OASIS – "All Around The World"

#3: Fair point, on relistening that does seem to be the lyric. I can at least pass the buck on this one to Noel himself.

I think this is a remarkably kind and sensitive review of one of the most narcissistic (and simply lazy) records that will be encountered here – and also of a track that, essentially, goes nowhere, musically or lyrically, and never even promises to go somewhere and never even bothers to hint that it might perhaps just about consider doing so, at unreasonably great length. Then repeat, again again. No big hug here, apart from Gallagher Bro hugging himself. “I wanna kiss myself. I’m the one and only dominator”: is this the message here? If the track were less asleep, perhaps it would have been. Self-satisfied and enclosed, anyway.

Let’s call it an “installation” rather than a “song” and gape at it, and then fall asleep. Dullsville, Manchester.

This exhibit, ladies and gentlemen, is the passing of the sell-by date of Oasis, Britpop, and whatever the cokehead media invention “90s lad culture” was supposed to be.. narcissism, misguided nostalgia, overstaying its welcome to the nth degree (okay, five minutes) and a sense of “quintessentially English charm” used as a disguise for charmlessly imposing thuggery. It was a similar egomaniac, nationalist, “we are the best!” (note lower case, Swedish readers) idiocy that led to the trouble in Marseilles at France 98.

Somehow, this record’s never really caused me hatred. Unlike Bohemian Rhapsody or American Pie, the first few lines don’t evoke a memorable sense of a very long single going on a very memorable journey. Beatles harmonies and cod-hippy references as transparent as a neon tetra. I usually like that naff sort of thing anyway, especially when it’s done in the tongue-in-cheek way the Gallaghers (before Be Here Now) were great at. But this is precisely the point I went from thinking Oasis were both the best mates you could ever have and the people you dreamed of being when you grew up, to boring old men down the pub farting on about “the good old days” (and when were they, exactly?) FIVE.

3 seems kind. oasis’ rep in america now is curious. ‘wonderwall’ never really faded away completely and on alt-nostalgia stations you’ll still hear most of the oasis tracks that hit on any level here – ‘live forever’, ‘supersonic’, ‘cigarettes and alcohol’, ‘wonderwall’, ‘morning glory’, ‘champagne supernova’, ‘don’t look back in anger’. that’s a pretty deep bench, deeper than soundgarden or alice in chains or 90s (not 00s) green day manage and deeper than the rest of britpop combined (effectively just ‘bittersweet symphony’, ‘song 2’ and ‘there’s no other way’ if that counts, it’s been years since i heard the elastica or supergrass that managed to have any impact in the us). and yet the line is drawn at be here now as it has been in retrospect to the album itself. i say in retrospect because at the time be here now was a success in the us – ‘dya know whut i mean’ was a big mtv hit, ‘don’t go away’ hit #5 on the modern rock chart, oasis dominated rolling stone’s readers poll. i say this cuz there’s this sense that america wised up to oasis, while england hilariously made them a legacy act. it’s not totally errant – this lumbering turd went nowhere over here though it would eventually gain some profile via an att&t ad, like a microbe released by thawing tundra – but if anything killed america’s slight oasis mania it was the change in the altrock format and not the turn toward open worthlessness the band took. i guess what i’m saying is if at this late date anyone is still struggling to find a positive to nu metal, well, there’s yr silver lining.

1.

This makes ‘Whatever’ sound like ‘How Sweet to be an Idiot’.

Also, it’s not just Hey Jude I hear in this. Especially with the mixed-low piano at the end, to me this really sounds like the massive rock singalong that the Stones could have followed up You Can’t Always Get What You Want with but didn’t.

I’ve always wondered what they would have done if they hadn’t treated that song and Gimme Shelter as dead ends and gone back to simpler rock songs. But maybe I shouldn’t.

