had different versions of what became The Right Stuff and The Mexican on, and a planned remix album of Chasing Yesterday tunes?
It's mad that Noel wouldn't just give them a co-writers credit. I can't work him out sometimes...
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Post by spaneli on Feb 10, 2017 13:45:29 GMT -5
Argh. Too much text, I can't take it all in. So has Noel now canned two records AA helped him make - the original follow up to Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds that had different versions of what became The Right Stuff and The Mexican on, and a planned remix album of Chasing Yesterday tunes? It's mad that Noel wouldn't just give them a co-writers credit. I can't work him out sometimes... Typically, how writing credits will be distributed should be settled before starting any project. It doesn't really matter what arrangements you've had with other songwriters. It's still incumbent upon the producer and artist to discuss that first, prior to any work occurring. That's really on Gaz tbh. A decent amount of songwriters hold the view that their version, the guitar and lyrics, are the song, and the rest is either production or just session credits. Gaz admits that it is a school of thought, but with varying schools, and his awareness of that fact, it's all the more reason to discuss writing credits beforehand. Also, I'm not sure Donna Summers wrote songs at all It's "funny" though, when Gaz says that these weren't remixes, but then he describes the tracks, and they sound like the typical AA excesses. And while I can see the AA's disappointment that the album was shelved, in the end, that can happen with any album and it's at the writer's discretion (Which is always a valid possibility when beginning work, no matter where the album is in the process). But who knows? Gaz throws a ton of guesses out there of why it was scrapped other than one possible reason. That given time, and once the enthusiasm had faded, that Noel re-listened to the tracks and possibly thought that they weren't that good. Not that there couldn't be other reasons, like Noel being lazy. But this is also another possible, and valid, conclusion.
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Post by Derrick on Feb 10, 2017 15:01:21 GMT -5
Thanks very much theseventwenty for asking Gaz & sharing his detailed answer with us! But who knows? Gaz throws a ton of guesses out there of why it was scrapped other than one possible reason. That given time, and once the enthusiasm had faded, that Noel re-listened to the tracks and possibly thought that they weren't that good. Not that there couldn't be other reasons, like Noel being lazy. But this is also another possible, and valid, conclusion. Well, if the initial album the AA had been working on while, unbeknownst to them, Noel was recording the classic-sounding first HFB album, was really so bad that Noel eventually couldn't release it, no final mixes being able to salvage the bad quality of it all, then why would he get in touch with the AA once again a few years later to ask them to make an EP of remixes of "Chasing yesterday" tracks? Noel loved the AA's previous work, praised their remix of "Falling down", released "Shoot a hole into the sun" & played it over the PA at the beginning of his gigs during the tour, plus he kept "The Mexican" & "The right stuff" for his second album. In regard of all that I think it has more to do with Noel's laziness to complete, release & promote a second album as the tour for the first HFB's album wore on much longer than expected, as well as perhaps Noel's reluctance to venture out of his comfort zone which could possibly have left him with something too far-out to handle, & he didn't know how to mix it properly... We'll probably never know why the first AA project was never completed & shelved (or even destroyed, claims Noel, though I doubt he really had the only existing copy, the AA must've kept at least another in their vaults unless they're complete dumbasses), but I don't believe it was only or mainly because it didn't sound good. If you're not satisfied with someone's work, you don't ask them to work for you on another project.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 10, 2017 15:50:37 GMT -5
I remember spending ages when I first signed up here just tracking and talking about the AA album, and tbh there's nothing much more to be said on it. By round about April 2015, the bulk of every opinion and viewpoint had already been said on the matter somewhere scattered across threads, Gaz's FB posts and Noel interviews, and everything since has just been occasional tiny shifts in perspective and reiterations of the same stuff. The only important open question left for me now is whether any of the material will be released. At the moment, answer looks like a 'no'. So, nothing to talk about imo now. Instead, just looking forward to Noel's 3rd album and the AA's new album. Happy days
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Post by Deleted on Feb 10, 2017 15:57:52 GMT -5
Sounds exactly right. Noel wanted to do something new and totally bottled it once it became clear he was still going to be able to fill arenas doing the same thing he's always done.
Noel savaged them in the press for no apparent reason but to spare his own blushes. Whatever the truth is about how much of The Mexican and The Right Stuff they wrote (and I suspect Gaz is exaggerating that), he should have made sure they got paid as an apology as much as anything else.
