Oasis : Live Forever

Two ungainly slabs of thug-boogie down the line, and I had this lot marked down less as the Beatle-browed saviours of rock ‘n’ roll, and more as The Real People for ’94. Remember The Real People? Scally bruisers with a heavier take on baggy, a taste for scrapes and an inevitable obsession with the Fab Four… See?



‘Live Forever’, though, is much, much better. Noel classes it alongside ‘Wild Horses’ and ‘Cortez The Killer’, predictable bravado that shows in a couple of impeccable solos. But really, with a kind of sun-kissed nonchalance rather than those two’s fraught elegance, it comes across more like The La’s ‘There She Goes’ or- I’m afraid it’s true- like ‘Made Of Stone’. It TOTALLY gives off the impression that the Gallaghers believe they can make the world dance around their little fingers just when they like it- which they can nowadays, more or less. And it even succeeds at being extremely pretty, a quality you’d hardly expect from such svelte sophisticates.



Basically, what thus far looked like Manc lad arrogance looks like sheer effortlessness. A terrific record.


John Mulvey



Watch the video here