This could be ok if it ended after three or four minutes, but the sheer length of the thing is just so unearned and the way they can’t resist sticking a guitar lick into every tiny gap… further proof, it was needed, that taking too much cocaine doesn’t generally mean you’ll turn into the thin white duke.
The overselfindulgence here is so extreme that it’s almost enjoyable camp – but you’d probably need to already have a fan’s commitment to even have the patience for that. If anyone’s interested someone’s made a video edit for the full eleven and a half minutes – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0yzMwsLooXE – I think there should be some kind of prize for watching it all, like a restaurant with a huge hamburger eating challenge.

I had a quick look at my collection for songs between 7:00 and 7:10 in length, and there is not much comparable. It’s the length of Primal Scream’s Loaded, Pink Floyd’s Time, Aphex Twin’s On, some Red Snapper, Jah Wobble, Talk Talk’s Taphead etc, plus many tracks stretched out or shrunk down as played live, but straight-out, studio recorded rock is conspicuously absent.

Even looking longer there isn’t much. Blur’s Tender is longer (7:40), though again it is more comparable with Spiritualized than this era Oasis.

Thanks Weej. So people saw the video, bought the single and got minutes of… err… added goodness.

there’s a reasonably satisfactory b-side buried in here beneath the bombast and key-changes – unfortunately it really is dead and buried by the time the song ends.
According to wikipedia Noel thought so much of this song that he had been saving it until he could do it justice. Just as with DYKWIM there’s a simple strummed chord sequence over which he proceeds to layer various effect pedals before lurching through the key changes. A large part of the problem is that none of the added guitars, effects, etc. add any counterpoint or richness to the song. The Beatles could rely on Ringo’s idiosyncratic drum fills, Lennon’s mercurial contributions or McCartney’s inventive bass lines (or on Hey Jude his varied vocals); here everyone just dumbly repeats Noel’s chord sequence. Only Liam adds any variety but even that wears thin after a while.

Reminds me a lot of Tears for Fears, Sowing the Seeds of Love. Vaguely ‘will this do’ songwriting, with aspirational/feel-good lyrics which could be pastiche or genuine tribute. As ever with Oasis I can’t work out whether Liam’s weird accentuation (sheeiiiiinnneee) is a defiant assertion of provincial accent and phrasing, punk-ish distancing from the sentiments of the song, or art rock affectation.

#22 “there’s a simple strummed chord sequence over which he proceeds to layer various effect pedals before lurching through the key changes”

Taking advantage of hindsight I’m tempted to say that this is the endpoint towards which most of the indie guitar/shoegaze of the 1980s and 1990s is pointing. If I’m remembering correctly Spiritualized are out on the road touring Ladies and Gentlemen We’re Floating in Space which is basically the same sort of thing as this but the tunes borrowed from slightly more obscure source material.

Tut, Tom, never heard of the phrase ‘Bunnied Welsh Band’? It’s there for a reason 😉

With that out of the way…

At this point, my relationship with Oasis had pretty much soured. 15-year-old me (quickly approaching my 16th birthday) had rejected the band. However, there were still moments…

There are three points where Oasis should have split.

Firstly, after Some Might Say got to number one (or, more properly, when Tony McCarroll left the band). Had they called it quits then, they would have been five lads from Manchester who released six singles and one album, who’d topped the charts and shone so brightly it would be a tough act to follow.

Secondly, after Knebworth. How can you beat the two biggest gigs in British history? Imagine what a statement that would have been. To have had everything and thrown it away.

Thirdly, after this. This was the end of Oasis as even four blokes from Manchester and one Ringo impersonator from London. This song had a certain reputation before anyone had actually heard it. It had, Noel said, been written before Definitely Maybe came out. It was held off because he wanted it to be done right.

So what of it?

Well, it starts off relatively sedately. And it builds, and builds, and builds. Brass honks, guitars squall, and Liam tries to reassure – him? us? someone else? – and then it looks like it’s going to end on some ‘nah nah nahs’. And then you look at the time remaining…and you realise that the song’s only about halfway through. And it keeps going and going and going. This is the sound of Noel Gallagher flicking the Vs at taste, at trends, at the radio, at everyone, while Liam gets his nob out and pisses all over everything.

