How Does It Feel Like?
The Chemical Brothers were, for a lot of indie music fans of my generation, a gateway drug into the world of dance music (such as it was in the mid-90s music scene); along with the Prodigy, they came up with the most commercial version of dance music that was nonetheless familiar enough not to scare those of us who were more used to bands who wanted to be the Beatles than come up with “bangin’ choons” to pump your fist to in sweaty clubs every weekend. Of course, the Chemical Brothers managed this by wanting to be the Beatles as well, it’s just that they wanted to be “Tomorrow Never Knows” and “It’s All Too Much” and the more psychedelic Beatles than anything else (By comparison, the Prodigy just wanted to be the Sex Pistols. Like, really, really badly). Luckily, Noel Gallagher was there to help them with that:
Yes, it’s really just “Tomorrow Never Knows” with a bit more of a song to it, but I remember at the time thinking it was the best thing they’d done, and the most exciting thing I’d heard in a long time, some strange avatar of where both the Chems and Oasis would go next. Suddenly, there seemed like the potential for something new, something familiar, yes, but not the same as everything else we’d been listening to, something that actually summed up what our lives were about at that time in the way that you always want music to when you’re 21 years old and think that’s the way everything should work in some strange pop utopia. That wasn’t what happened, although that didn’t stop both the Chemical Brothers and Noel Gallagher trying to do what was essentially the same song, only a bit poppier, a couple of years later:
(That video, by the way, is one of my favorite music videos of all time, so wonderfully over the top.)
The strange, momentary crossover where it seemed like indie guitar bands and dance music were going to, if not merge together to come up with something that mixed the two, then at least open up their audiences to share and discover new and different things, is something that fascinates me even today. Not just for the missed opportunity, and the unfulfilled potential for What Could’ve Been, but for the wonderful lost innocence that genuinely believed it was possible, once.
I Lost My Faith In The Summer Time
The news that Noel Gallagher has, apparently, quit Oasis makes me feel both sad and curiously nostalgic. Oasis have never been my favorite band, but they’re a band that I have a curious love for that’s as born of the fact that they were so omnipresent during a specific part of my life as it is of any particular song they’ve recorded; instead of being a band, they’re an experience, an event (or series of events) in a way that more pretentious, more interesting bands could only ever hope to be.
When I think of Oasis, I think of the release of (What’s The Story) Morning Glory? and the fact that it was everywhere at the time. A friend told me in all seriousness that the reason he hadn’t bought it was that he didn’t need to; if he wanted to hear it, all he had to do was go into a store, and it’d be playing, or turn on the radio and flick between channels. I was in art school at the time, and it was played all the time there, as well, the only band and album that everyone could listen to without complaint (Well, maybe some complaint), our resident DJ and dance music fan commenting that the (shitty, lazy) line “All your dreams are made/When you’re chained to the mirror and the razor blade” was “so true, man” and describing the Beatles-but-less-so songs as “bangin’.”
Thing is, as much as the band members tried to make it otherwise with multiple and varied idiotic public statements, it really was kind of hard to hate Oasis. Sure, you could think they were dull, unoriginal and graceless, and all of that is true, but at the same time, they have this… heart? authenticity? dim-witted charm? something like that, that makes them oddly winning, nonetheless. They never deserved all the hype, the adoration and blind obedience that they were given, but at the same time, I can never really believe that there’s not some anti-snobbery pose involved with those who complain that they’re completely without worth, either.
For my part, I liked them when they tried to “rock” less and got poppier (“Whatever,” even though it’s even more ripped off than anything else they did, “She’s Electric,” “Round Are Way,” “Who Feels Love” etc.) and, of course, Noel’s acoustic songs were generally enough to win me over easily as well. Being naturally contrary, I think they got more interesting with their later (less popular, arguably less relevant) albums, but that might just be because the production and arrangements got better even as they got bloated and more pointless. But nevertheless, if Noel doesn’t do his traditional about-face and rejoin the band within the next month or so, I’ll be sad that Oasis is no more; they were an important part of my youth, even if I’m not entirely sure why.