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Post by spaneli on Feb 10, 2017 17:15:42 GMT -5
Thanks very much theseventwenty for asking Gaz & sharing his detailed answer with us! But who knows? Gaz throws a ton of guesses out there of why it was scrapped other than one possible reason. That given time, and once the enthusiasm had faded, that Noel re-listened to the tracks and possibly thought that they weren't that good. Not that there couldn't be other reasons, like Noel being lazy. But this is also another possible, and valid, conclusion. Well, if the initial album the AA had been working on while, unbeknownst to them, Noel was recording the classic-sounding first HFB album, was really so bad that Noel eventually couldn't release it, no final mixes being able to salvage the bad quality of it all, then why would he get in touch with the AA once again a few years later to ask them to make an EP of remixes of "Chasing yesterday" tracks?
Noel loved the AA's previous work, praised their remix of "Falling down", released "Shoot a hole into the sun" & played it over the PA at the beginning of his gigs during the tour, plus he kept "The Mexican" & "The right stuff" for his second album. In regard of all that I think it has more to do with Noel's laziness to complete, release & promote a second album as the tour for the first HFB's album wore on much longer than expected, as well as perhaps Noel's reluctance to venture out of his comfort zone which could possibly have left him with something too far-out to handle, & he didn't know how to mix it properly... We'll probably never know why the first AA project was never completed & shelved (or even destroyed, claims Noel, though I doubt he really had the only existing copy, the AA must've kept at least another in their vaults unless they're complete dumbasses), but I don't believe it was only or mainly because it didn't sound good. If you're not satisfied with someone's work, you don't ask them to work for you on another project. Just because you leave a project doesn't mean you don't have to work with those people again. I think you're making a false assumption
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Post by matt on Feb 10, 2017 19:48:08 GMT -5
I'm sorry, but there's nothing more to say than..... FUCK YOU NOEL YOU COWARDLY SHIT BUCKET, AND FUCK YOUR BLAND DEBUT WITH YOUR SHITTY BLAND PRODUCTION AND FUCK YOUR MANAGEMENT. There are more eloquent ways of putting it but I can't be arsed. P.S. Thanks theseventwenty for the investigative work. Lovely stuff ("not my words, but the words of Shakin Stevens").
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Post by matt on Feb 10, 2017 20:18:44 GMT -5
Thanks very much theseventwenty for asking Gaz & sharing his detailed answer with us! But who knows? Gaz throws a ton of guesses out there of why it was scrapped other than one possible reason. That given time, and once the enthusiasm had faded, that Noel re-listened to the tracks and possibly thought that they weren't that good. Not that there couldn't be other reasons, like Noel being lazy. But this is also another possible, and valid, conclusion. Well, if the initial album the AA had been working on while, unbeknownst to them, Noel was recording the classic-sounding first HFB album, was really so bad that Noel eventually couldn't release it, no final mixes being able to salvage the bad quality of it all, then why would he get in touch with the AA once again a few years later to ask them to make an EP of remixes of "Chasing yesterday" tracks? Noel loved the AA's previous work, praised their remix of "Falling down", released "Shoot a hole into the sun" & played it over the PA at the beginning of his gigs during the tour, plus he kept "The Mexican" & "The right stuff" for his second album. In regard of all that I think it has more to do with Noel's laziness to complete, release & promote a second album as the tour for the first HFB's album wore on much longer than expected, as well as perhaps Noel's reluctance to venture out of his comfort zone which could possibly have left him with something too far-out to handle, & he didn't know how to mix it properly... We'll probably never know why the first AA project was never completed & shelved (or even destroyed, claims Noel, though I doubt he really had the only existing copy, the AA must've kept at least another in their vaults unless they're complete dumbasses), but I don't believe it was only or mainly because it didn't sound good. If you're not satisfied with someone's work, you don't ask them to work for you on another project. Yeah, it's hard to believe that Noel was 'unsatisfied' with the recordings. It's difficult to go from stating the album is 'fuckin brilliant' to 'shit' in a matter of mere months. If I recall correctly, Noel's management persuaded him not to release the AA album. If ever there was an example of management creatively inhibiting their stars with bad influence, then this is one.
