Who Will Win Battle For Oasis' Soul?

It was a smart move by the NME to beat those Christmas deadlines - and I really enjoyed this week's Oasis tribute issue.

No band has ever given such consistently great interviews, from Liam Gallagher's "madferit!" stream-of-consciousness to Noel's sharp wit and forthright opinions.

Reading the best of them from over the years is almost as entertaining as putting on their old records - more so if we're talking Be Here Now onwards.

The withering put downs of their rivals are great, even if they became harder to justify as, post-millennium, the bands they were berating were generally making much better records (it was much easier to badmouth Shed Seven and Menswear).

Still, my favourite was Liam's verdict on Bloc Party as "a band off University Challenge". He sneered: "You see them and you're just waiting for some geezer to start asking them questions."

It strikes you as amazing how it took them so long to split up, considering how many times the brothers used a certain word to describe each other.

It'll be fascinating to see what they do next - much more interesting than the prospect of another Oasis record (those promo interviews aside).

Everyone's expecting Noel to go solo and I expect he will when he feels the time's right. I suspect it will be collaborations and guest spots for the moment though while he gets his stuff together.

He's still a great songwriter, just one who hasn't written a great song for a while. It might do him a lot of good to write a song without imagining what an Oasis song should sound like or how Liam will sing it.

As for Liam, it's harder to call. He's a great singer and frontman and probably always will be. He could just sing Oasis songs for the rest of his career if he wanted. I'm sure he'll hang on to many of them.

The younger Gallagher seems in much more of a rush and it looks like he's taking his old bandmates Gem Archer and Andy Bell with him, but the key to their future as a new act is the quality of the songwriting.

I haven't heard anything particularly good written by any of those three in the latter Oasis albums (no, not even Songbird).

It's hardly an uncommon view, but to me it looks like Noel has got the brighter, more interesting future. But you never know. Who would have thought Ian Brown would have left John Squire behind like he has?

The only certainty is that there will be some entertaining utterances from both camps as it all plays out. You just have to hope the music does them justice - and that they don't feel the need to get back together just yet.

Source: www.eadt.co.uk