A solo high point from Noel Gallagher.
Although he’s never far from the public consciousness and there has been plenty of new music in that time, it’s been a hefty five-and-a-half years since the last studio album from Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds, the fanbase-rupturing Who Built The Moon? (lest we forget, a Mercury-nominated effort).
Although planning to take 2020 off after several busy years, Noel Gallagher – like all of us – found himself with time on his hands in that fallow year, to reminisce about his journey on the road up to that point.
Yet despite his usual frankness about the lyrical inspiration, Council Skies is no fusion of The Beatles, The Smiths, The Stone Roses and that band he was in, but something else entirely.
Recorded in his brand new studio, with influences adorning the walls, there is still some pilfering, naturally: the string arrangement on the optimistic, sprightly Open The Door, See What You Find call to mind Different For Girls by Joe Jackson, but the track is laden with gongs, big drums and scrunchy guitars alongside an impassioned vocal which feels like a cathartic release.
Unfortunately he’s resorted to ripping himself on the title-track (which, in fairness, does create less hassle), a mixture of EP track Rattling Rose and Ballad Of The Mighty I (from 2015’s Chasing Yesterday), although the bossa nova beat and snappy Bacharachian backing vocals help it to propel along pleasantly enough, and the seemingly autobiographical lyrics exemplify the album’s themes well.
Luscious strings dominate, supplied by orchestral arranger and long-time High Flying Birds collaborator Rosie Danvers, working wonderfully in tandem with the classically uplifting (Noel Gallagher’s trademark) I’m Not Giving Up Tonight, which dustily looks forward (‘the good lady said it’s time to free my soul,’) with head held high.
Then a stylistic volte-face occurs as motoring Krautrock monster Pretty Boy rolls into view. With typically frenetic guitar from Johnny Marr, it’s perhaps the closest to Noel Gallagher’s work with David Holmes and uneasily builds as layer lands upon layer wonkily. Perhaps not appreciated at the time of release, it’s sure to be a staple of his live shows.
As will the album’s centrepiece, the knowingly Oasis, arms-in-the-air anthem Easy Now. It’s unashamedly big but ever-so-slightly psychedelic with a universal guitar solo and some insightful lyrics (‘if you trade all the love you ever made for what you gave away, I wonder what you’d find?’) which has all the ingredients which brought his songwriting to the masses so successfully.
As is widely known, Council Skies was written during the same period as Noel Gallagher’s marriage was ending, and in that context it’s hard to feel anything but sympathy for both.
The sprawling, stomping Think Of A Number (‘you were my hero and you left and took your bow’) is a big emotional rock song but blessedly tinged with bittersweet optimism, perfectly summing up the life-is-a-rollercoaster vibe, while Dead To The World is beautiful yet heart-wrenchingly romantic, but at the wrong end of a relationship. Its fragility is bolstered by a well-judged accordion which adds the required class and a reminder that when Noel Gallagher is in the mood, he’s untouchable.
Likewise Trying To Find A World That’s Been And Gone, originally released without fanfare in late 2021 and initially speculated (if only by your reviewer) to be about life post-pandemic, its mournful horns and sweeping elegance accompany Gallagher at his most vulnerable (‘The cold against my shoulder that always seems to be there, do you think I’ll ever learn?’).
With shade, there must be light, and the High Flying Birds bathe in sunshine on the swaggering, imperial-era Rolling Stones Love Is A Rich Man.
The guitars sneer and swing with the brass on the verse before the chorus confidently marches then rollicks once more, while There She Blows! groovily strides after multi-layered vocals and dry acoustics give way to something moody yet righteous.
Closing proceedings, ‘bonus track’ We’re Gonna Get There In The End – also released during the pandemic – has been spruced up with playful horns but its bouncing rhythm remains intact.
‘It’s going back to the beginning. Daydreaming, looking up at the sky and wondering about what life could be,’ states Gallagher in the PR for Council Skies. Yet, like the swirling winds which sweep throughout the entirety of the album, and with a lot of musical miles under his belt, life is always moving.
Although some of his familiar tropes return (the rustle of a tambourine is never far away), Noel Gallagher has successfully fused the various sounds of the High Flying Birds (many of whom play on record for the first time) and added even further sonics for his most accomplished solo album yet.