Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds – Royal Albert Hall, London.
- Simon Harwood
- Dec 10, 2015
- 3 min read
Since his album release ‘Chasing Yesterday’ in February 2015, Noel Gallagher has been busy either performing or flipping off modern artists, and on the 10th December, I had the pleasure of watching him perform. This was his final show of the year and held at none other than the Royal Albert Hall.
After 45 minutes of admiring the venue’s vastness from a near bird’s-eye view, and 15 minutes after the performance was scheduled to commence, Noel arrived on stage with four other musicians including former Oasis member, Gem Archer joining him on Lead Guitar. Noel gave no introduction to his trusted guitarist, he instead just demanded the crowd “give it up for the ones in the cheap seats”. The band performed a modest acoustic tribute to Oasis, putting a lighter spin on hits such as, ‘Listen Up’, ‘The Importance Of Being Idle’ and ‘Slide Away’, which he dedicated to his “beautiful” wife.
The seemingly fed-up Gallagher also mentioned that he was “only doing this because we couldn’t find a fucking support band. I ain’t joking neither. My manager goes, ‘I’ve got a fucking great idea, you can be the support band and play for four hours’. I get double the rider though so every cloud”.
It was easy to tell that the acoustic set was quickly thrown together, the lights and visuals weren’t rehearsed, an arrangement of cloaked instruments lurked behind them and there was no video coverage. ‘Wonderwall’ was the first big finisher, however Noel persisted to change up the tracks, incorporating swung rhythms and using different melody lines, separating his own performance from an Oasis one. Or maaaaybe (sorry) he’s just so sadistic that he enjoys throwing off his crowd from joining in on the karaoke classic.
“A tough act to follow” Noel says after making his way back onto the rearranged stage, and this time accompanied by a non-uniform choir and seven new band members. By then, his presence had been made with choral sing-along tracks such as ‘Knock on the Door’, ‘Dream On’ and the refreshingly climactic ‘Champagne Supernova’.
With mesmerizing visuals and flawless singing, Noel’s stage presence was charmingly miserable, while the audience reflected the experience joyously. They celebrated with what I can only describe as ‘Hug-Pits’; groups of polo shirt-wearing, beer-bellied men aimlessly bouncing with linked arms and yelling back the lyrics of that one “banger” they can all name. The boisterous crowd would also chant out “Noel!” during the short intervals between songs, which received responses with nothing other than “what?” from the deadpan frontman.
Even from the highest balcony, people congregated at the stairs swaying and, with arms spread, spilled beer from one hand and recorded laborious snapchat stories with the other. Noel even pointed at one audience member in the front row and declared “someone’s been drinking”.
Towards the end of the set, Noel received an unexpected visit from a female fan who ran onto the stage, hugged him and kissed his faced as many times as she could before being dragged off by security. Noel joked, “That’s my PA, pissed out of her head”, and quickly got back to the job at hand. Despite how ape-like these fanatics would seem to any outsider, it was a unifying experience that invoked no hostility, only sticky shoes.
I, as a die-hard fan of both Noel Gallagher’s solo material and Oasis, can vouch for this performance as being an extremely satisfying and special experience… and going off his Instagram account, David Beckham agrees…
…Though a little peeved about something else!
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