Oasis' Bonehead In Basingstoke Tonight

In a great coup for the town’s music scene, Oasis founder member Paul “Bonehead” Arthurs will play Karma tonight as part of a stunning One Hundred Percent Music line-up.

He’ll be in Basingstoke in a new four-piece – fronted by Scottish musician John Mackie – and he tells me in a quick chat over the phone that he can’t wait for the tour to start.

Paul enthuses: “It’s going to be good because I haven’t done anything for a while. John’s been around on the Manchester scene for a few years as a solo artist and he’s pretty well known.

“We lost the singer in our old band (The Vortex), and we got John in. Then when that split and fizzled out, we just got stuck into doing some recording, me and John.

“We just seemed to gel together workwise and in the studio, so we just thought we’d make a go of it so we recruited a bass player and drummer just before Christmas. I have a very good feeling about it and can’t wait to get out on the road, actually.”

Basingstoke’s One Hundred Percent Music has assembled a superb rock and indie triple bill consisting of Sevesa, ElleKaye and Bluefire Messiahs – who’ll be seen at Basingstoke Live – to perform on the night too.

So, is Paul’s new material in the indie vein?

“Indie yeah, but big powerful songs written by John,” Paul replies. “Big life stories, pretty emotional songs, quite personal to John, but what everyone can share and make something of – really powerful words.”

The new group hope to record with the legendary Owen Morris, who produced the first three Oasis albums in addition to The Verve’s Northern Soul and The View’s debut release.

Paul explains: “We are going to record with him once he can find some space but I’ve got a recording studio at home, so for the moment we’re just doing it there. We have no plans yet but it will be good when it happens – if we can contain him, but that’s another story.”

And now for the inevitable Oasis questions. Credit to him, 45 year-old Paul deals with them in extremely good grace, clearly in complete understanding of the awe in which the band were, and still are, held.

He says: “People ask me a lot about Oasis, how it was and how it is now. But I get nothing but good reaction from Oasis fans in general in the street or out in town.”

Obviously, he left in 1999 before the lesser material of the later years and the friction between the Gallagher brothers eventually caused the bitter end of Oasis.

Dare I ask if he was glad to have been proved wise in hindsight by leaving before it all went wrong and the quality of their output sharply declined?

Impressively, he refuses to say a bad word about anyone connected with the group.

“You’re speaking to the wrong man because I am Oasis’ number one fan and always will be. I am off up to Glasgow to see Liam’s first gig with Beady Eye so that’ll be good.

“I am never gonna put Oasis down but I do think I got out at the right time. I have always said that I do think we should have bowed out at Knebworth, come off stage and said, ‘Thank you, goodnight, we were Oasis’. That would have been a fitting ending to the whole dream, and that’s my perspective.”

When Paul decided to make a break from the band, he cited the need to spend more time with his family, especially his two children who were just toddlers at the time.

What’s it like now that they’re old enough to attend his gigs and critique the old man? Do they understand the legacy he has been a part of?

“My daughter came to see us last year and she absolutely loved it. They do seem to understand – they are both big music fans in their own right and they have good taste in music.”

“Although,” he adds with a laugh. “It tends to be my kid’s mates’ parents who are a bit giddy that I was in Oasis.”

Source: www.basingstokegazette.co.uk

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