|
I watch Noel half raise a hand in silent greeting through
the glass. Suddenly the door opens, there's sound and he's on the threshold.
Our eyes meet and the famous monobrow furrows.
Am I the guy from the last Q interview? All that
rowdiness in the pub round the corner?
I am.
"So you were the c**t asking all the questions about
my ex-missus?" he demands.
Yes.
"You've cost me a lot of f**king money."
The publicist intervenes.
Wasn't it just some cheeky picture captions?
"No, it wasn't," says Noel.
He makes his way to the sofa and throws his keys down.
He's like a man contemplating his options on hearing his hotel room is double
booked. Stay in high indignation and beast the cravenly apologetic stuff? Or
storm off home? His publicist asks if he really wants to do the interview.
"No, I think I'd rather go shopping."
With that he collects his jacket and keys and walks out.
"I've never seen him like this before," says
his publicist. "Never."
Lounging happily by a photocopier, Liam Gallagher watches
with genuine bafflement as his older brother shoulders past, jacket opening
like a sail over his head.
He's upset," says Liam, not entirely without
mischief.
WITH THEIR SIXTH studio album, Don't Believe The Truth,
Oasis appear less of a double act and more a band then they've ever been. With
three contributions from Liam Gallagher, two from bassist Andy Bell and one
from guitarist Gem Archer, the new album revisits their glory years. Noel, the
boss and surrogate dad to his younger brother, has matured and can claim
friendships with the likes of Chris Martin, who he has described as "a
bloke I wouldn't have liked 10 years ago." Liam has calmed, too. Life with
Nicole Appleton and his family suits him. Since one final epic scrap in a
Munich hotel bar in December 2002, in which Liam lost his two front teeth, he
hasn't heard the words 'you have the right to remain silent" for a while.
But the sibling argy-bargy of old has developed into
something darker. "As a frontman, he's the best. As a person, there are
things about him I don't like," Noel has said of his brother. The
animosity was crystallised in Barcelona in 2000. Backstage, there was a drunken
Liam taunt so heinous that Noel walked off the tour and said he would never
forgive him.
At Glastonbury 2004, they were rumoured to have arrived
separately to play a disastrous set. Clearly the threat of brotherly ructions
still hangs over the new world tour.
At the start of week one, as I climb aboard , Liam
Gallagher has been briefly recast
as the sensible one, the peacemaker. By the end of our time with the band, it
is hard to tell who's first in line for a Liam "slap".
AN HOUR BEFORE the walkout, the ergonomic office chair
spins and offers up a hairy hand and the burning Gallagher eyes. Liam even asks how I am, and I
bask in the new etiquette. There are improvements in personal aroma too. When
we met at the band's Buckinghamshire studio in 2002 he seemed to be perspiring
super-strength lager. In its place this time is an appealing men's fragrance.
And where you once winced at the sheer volume of
profanities, I am now only occasionally a "c**t" for the odd
ill-judged question, and even this can be downgraded to "soft lad" on
appeal.
Certain issues still arouse the inner caveman. The word
marriage, he says, makes him think of "dog shit". But, as long time
observers will concede, even this is a mellowing.
|
