Last night, I was able to go and see Catfish and the Bottlemen play in Ames, Iowa. I've been a pretty tremendous fan of their debut record since it came out last year and even more so after watching their live videos and interviews. They were incredible to see in a very small venue last night, although the crowd was horrendous; full of underage kids who knew nothing about music. The opening band, Wild Party, was fairly awful and a strange billing to be with Catfish as they sounded a bit like a Killers rip but even more poppy (as if that's possible. Also, afterwards, my friend and I were talking to their lead singer and he had never heard of Ian Brown or the Stone Roses... so you can skip on listening to his band).

Anyway, Catfish played for well over an hour, extending some tracks "Pacifier" and "Tyrants" to close to nine minutes. Great gig, again, lousy crowd.

The cool part about Van McCann: he's a massive Oasis fan and this week spoke with Noel in regards to Noel's working class comments.

After the gig there was a line of about 20 people waiting to say hello and have the boys sign stuff outside of their bus. We waited patiently and it was totally worth it. Van is a top guy. Super nice. We chatted for a bit and I had him sign the record for me, as did my friend, and then he saw my Oasis tattoo. I told him I was super excited for his band to be playing T in the Park, especially on the same day as Noel and Prodigy, "and Stereophonics" he added, (Bob and Benji told us they were most excited to see Modest Mouse that day). I told him that the Catfish record makes me wish I had a 13 year old son or daughter so they could get into it like I got into "Definitely Maybe" in 1994. I told him that I see a lot of parallels in both of those records and he said they intentionally thought about that while making the record and then went on to say: "Wait until you hear the next record. I just finished writing it 3 days ago. It's our Morning Glory. It makes The Balcony sound like b-sides."

I thought that was a fucking great statement and ballsy as hell. I love the swagger in that comment. I told him that I was just mentioning to my friend that I was excited to hear where Catfish would be in five years or so when they went through their "Be Here Now" stage and he laughed and said that the whole band have lots of ideas as to where they want to take the band creatively. He also mentioned that they would not be playing any new material, he thought, at T in the Park or over the summer but, that they all hoped new music would be out in 2015 and for sure on their next trip around the States.

I politely tried to step away and make room for other people but he asked me about the Welsh scarf I was wearing (it was 10 degrees out Fahrenheit) and I told him I lived there when I was a student and that my Grandma was from Bath. He said he just moved up north to a port town and was excited to be there. I told him I loved his response to Noel's comments on working class bands and he lit up and was genuinely excited that I had read that. He said, "That's what my band is. We're working class. Always have been." He told me that after Noel had read his comments that Noel had reached out to Catfish to get a copy of the video of Van talking about it and they sent it to him and then he spoke with Noel this week where Noel told him, "I hope Catfish takes over the world."

He shook my hand probably 7 or 8 times and thanked me a few more for coming. I'm sure the people behind me were getting pissed but whatever. Bob and Benji stepped out of the bus and we spoke to them for a few moments and had them sign our albums and moved on. They were all very approachable and really cool guys. I've been buzzing ever since. Keep replaying his Oasis comments over in my head.

If you get the chance to see them, do so. Nice to know that the Oasis spirit is alive in at least one new band these days.

Cheers.