Anyway, Here’s ‘Wonderwall': My Afternoon With Liam Gallagher of Oasis

Typically, my Saturday afternoons consist of tending to a week’s-worth of neglected dishes and rifling through my car to find enough spare quarters for a load of laundry. But, this one took a turn for the glamorous as I arrived at the Four Seasons in Denver to meet up with Liam Gallagher at this hotel (valeting my beater, held together by duct tape in some places, is another story).

From his accommodations, I was lead to Gallagher’s silver bullet of a tour bus, where I met the former Oasis singer. Not dressed in the striped Adidas tracksuit I was expecting, but a zip-up navy windbreaker; he was fidgeting with a bottle of apple cider vinegar, for his immune system, he explained, after a stiff but cordial exchange of introductions.

‘Nice to be here, though a bit cold isn’t it?’ he mumbled in his heavily-accented English. ‘I like it when it’s cold and sunny, because you can wear a big coat, and you can still look pretty cool; Wear your shades.’

It was just last month that Gallagher embarked on releasing his solo record, As You Were.

Now, he sits with me in his bus before a sold-out show at Denver’s Gothic Theatre, glancing away from me as we dig into the questions, seemingly distracted, or just anticipating any mention of Noel, or the future of Oasis. But, he re-establishes eye contact with me sparingly, as if just to reassure he is still engaged in our conversation.

As You Were came out last month, and you make sure people know the title to that record on your Twitter.

LG: Yeah, well, I reckon. Definitely have rammed it down people’s throats and put it in their psyche. But yeah, yeah, why not?

Every tweet, ‘…As You Were.’

LG: ‘As you were’ sort of just means, like, ‘Get on with it.’ …

I do like the words ‘as you were,’ I think it’s pretty cool. Like, these things like John Lennon used to years ago – ‘You are here.’ Stuff like that, on t-shirts. ‘As you were’ looks good on a t-shirt. But then again, it really is about the music more so than the title, know what I mean?

‘Come Back to Me’ is the single. I was actually kind of surprised, I guess, that you’ve said that’s a very Oasis-y song.

LG: Yeah I think that is… There’s a few songs on there that are pretty Oasis-y. But, I mean, I wasn’t self-consciously going out to make a record that sounds like Oasis, or a nostalgic ‘90s record. It just sort of happened. I think… once I put my voice on it, it’s always gonna sound like Oasis.

And, I don’t mind it. I’m not looking to do anything crazy and out there… I like standard classic rock ‘n’ roll music… I’m not gonna reinvent the wheel just for the sake of it… nine out of ten times ‘new’ is pretty sh**, you know what I mean? I’m quite happy doing that kind of music.

You’ve been fairly candid about comparing this music to Oasis songs, and I was a little bit surprised by that. I see that you’ve been opening some of your shows with Oasis songs.

LG: …I’m always gonna play Oasis songs… People who come to see me… or Noel, or whatever, have invested a lot of time and money into [Oasis]… so, yeah, I’m always gonna play Oasis songs. I don’t have to play them. I like playing them. I play them because I want to play them…

I love loud guitar music... I'll play it 'til the f***ing day I die.

They say, 'When in Rome, do as the Romans do.' I say, when in Liam Gallagher's bus, you should probably just ask point blank, 'Where do you stand with Oasis?'

Here's what he had to say about that:

In the brief time I spent in the presence of an era-defining, modern rock icon, I thought, 'Has he ever cracked a smile, just once?' 'Does he laugh during movies?' His exterior was near impossible to breach, but as he took a photo with me and Scruggs, he did assure us that he was, in fact, 'smiling on the inside.'

As you were, Liam.