Bag It Up / The Turning / Waiting For The Rapture

Mojo (August 2008 issue)
“Well we had 66 songs for the last album, and we had sh-tloads left over. I remember saying out of those 66, 11 were good and seven were really great. So I was counting on them being the core of the next record, but it didn’t quite turn out like that.”

What happened?
“Well we ended up sitting around for a year and by the time it came round to recording those seven songs, they sounded like B-sides to me. I thought we should do something new. Then completely by chance, dead quickly, I wrote three songs over the space of a week, and ‘cos Weller was in our studio, I demo’d them in Gem’s bedroom.”

This was when?
“This was last summer. We had to finish the tunes before Gem’s kids got home from school at 10 to five. So these demos were really rushed and they were pretty sparse. There were no backing vocals, no acoustic guitars... Of course, when we played them to Dave Sardy, he was going, “It’s f---ing genius! I love the bare-bones quality!” And I was looking at Gem going, “I’d have put trumpets on it, but your kids were knocking at the door...”

Describe those songs to me.
“If they’re like any of my previous songs, they’re like Columbia, in the sense that they’re kind of trance and ‘groovy’. I don’t like to use that word, but the rhythms are quite strong, and I suggested to the others that if they had any songs like that lying around they should bring then in. Liam obviously f---ing freaked out, ‘cos he always hates new directions.”

So did the idea to keep it simple go out of the window in the end?
“Yeah. There’s too many multi-instrumentalists in this band to do anything minimal. Anyway, I don’t like concepts following around records, that’s the Brian Eno curse. I think a lot of bands fall down on that – they get the concept first.”

So if it’s not a stripped back album, what are the songs like?
“The three initial tracks I did at Gem’s were in a dropped tuning, all in the same key. One of them sounds like The Stooges doing Fools Gold. One of them sounds like Strawberry Fields on really f---ing cheap bad acid. Another one started off sounding like a strummy, A-minor, very plaintive love song, but when we were doing it at Gem’s I was like, F--- it, and it ended up like The Doors’ Peace Frog, with this heavy two-note riff.

September 2008 – Q (October 2008 issue)
Andy Bell on Bag It Up: "One of the first three tracks that Noel recorded at Gem's place (Archer's home studio) they were done in a very quiet, very basic way and they became the blueprint".

The Shock Of The Lightning

Biography on Oasisinet
“Both ‘The Shock of the Lightning’ and ‘Bag It Up’”, Noels says, “Were written basically in the studio. If ‘The Shock of the Lightning’ sounds instant and compelling to you, it’s because it was written dead fast. And recorded dead fast. And before we knew it we were saying: ‘f--king hell: you know what, this is really good.’ I’d say it’s probably the most current song we have had on a record - ever. Because generally I would write a song, then demo it, then listen to it for months. And f--k about with it. Whereas ‘The Shock of The Lightning’ basically is the demo. And it has retained its energy. And there’s a lot to be said for that, I think. The first time you record something is always the best.”

Q (October 2008 issue)
Gem Archer on The Shock Of The Lightning: "Noel literally just played it the night before [it was recorded]. Did a little one-man-band job, played the drums, the bass, the guitar, sung it and came back up the stairs".

I’m Outta Time

October 2008 – Liam in Clash Magazine
That song contains an extract from the last interview that John Lennon ever did. Was the part you used chosen specifically, and if so, why?
Me and Gem sat there... Now I’ve always liked when I hear people talking on records. I just wanted a bit of a sample, and obviously it’s gotta be John Lennon. So me and Gem just started sifting through ’em up at Wheeler End and that was the first one that popped out. And I mean that; we didn’t go through many, man. I said, “What the fuck is he saying there?” And we’re all listening in.

30th October 2008 – Liam Interview (www.rollingstone.com)
Tell me about "I'm Outta Time."
That's a song I had about three years ago and I demoed it in our studio. I got the verses and the music, the chorus took like f--king years to write, I just couldn't get anything. One day I was f--king about and it just happened. I thought, "All right, that's the song done. It's f--king done." I was playing it and the outro goes round and round, it needs something — obviously I'm a big John Lennon fan and it's got a bit of a Lennon vibe, so I thought, "Well, I've got to find a bit of him speaking." So we went through all these old interviews, that's the first one I found, and it just sort of worked. It's not a tribute to John Lennon because if you sat down and tried to write a tribute to John Lennon it'd be fucking rubbish, but it's kind of a nod.

