Ten years on, Terry Christian recalls how Oasis made their TV debut on The Word. And it was all down to him ...

There's an old saying that success has many fathers but failure is an orphan. Since Oasis made their first television appearance, on Channel 4's The Word on 18 March 1994, everyone from the series editor and music booker to the cleaning lady has tried to take the credit - when, of course, it was really all down to me, me, me!
The first hurdle was convincing Paul Ross, our northerner-hating editor, and Ed Fosdyke, our music producer, who thought New Wave of New Wave (rehashed punk) was the next big thing. It was my girlfriend's plugging company in Manchester, Red Alert, who were responsible for plugging Oasis to regional radio and TV; coincidentally Noel Gallagher's live-in girlfriend of six years, Louise Jones, also worked for Red Alert at the time. I'd already had Noel pestering me on nights out in Manchester to get his band on the show when their debut single came out. I'd loved the promo and the live demo tape I'd heard, but the only times I'd seen them live they hadn't impressed, especially at the Hop & Grape bar at Manchester University, where Liam was so shy he sang the whole set with his back to the audience.

Ed Fosdyke's first objection was that The Word show on 18 March was the last show of series four, and the Oasis single 'Supersonic' wasn't going to be out until 11 April: it could make us look silly to put a band on when people couldn't buy the single for another three weeks or so. His second objection was that, besides American band Soul Asylum (hot at the time because their singer was going out with Winona Ryder), the other band booked was an Asian rap group from Manchester, the Kaliphz: 'But Terry, we can't have two bands from Manchester on the same show.'

'So you wouldn't have two bands from London on the same show?'

Fortunately for Oasis, the third band booked for that night's show had to pull out at the last minute, so they were on. They arrived accompanied by a scallyish entourage of crew plus assorted mates from Manchester. During rehearsal it was heartening to see that Liam Gallagher, far from being shy and retiring, was cheekily chatting up all the female dancers as if he was already a huge star. On the night itself they sounded fantastic, with the show's main guest, Bob Geldof, saying how good he thought the band were. As for Soul Asylum, they played 'Somebody to Shove', and although Winona was in the building, she refused to leave their dressing room.

The Word's after-show had a reputation as a good old drinking party with the bar open until at least 3am and, as it was the last show of that series, we had over 200 people, more than a quarter of them from Manchester. Noel was on form, taking the mickey out of England fans, saying that most England supporters supported crap teams like Huddersfield Town, Carlisle and Chelsea (hey, this was before the Russian arrived). Liam, meanwhile, was wandering around completely banjoed, speaking in a strange scouse accent and hanging out with the lads from Liverpool band Smaller.

Paula Yates was down, and excited about all the Mancunian accents from the Oasis and Kaliphz entourages, as she and her older daughters were big fans of Take That. As it was the last show, most of the maggot-eating Hopefuls who'd been on that series had come down for the after-show, and one of the girls made a beeline for Liam. He then took her back to the band's studio where they were staying that night (no hotels in their rock'n'roll lifestyle then) to do the business.

So that was Oasis: pushed themselves on to TV by pestering, great performance on the night, everyone got trashed, and the lead singer banged a Hopeful. 'Supersonic', the first single by this relatively unknown band, went straight to number 31 in the charts.The irony of it all was that, even years later, Ed Fosdyke will still insist he had Oasis booked all along. When we put together a series of edited repeats of The Word that summer, more than two thirds of the bands from the series were used - but not Oasis. That's how relevant the powers that be found them. But that's London for you.



the observer