Liam Gallagher returns to the site of Oasis’ era-defining peak.
When he launched his solo career back in 2017, even the notoriously self-assured Liam Gallagher can’t have seen this coming.
Hard to envisage now, but for several years the iconic frontman was regarded as outdated, only to be remembered during talking head shows about the 1990s.
Oasis were done and Beady Eye, after a promising start, weren’t making any waves despite their best efforts. With his older brother taking all the accolades, it seemed that Gallagher Junior’s best hope lay in praying for That reunion.
Fate, however, had other ideas. In 2016 – shortly after his partner Debbie Gwyther had orchestrated a record deal for a solo career – the Supersonic documentary was released, reigniting interest in his former band. As the astonishing success of his debut album As You Were proved the following year, absence had made the heart grow fonder.
Mirroring the meteoric rise of Oasis, a few short years later Liam Gallagher headlined Knebworth, even if it took slightly longer second time around (although without the delays caused by the pandemic, who’s to say it couldn’t have happened sooner).
If the timing of the announcement felt slightly cynical (a week after the release of the documentary film about the 1996 shows), no-one could question the demand. For years Gallagher was hounded by his followers on Twitter about when he would play Knebworth again and, as has been the modus operandi throughout his second act, he was simply giving the people what they wanted.
From the opening seconds of the album, as the crowd noise erupts before Hello, it does sound truly gargantuan with the audience needing no invitation to sing along.
The remaining Oasis songs (9 in total, just over half the tracklist) fare equally well, with Liam Gallagher’s band having evolved from playing the studio version to the live iterations. Even without the original musicians playing the instruments there is new life breathed into old songs (although Slide Away is somewhat rigid compared to the version on Oasis’s last tour in 2008/09), as the band unleash hell on the final straight of Oasis anthems.
Supersonic is especially attacked with vigour, while only Some Might Say is a stretch for the band; the combination of time influencing the vocals and Drew McConnell on backing proving that, for all his strengths, he’s no Noel Gallagher.
Interestingly, Liam Gallagher’s vocal inflections on Rock ‘n’ Roll Star eerily recall the recently-discovered (if you know where to look) Sawmills Sessions – the first of many attempts at recording Definitely Maybe – suggesting that Gallagher has come full circle with his singing choices.
Consolidating his renaissance, the inclusion of Roll It Over – never previously performed live – was a brave choice and not something Liam Gallagher would have attempted 10 years ago, with some sky-scraping notes required, but acts as an exemplar of how much his voice has improved. The recorded backing vocals – rather than muffle his voice – add to the majesty, as do the backing singers who appear intermittently across the album, most vividly on Wall Of Glass.
The solo material stands up well, with the choir on More Power adding texture to an otherwise balls out rock and roll show, while on the quivering Once the accompanying fireworks can just about be made out in the audience’s reaction.
Elsewhere, Liam Gallagher revels getting his teeth into the grizzly Shockwave, and while the marauding C’Mon You Know is somewhat rudderless, the melody does possess a certain charm.
Liam’s patter is minimal as always, with only dedications to Gwyther (‘Guru, guru!’) and a hippy-esque addition to Champagne Supernova (‘not necessarily stoned, but beautiful!’) standing out, but kudos to a man who knows his strengths and weaknesses.
Despite some curious omissions (a version of last year’s single Diamond In The Dark from these shows was released last year, yet is nowhere to be found, while Why Me. Why Not?, with its Come Together coda, would have been welcome), the album is a fitting accompaniment to an unforgettable weekend if you were there and, for those who weren’t, captures a rock and roll star at the top of his game (once again).