(Get Off Your) High Horse Lady

Q (October 2008 issue)
Noel Gallagher: "The oldest song on the album, originally demoed for Heathen Chemistry. Wouldn't have made the album, but the bass is so heavy, it forced its way onto the final cut."

Falling Down

20th October 2008 – Gem Interview (Bournemouth Echo)
“That song was one of the ones Noel demoed by himself in Abbey Road, the night before we recorded it properly,” explains Gem.

“It was totally fresh when we did it because we’d not recorded it over and over making demos.

“Not only is it one of the best songs he’s written, but the production of it is mega. If we’d recorded demos of that song, we would have spoiled it.”

To Be Where There’s Life

Q (October 2008 issue)
Gem Archer: "It was just a groove, a bassline and Noel was like 'that's the one, write some words for it'. It's a stream of consciousness. And there's no guitars on it which is another thing I like as well".

Andy Bell in Clash Magazine:
With Gem’s tune on this album, it was like a snatch of instrumental music that Gem had done on a demo and Noel happened to hear it and go, “What’s that?” And then Gem was like, “It’s one of my little ideas I’ve done.” Noel kinda said – I think this is what happened – he said, “Why don’t you just turn it into a tune? Write a melody and lyrics for it.” And that’s how that tune came about.

8th October 2008 – Interview With Noel and Gem (XFM X-Posure Show)
Started as a two minute instrumental played by Gem on bass and his son on drums.

Ain’t Got Nothin’

Q (October 2008 issue)
Q: Another of your tracks on the album is Ain’t Got Nothin’. Totally different. Squalling guitars. An aggressive lyric: ‘All I want is the truth…”
Liam: It’s about that scrap in Germany. I wrote it about six months after it happened because everyone was going around saying, “It was down to them (Oasis), they started it.” No, it f--king weren’t. And it wasn’t even the press. It was the police and even friends of mine that I thought would be on my side. They were like, “It was f--king you lot, all pissed up.” And so I was like, “F--k you then, you bunch of c--ts. I know the truth.

The Nature Of Reality

4th October 2008 – Gallagher Rules Oasis With A Musical Iron Fist (The Edmonton Journal)
A strict taskmaster, Gallagher has no time for coddling inferior songwriting. The songs that made it had to pass his approval, and he singles out bassist Andy Bell's T-Rex and blues-flavoured The Nature of Reality as a personal favourite among the other contributions.

"Andy sent a demo with five tunes, in order of what he thought was best to worst, and that was the one he thought was the worst, but I thought was the best. I think it was only song we played live in the studio. The others were chopped up on computers."

Soldier On

Mojo (August 2008 issue)
“There’s a song of Liam’s called Soldier On, which is a kind of lost-and-found story. We’d not started recording, but we’d started gathering together tunes that had a certain feel to them. I was doing the Electric Proms with The Coral, who’d recorded their album at my studio, and it turns out they’d come across a hard drive in the Pro Tools that sad New Oasis Stuff, and they’d had a sneaky listen... So [Coral singer] James Skelly, a bit sheepish, asks me, “Are you gonna do that tune Solider On?” Now I don’t remember it, Gem doesn’t remember it, Liam certainly doesn’t remember it, but the other lads in The Coral are going, “You’ve gotta record this tune, it’s f---ing boss!” So I ransack this hard drive, can’t find a track called Solider On. So we get to Abbey Road and we’re chatting away, and Andy Bell goes, “Solider On? Brilliant” I’ve got a CD of it in my bag.” Turns out he recorded it with Liam, but Liam still doesn’t remember it. “Well,” says Andy, “you were pretty f---ing p---ed.” So we stick it on. Like all Liam’s songs its got one verse and one chorus just repeated, but it’s ended up being the last track on the album. It reminds me of a guy walking through sand, carrying a big f---ing block on his back, and it just goes on for ages. It goes quite dubby at the end, and I play melodic on it, in the reverb chamber that The Beatles used!”

Q (October 2008 issue)
Herbal-scented, trancey closer, discovered by The Coral on a hard drive at Oasis's old studio, Wheeler's End. None of the band could remember it until Andy Bell found it on his iPod.

Gem Archer: "The Coral said to Noel 'that's a top tune' so Noel said 'What's this?' and I said I haven't got a clue. It was an old Liam song I demoed with him around 2004 or 2005 and couldn't remember".