The early to mid-nineties was a depressing time where there was not a less credible than actually caring. Which is what makes Oasis’s rise so remarkable. They wanted to be the biggest band in the world. They had the attitude of eighties Sunset Strip, riffs from the classic rock era of the sixties, mixes with a dash of the weirdness that alt-rock craze of the nineties. The first song off their debut album Rock ‘n’ Roll Star was a shot across the bow of the shoe gazers of the time. Hard partying, heavy drinking, and massive group infighting was back and for a brief moment, it was glorious. The band became so big, even a single of the brothers Gallagher charted in their native England.
Though the band did not become the global superstars until their second album, Definitely Maybe, this month’s induction into the Scooter Hall of Fame, was a great start with a few singles that should have broke the band stateside. There was plenty of cocksure in the rock anthem Supersonic which should have had a crossover with the Shawn Kemp led Seattle basketball team at the time. Second single Live Forever was more melancholy but still managed to rock hard. Though those two track stood out, there was not a skippable song on the album.
Oasis’s love of The Beatles is well documented and the influence is heard the most on Shakemaker which could have fit in their trippy period. And where the band showed they could rock hard (Bring it on Down actually would not have sounded out of place on the eighties Sunset Strip) the album is just as interested when the band slowed down; Digsy's Dinner is a fun jaunt though the British countryside. And while the Beatles influences are so abundant one can argue plagiarism at time, album closer Married with Children sounds like the best ballad the Davies Brothers of The Kinks never wrote.
Stuck between those two slower tracks is one of the great hidden gems of the nineties Slide Away, the most vulnerable the band is on the album but still exudes some English attitude on the track. There was plenty of hype surrounded Oasis when they came out, mostly created by the band itself, and the was finally realized with the release of the second album, most specifically Wonderwall, but you have to wonder if their hubris was also their downfall as went away Stateside as quickly as the conquered (though for those who stopped paying attention to the around the release of Be Here Now I highly recommend checking out Stop Crying Your Heart Out, the closest they got to recreating Wonderwall)but for one deleting moment everyone agreed with the Gallagher Bothers that Oasis, indeed, was the biggest and best band in the world.
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