They say rock ’n’ roll is dead, but try telling that to Liam Gallagher.
The ex-Oasis man enjoyed a huge 2019 thanks to the release of his second solo album, Why Me? Why Not, which notched up 68,000 sales in its first week and became the fastest-selling vinyl of the year.
Add a memorable Glastonbury Festival performance, a rowdy sell-out arena tour plus some barbed, often hilarious, comments about his estranged brother Noel, and it’s been another vintage 12 months.
“It’s sad I can only really name me as a rock ’n’ roll star today,” ponders Liam. “So I still get loads of kids coming to my gigs.
“We no longer have f***ers like Keith Moon, but rock is only in a coma, it’s not dead. It’s coming back.
“Today there are more groups, but they don’t always have the right attitude or songs.
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“I don’t see anyone out there who was as beautiful as me aged 20.
“Maybe it’s the drugs they’re taking, or the ones they’re not taking. There’s no cool f***ers any more.”
He’s not wrong, Liam is the last homegrown rock God and his shows still feel like primal events you want to be part of.
“Nobody is buying records, and the world wants everything straight away now,” says Manchester’s finest. “After one hit, bands want to play stadiums. They don’t want to work or tour Europe in a van. The joy and love of being in a rock ’n’ roll group isn’t what it once was. I blame mobile phones.
“Now at gigs all people want to do is take photographs, but it goes off at my gigs.”
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Liam has a very simple answer when you ask why he’s so successful still: “I refuse to change my music. I love The Beatles, The Stones, The Kinks, the Sex Pistols. I love Oasis.
“Oasis didn’t reinvent the wheel. It’s verse, chorus, verse, chorus. Rock ’n’ roll is always the basis.
“When I write I don’t think about it sounding the same (as Oasis), it just ends up sounding like that.
“If that wasn’t the case I’d probably turn around and say, ‘S**t, that sounds like The Beatles!”
Liam wrote his new album with three major songwriters – Greg Kurstin, Andrew Wyatt and Damon McMahon.
The Burnage boy says: “I can write songs, I appreciate the process, seeing it evolve. But I also worked with two or three geezers who helped me make it, I can’t do everything by myself. If that was the case I’d spend five years putting screws in a chair.”
Incredibly it’s been 10 years since Oasis split up and Liam refers to their troubled past in stand-out new song, One Of Us.
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“It’s to do with brothers, friendship, finding your place,” he says. “It’s a shame and really sad that the group split up but while we are still alive there’s hope.
“Even if one of us is making stupid disco, at least one of us has stayed the same.”
He is, of course, referring to his brother Noel who he hasn’t spoken to in the best part of a decade.
This year things reached an all-time low when Liam allegedly threatened Noel’s wife on social media. He has since apologised for any confusion but Noel still gets it in the neck.
“People know who I am,” Liam says. “I am extraordinary but I can also be a bit of a knob – I know all of that.”
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Referring to Noel, he says: “He’s got this impression he’s special but if you asked him to play his new songs on acoustic guitar it sounds f***ing shocking, in the wrong sense of the word. He’s not on top form, but I’ll let him keep doing his thing.”
Indeed Liam has nothing to prove to Noel any more and 2020 promises to be even bigger with huge summer shows at Heaton Park and headline sets at TRNSMT, Reading/Leeds and Latitude festivals.
And not forgetting he’s set to marry his long-term girlfriend Debbie Gwyther.
Perhaps all that remains is for Liam to become a major movie star next? “I never want to be an actor even though I’m beautiful enough to be one.
“I like to be myself 24 hours a day, seven days a week, I don’t need no script. I’m happy being me.”
There’s no denying he’s our best loved rock star and the feeling is mutual: “I love England, I love the culture, football, music, the cold.
“I love the English weather. I hate it when its hot. I love pubs, I love spliffs – I love everyone.”
- Glastonbury Festival
- Liam Gallagher
- Noel Gallagher
- Pubs
- Drugs
- London
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