First Listen: Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds

The much anticipated debut solo record from Oasis guitarist Noel Gallagher came across the Your Daily SPA desk this morning and we just couldn’t help but jot down a few words about what this larger than life rocker has in store for us.

Some background rustling and a casual cough make for a disconcerting first couple of seconds of Noel Gallagher’s debut record, but it’s clearly there to throw us off the scent as Everybody’s On The Run erupts into an epic, anthemic piece, replete with strings, a choir and a big, bombastic chorus.

If I Had A Gun does away with the lavish touches and rest on more of a standard rock band formation. The sentiment is a little weird; “ If I had a gun, I’d shoot a hole into the sun and never burn this city down for you ” isn’t exactly Gallagher at his most poignant, but we’ve never been too romantic so who are we to judge?

Surely no one is looking forward to hearing a song called (I Wanna Live a Dream In My) Record Machine. We weren’t. The seemingly inappropriate sound of children chatting and playing opens it up, before we quickly realize this is yet another big ballad, this time driven by an acoustic guitar, some huge harmonies and before you know it, hello, here come those swirling strings and that choir again. It wouldn’t be that bad of a song, but when the chorus kicks in and Gallagher actually sings “_I wanna live a dream in my record machine_” you can’t help but laugh/cringe and then you just want those fucking kids to shut up. There’s a pretty nice guitar solo over an incredibly dramatic string interlude but it all feels a bit silly, really.

The rolling piano and static bass of What A Life starts the song of promisingly, and the song putters along just how a nice and inoffensive modern rock tune oughta. It won’t blow your mind but it’ll make you tap your foot and the little dash of mellotron thrown over the top of the solid groove established by the rhythm section is a very nice touch.

We certainly weren’t ready for The Death of You and Me. An intro that almost sounds inspired by a spaghetti western, Gallagher pulling out his finest falsetto and, frankly, one of the best choruses he has written in years is far removed from the sappy melodrama expected. It’s a perky tune with miserable subject matter and, most importantly, a big old fashioned New Orleans inspired horn section that kind of doesn’t fit, which actually makes it better. A bunch of rather disparate ideas smashed together doesn’t often work, but it has here. Might not be a single, but it’s bloody good all the same.

Stop The Clocks is boring, quite frankly, and it features the line “ What if I’m already dead? How would I know? “, which leads us immediately to the skip button. Dream On is a jaunty slice of Britpop that takes itself a bit too seriously to be fun, but hits the mark all the same. Suspicious as we are, a song called Soldier Boys and Jesus Freaks has us pretty excited, but sadly it doesn’t get anywhere as dark as its title had us hoping for, but it’s not anywhere near as banal as AKA Broken Arrow, which honestly sounds like Gallagher is just reading verbatim from a book called Clichés for Dummies; you have to hear this shit to believe it.
The brackets are given a second run as (Stranded On) The Wrong Beach drops by. It’s far better than the last bracketed song and the gritty, swaggering chorus is one of the best on the record. It’s a bit more Stones than Beatles and shows us Gallagher has balls, without slapping us in the face with them as has happened a few times with the

Forget the kitchen sink; Gallagher and co have thrown the entire housing estate at this record. It sounds like it cost millions of bucks to make and as if it would have been a bit of a pain in the arse to do. The production is slick, the instrumentation intense (sometimes too much so) and Gallagher really belts it out on his vocal takes. The results are mostly pretty impressive – a few missteps aside – now we just need to kick back and watch the fireworks as Oasis fans tussle over whether or not it’s better than Beady Eye…

Noel Gallagher’s solo debut album Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds will be released on November 8th on Sour Mash/Mercury Records.

Source: themusic.com.au