By Jon Caramanica
For around two hours, Oasis – perhaps the most meaningful and popular British band of the 1990s, and certainly the rowdiest and most fun – toggled back and forth between masculinist ecstasy, and a sometimes fumbling search for it, in a frills-free and dogged performance. At times, it was pure triumph, the grandest pub singalong fathomable. At other moments, it was a ramble in the dark.
In total, it was a success if only for its improbability. The Gallaghers’ personal and professional brotherly hate verges on the Shakespearean – a legible public soap opera in a high tabloid era – and it has long seemed as if the two would never reconcile to share the stage again. Even when the group was at its mid- to late-90s peak, its stability was perilous, if amusingly so. Rarely has a modern musical act so effectively weaponised chaos in its favour, making Oasis as appealing for its mayhem as its songs, which were curiously well-structured and mature for a band of its bedlam.
What animated Oasis the most was that, as a songwriter, Noel was sentimental and a bit dreamy, and as a singer, Liam was sneering and a touch rude. Hearing Noel’s words in Liam’s voice – most Oasis songs are delivered this way – is like being serenaded by a resentful punk. Onstage, Liam sings directly into the microphone, leaning in ever so slightly with menace. Noel, playing guitar, sometimes nimbly, can verge on the beatific.