Ok, so here comes the article translated:
It's a little bit confusing. After the wide spread stories about the clash in Paris, where Noel and Liam started to fight, Noel Gallagher quit Oasis. He took the first plane to london. In British music press it rained insults and swear words. Now, half a year after Beady Eye (Oasis minus Noel) released DGSS, the first Noel Gallagher solo album is to be released. A few days after the riots in London he talks to us about Noel Gallagher and his High Flying Birds. And what's the first thing you see in his office? A box of Beady Eye T-shirts!
Masterplan
"It's weird", says NG. "We have the some management. Liam could walk in any time, which would be great for your story ofcourse. No, we don't make any agreements about that. I don't have anything against Beady Eye. I like their album, I wish them all the succes of the world. I assume the people of Beady Eye think the same about me. It's a pitty that the singer of Beady Eye keeps acting like a dick, which makes all the work a bit harder for everyone. Oasis was at its best when I wrote the songs and Liam sang them. It's as simple as that. When that changed, Oasis changed. Sometimes it resulted in good things, like TIOBI, but in fact the essence of the band was lost."
Beady Eye made a real rock 'n' roll reccord, Noel's first record however is full of acoustic guitars, piano's and strings. Especially the calm first single TDOYAM is striking. "Everyone always comes back with a bang, I wanted to come back with a whisper" explains Gallagher. "I want to make the people listen, really listen. I didn't make this album with a Masterplan. With Oasis I always knew which song we would use as a set opener, how everything would look like, everything. This time I didn't even have a band. There was no one I had to please, except for myself. I started and came to the conclusion that I had enough material for two albums really fast. It became three albums in the end."
Acid House
The second album, that's only to be released next year, he made with the AA duo. They are much more famous as the electronica act The Future Sound Of london, but with this alias the make psychedelic rock with krautrock and jazz influences, in which electronica is of minor importance. However, the album will be very listenable, promises Gallagher. "It really are songs". The flirt with the AA duo is remarkable, especially because Gallagher himself names the Detroit techno classic Strings of Life as his inspiration for the song AKA WAL. Not really something you would expect from a rocker, but he has the exact right age to have lived the house revolution. No, it's not a coincidence that he participated on a Chemical Brothers album already twice in the nineties.
"I literally lived in the street with the famous Hacienda Club in Manchester. I spent almost every thursday, friday and staterday there, for about 4 years. I can not even try to explain how much impressions that made on me. When I heard acid-house for the first time, in 1987, the word itself wasn't even invented yet. Back then, you didn't think about it. You were young, you used drugs en went loose. Only the last 5 years I started to realise how good that music actually was. I wrote WAL and played the chords on a few different ways. I always do that, and what sounds the best becomes the final version. And suddenly I thoughg: Strings Of Life!"
The acid-house revolution had a big influence on guitar bands from Manchester. Bands like Happy Mondays and Stone Roses flirted with housel, just like the scotts Primal Scream. But Oasis was a real rock band from day one. "After the Hacienda we went to The Kitche, an after hours tent. And when they closed we went on to someones home to party on. It was the time before the iPod and mobile phones and there were no acid-house compilations. So on those parties we played Neil Young and The Beatles. It was all the same for me. Tomorrow Never Knows is psychedelic music. When I joined the band I didn't think for a second about making electronic music. Rock 'n' roll is in my soul.
Irac
Also something we aren't used to from Gallagher: a song about the things happening in Irak. Soldier Boys and Jesus Freaks. I started writing the song while the war in Irak was going on, started with the help of Tony Blair (the man who Gallagher once gave his trust in public) explains Gallagher. "I never sit down with a story in my head. I have nothing to tell. It always starts with a few chords on the guitar. After that I have to think really long to find a first lyric. Once I have that, it's pretty easy. SBAJF is not specifically about Irac. When I wrote the song the news was completely dominated with religious extremists on one side (Americans) and religous extremists on the other side (terrorists). And in between them are the soldiers, who have to do all the work. I don't blame Blair. Any other prime minister would have done the same. As soon as people start going on about Blair I say: what about the terrorists? Those guys who crashed into the towers are the ones who started all this. Everything that happened next is a reaction."
Blair had no other choice, because he was the prime minister of England, says Gallagher. It's one of the biggest tradegies of the country. "The UK is having a permanent indentity crisis, which is part of the power of the country. We're changing all the time. But after 9/11 it only got worse. We thing we're the big ally from the US, but in reality they don't care a fuck about us. We were their allies during the cold war, because they could land their planes with us and shoot their bombs".
Riots
Only a week before our conversation the UK was in a miserable situation. The buildings alre literally still burning. The Gallagher brothers always identified with the working class, the lower English class, a group surrounded by dissapointment. But Gallagher can speak no good about the riots. "There's a million reasons, but there's no excuse. I was poor myself, but not one time have I thought to riot and loot someones shop. It's pure opportunism. A week before that gangster got shot, nobody was complaining!"
"When I was young, the working class was the lowest class. Now there's another class even lower than the working class. People who have never worked in their entire lives, and that never will work. They have to struggle hard to get around. The working class in my time always tried to improve their situations. I was lucky. I saw a guitar in the corner and I thought: what noise would that make? I practised for years and for years I was shit. We started a band and we were shit, for years, until I worte my first great song. The kids from today have no patience, they want everything right away. In a guitar they see no more than some wood. They are to busy telling each other bulshit on the internet."
Clothing Line
To end, a little teasing. One of the shops that got looted during the riots was Liam Gallagher's clothing store in Manchester. A big portrait of Liam could be seen inbetween of broken glasses and empty clothing racks. The damage? About a 300.000 euros. What did Noel thing about all this? Did he feel bad for Liam? Or was it what Liam deserved? After all, according to Noel, Liam's clothing line was the direct reason for the clash between the two of them. Noel hesitates, as if he feels caught. But then he says "That store.... I won't even begin to form an opinion on that."
That's it. Probably fyll of spelling and gramatical mistakes, but it's better than having to read it in Dutch I guess