Book review: Gallagher The Fall and Rise of Oasis
Author: PJ Harrison
Publisher: Hachette
I was a ’90s teen, so Oasis’ anthem-level songs formed part of the general musical backdrop to my coming of age. Such associations explain why I picked this book up with a certain relish.
It chronicles the band’s declines and comebacks, from their heyday to their recent reunion.
It is also a story about the brothers Liam and Noel Gallagher, the front runners, and their fraught relationship, and how it both made and broke the band.
Synopsis
The book traces their paths from the band’s break-up in 2009 through 15 turbulent years of rivalry, reinvention and eventual reconciliation.
Drawing on his own experiences as a former label owner and artist manager, and a lifelong Oasis fan who spent time both on the road and in the studio with the band, Harrison offers an insider’s view of the highs, lows and lasting influence of the Gallaghers’ music.
He gives the reader insight into how two working-class brothers from Manchester rose to rock stardom and created music that still gets airplay 30 years later.
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Mixed-bag reception
My Oasis knowledge is on a par with my lukewarm fandom. I liked their music, but my teenage self didn’t stalk them as intensely as other musicians of the same era (cough Alanis). I mention this because, while I enjoyed the book, hard-core fans were quick to take to the internet to point out all its errors and oversights.
If there were indeed any errors or oversights they went over my head because I simply did not know enough about the band’s personal information to notice.
One reviewer on Goodreads simply said: “sh** family, sh** book, unfortunately amazing music”.
For a low-level fan like me the book was a quick, interesting read that had me raising my eyebrows a few times.
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