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Post by spaneli on Feb 10, 2017 20:36:35 GMT -5
Thanks very much theseventwenty for asking Gaz & sharing his detailed answer with us! Well, if the initial album the AA had been working on while, unbeknownst to them, Noel was recording the classic-sounding first HFB album, was really so bad that Noel eventually couldn't release it, no final mixes being able to salvage the bad quality of it all, then why would he get in touch with the AA once again a few years later to ask them to make an EP of remixes of "Chasing yesterday" tracks? Noel loved the AA's previous work, praised their remix of "Falling down", released "Shoot a hole into the sun" & played it over the PA at the beginning of his gigs during the tour, plus he kept "The Mexican" & "The right stuff" for his second album. In regard of all that I think it has more to do with Noel's laziness to complete, release & promote a second album as the tour for the first HFB's album wore on much longer than expected, as well as perhaps Noel's reluctance to venture out of his comfort zone which could possibly have left him with something too far-out to handle, & he didn't know how to mix it properly... We'll probably never know why the first AA project was never completed & shelved (or even destroyed, claims Noel, though I doubt he really had the only existing copy, the AA must've kept at least another in their vaults unless they're complete dumbasses), but I don't believe it was only or mainly because it didn't sound good. If you're not satisfied with someone's work, you don't ask them to work for you on another project. Yeah, it's hard to believe that Noel was 'unsatisfied' with the recordings. It's difficult to go from stating the album is 'fuckin brilliant' to 'shit' in a matter of mere months. If I recall correctly, Noel's management persuaded him not to release the AA album. If ever there was an example of management creatively inhibiting their stars with bad influence, then this is one. I mean, it's not like Noel has ever gone from calling something brilliant, to shit before in months right? *cough* BHN** cough**DOYS*** People are easily forgetful, when this actually perfectly fits into Noels previous pattern
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Post by Deleted on Feb 10, 2017 21:01:46 GMT -5
Did he state Dig Out Your Soul was shit?! Usually its the case he hypes up new albums merely for commercial reasons, but he genuinely seemed enthusiastic about the AA album. I think he just went cowardly personally. He didn't flat out say it was shit, but he started to walk back that album super quick. It took a couple months before he started dropping the "album should 20-30% better because of said reasons" line. And we all know that he started hedging his bets on BHN almost immediately. Like Noel has walked back albums and songs, and has always been fickle. So why does it surprise everyone now that he did it again? I actually can't remember, has he ever gone back on his hype for Heathen Chemistry? Just thinking, because Noel's music taste isn't the final word on everything, even his own stuff.
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Post by spaneli on Feb 10, 2017 21:05:18 GMT -5
He didn't flat out say it was shit, but he started to walk back that album super quick. It took a couple months before he started dropping the "album should 20-30% better because of said reasons" line. And we all know that he started hedging his bets on BHN almost immediately. Like Noel has walked back albums and songs, and has always been fickle. So why does it surprise everyone now that he did it again? I actually can't remember, has he ever gone back on his hype for Heathen Chemistry? Just thinking, because Noel's music taste isn't the final word on everything, even his own stuff. Idk, but then again, how often is he asked about HC?
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Post by theyknowwhatimean on Feb 11, 2017 5:56:19 GMT -5
He didn't flat out say it was shit, but he started to walk back that album super quick. It took a couple months before he started dropping the "album should 20-30% better because of said reasons" line. And we all know that he started hedging his bets on BHN almost immediately. Like Noel has walked back albums and songs, and has always been fickle. So why does it surprise everyone now that he did it again? I actually can't remember, has he ever gone back on his hype for Heathen Chemistry? Just thinking, because Noel's music taste isn't the final word on everything, even his own stuff. On that AMA thing he did on Reddit a couple of years back, someone asked him, quite coyly I thought, why he slags off Be Here Now and doesn't albums like Heathen Chemistry. He said:
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Post by Let It 🩸 on Feb 11, 2017 9:45:42 GMT -5
those AA guys are really fucking weird.....i could imagine that album to be almost unlistenable to utterly brilliant......i dunno. but to continue utterly useless debate, i also doubt Noel felt like doing anything else after touring and promoting HFB's for like a a year or two period, or however long it was.... God bless. That's not the half of it. I heard the AA stuff at Black Barn whilst Noel was in there in between when the Rifles were recording their second album. It was all as out there as what we've heard. I just thought it was a fucking mess, couldn't appreciate it whatsoever. I had no idea there was 2 albums, whilst we were listening to that thinking that's never going to get any air play. There was a debate about STC/RM going on the album. I could comprehend how they could possibly go on the same record they were light years apart. But Noel was proud of it, most definitely keener promoting the AA stuff. And how different it was to anything he'd done before. It was amazing to see how much the AA pair would get away with with Noel. He gave them total creative control. But it was management who wanted the commercial HFB album. We later found out they were supposed to be alongside, to compliment the HFB album. But in the end management thought releasing it would damage the success it had already generated.
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