It’s big, it’s stupid, it’s over-indulgent, and – sad to say – I really bloody like it.

8.

#24 Oh no. I’ve got to contradict that point – I’ve been listening to “Sowing The Seeds of Love” a lot lately, and it’s a track that gets this kind of idea right. In fact, I was planning to mention it when we got to this single anyway. It’s enormous, but only six minutes long in comparison, and contains lots of little diversions and slip-roads away from the dominant, epic highway of a chorus, whereas AATW sticks doggedly to its particularly dull groove, and I don’t think any hook or chorus could really survive the kind of constant hammering this one gets. “Sowing The Seeds of Love” probably owes as much to “Good Vibrations” as it does to The Beatles, and as much as I would like to hate the pomposity and worthiness of it, its far too well executed.

I recall that AATW was originally supposed to have been Noel’s attempt at writing a Eurovision song – someone should clearly have nudged him about the three minute song length restriction for that contest (he might have written a better song that way). Whatever the original motivation behind it, the only contest this one would be likely to win on any continent at any time is “Worst Oasis number one”. Even Noel himself has openly expressed boredom at the way the thing drags (on the DVD commentary) and I’d half-expect him to agree with Tom’s review above. When even the songwriter can hear the problems with their work and pre-empts criticism, there’s usually a serious, serious problem. A 3 from me.

‘This song had a certain reputation before anyone had actually heard it. It had, Noel said, been written before Definitely Maybe came out. It was held off because he wanted it to be done right.’

this is almost literally the story of guns n roses’ ‘don’t cry’ – written before appetite, spoken of in interviews by axl but saved for a later album when it could be ‘done right’ and would receive the audience he thought it deserved. use yr illusion being a cousin of be here now (and my beautiful dark twisted fantasy).

Kids, don’t do drugs.

Why? Because, like this song, you might enjoy the experience for the single edit of four minutes, but at eight it’s an experience you have gone past the enjoyment phase of, and at eleven minutes you find the terror of something you cannot escape. Along with the brutal repeating images of the video,and so forth.

Not that I know anything about it..

Anyway, seven for the short 7″ version (US cd single, I believe), but as Noel has stated this as his Eurovision song ever since day one, he has only himself to blame for over-inflating a perfectly alright Oasis track beyond the bounds.

Also, blame the 12″ single for the plethora of ‘long version’ as opposed to ‘remix’ versions, except that Echo and the B’s “Killing Moon” worked, and still does.

@36 39: bunnies? Just in time for Easter? I’d love to know!

#41: Do the Midlands, Welsh and Stoke bunnies bring you lumps of coal instead of eggs?

Well, bugger! I’ve come too late to contribute anything useful towards AATW.

But! Stoke and the rest of North Staffordshire are not just famous for crockery but oatcakes as well.

I scored this a ‘6’, I think for two reasons – (a) I purchased it on cassette single, without much foreknowledge of Oasis/ Britpop as a phenomenon, but rather that I’d heard it and liked it on the telly and was then excited at the fact that for the first time I’d bought a single and helped it get to No. 1 (b) for me it marks the very last point when Oasis were listenable. I’d moved on by the time of SOTSOG (sounds like some kind of villanous organisation from James Bond), and was surprised by how underwhelmed I was by the lead singles off that, and so never took much of an interest in their subsequent releases.

I kinda expected this one would get a kicking.

I didn’t have any trouble finding oatcakes when I was in Uttoxeter the other week. They were new to me. A bit like a crepe (said the lifelong southerner).

The less exalted Popular influence on this single, I’d imagine, was I’d Like to Teach the World to Sing, which Noel had already signalled his fondness for on Shaker Maker.

AATW the label of the same name, was also rehashing old records in another part of Lancashire by this point, and will be exercising us in a few years time. Set You Free was always going to be the label’s unassailable peak, such a shame it fell one place short of no.1.

As for this AATW – given that I’d always pick the 7″ version as default single version over a 12″ or cd single version, this is merely dull, not overlong. It doesn’t kill me but it’s no Whatever either. 4.