Carnation / To Be Someone Questions (Read 2,786 times)

[Jim]

Does anyone know where and when Carnation and To Be Someone were recorded? I know it was sometime in 1999 but the Fire and Skill CD booklet doesn't give any information on which studios were used.

[davidjay]

Apr 27, 2013 7:32:24 GMT -5 Jim said:

Does anyone know where and when Carnation and To Be Someone were recorded? I know it was sometime in 1999 but the Fire and Skill CD booklet doesn't give any information on which studios were used.

Not sure where To Be Someone was done but the following excerpt from an interview with Liam done for Uncut magazine in April 2000 sheds some light on the Carnation session... Always thought Carnation sounded great btw. Would've been interesting to hear what Oasis would've sounded like produced by Brendan Lynch/mixed by Max Heyes (other than the Champagne Supenova remix of course). Their work on Weller and OCS albums has always impressed me.

Was it a challenging experience, working outside Oasis for the first time, with Steve Cradock on the 'Carnation' single?
"Well, I was a bit scared, you know what I mean? I didn't do it to be a single or anything like that. It was in Sweden or somewhere, I think, with Ocean Colour Scene when they supported us, and we were pissed and we was going on about the fucking Jam things. The Jam are all right, you know what I mean, but I was too young for them..."

I never thought of you as a massive Jam fan.
"No, I'm not. But I like some of the tracks, and I like Weller now. So we were speaking about The Jam and mods and all this nonsense, so I went, 'Oh, 'Carnation' is the fucking best tune,' and Steve goes, 'Oh, that's my favourite tune. I'd love to do a cover of it one day.'

"So anyway, he went away and done this version and sent me a tape. He goes, 'I'm in London next week – do you want to sing on it?' I was going, 'Oh, fuck that,' so I kept ignoring his phone calls, and Patsy's going, 'Ring him back; I'm going, 'No, cos I can't sing with anyone else, you know, I've never done it before.'

"I ended up, I got my fucking shit together and I went down there to Primal Scream's studio and we done it in the afternoon. And that was it. And no one ever mentioned putting out [the Jam tribute album] Fire And Skill. I don't even think that was thought of."

So the track existed before the idea of the album.
"Yeah. Yeah. And that was, like, done last year [1998]."

How was it different to working with Oasis?
"Just length in trousers, I reckon. Ours are 34 legs, theirs are, like, fucking up there (points to calf), cos they're mods and they like to show their ankles."

Once it was released as a single, did you want a Number One?
"No. No. I was gonna do Top Of The Pops and all that, cos we were getting back into the Oasis thing and I thought, 'Yeah, fucking, why not?' And then I thought, 'Well, it's a good song, I'm well happy with it, it's better than anything else around at the moment.' If it had gone in at Number One, yeah, great, but I get Number Ones with Oasis. Once you've had a Number One, you've had a Number One, you know. I'd have been disappointed if it hadn't got in the Top 10, only cos it was a good song."

Noel got involved in your TV appearances. Was he there to give you moral support or was he there as a mate of Paul Weller and Steve Cradock?
"He was gagging for it. No, he was just there for the piss-up, you know what I mean? It's a gathering of the lads, leave the wives at home, have a good drink..."

A lads' night out, really.
"That's what it was."

(Carol Clerk, Uncut, April 2000)

[Jim]

Just by coincidence David I came across these links

captainandme.com/brendan%20lynch/main.htm

www.recordproduction.com/record-producer-features/max-heyes-producer.html

So I guess "Lynchmob Studios" is the Carnation answer. I'll keep looking for any info on To Be Someone.

[Jim]

Noel mentions in this interview about To Be Someone being recorded two years prior to the release of Fire and Skill so possibly during the Be Here Now sessions?

oasisinterviews.blogspot.co.uk/1999_10_01_archive.html

[Lennon2217]

Apr 27, 2013 8:36:03 GMT -5 Jim said:

Noel mentions in this interview about To Be Someone being recorded two years prior to the release of Fire and Skill so possibly during the Be Here Now sessions?

oasisinterviews.blogspot.co.uk/1999_10_01_archive.html

That kind of makes sense since he started playing "To Be Someone" on the US tour in January of 1998. He probably recorded it over Christmas break, liked it, and played it on a handful of dates. I had the pleasure of hearing at their New Jersey show.

[davidjay]

Thanks for the links Jim! Would be good to interview Lynch and Heyes at some point to see if they could give some more details on these sessions. They worked on the Smokin Mojo Filters' cover of Come Together too...

[davidjay]

Apr 27, 2013 8:36:03 GMT -5 Jim said:

Noel mentions in this interview about To Be Someone being recorded two years prior to the release of Fire and Skill so possibly during the Be Here Now sessions?

oasisinterviews.blogspot.co.uk/1999_10_01_archive.html

Found this quote earlier... no studio & exact date but it fits your theory above. So I guess it's either from the main BHN sessions or one of the later sessions booked to record b-sides for the singles.

"I recorded [To Be Someone] three years ago in one afternoon. Someone just said, 'Do you want to do a track?' And I said, 'Yeah, I'll go and do it now.' So I did it that day. But if someone asked me about it today, I'd spend about six weeks, d'you know what I mean?' (Noel Gallagher, quoted in Total Guitar Issue 69, May 2000)

[oasisunited]

Tony Briggs just posted a picture of a contact sheet from the recording session that shows the date as November 20, 1998:

[mahsteve]

Shakermaker on YouTube has posted carnation and to be someone with some short extra takes I didn’t know existed.