I’ll get the comparison with Definitely Maybe out of the way early. It’s not as good, obviously.
But, the first half of Dig Out Your Soul is the most exhilarating thing they’ve done in 10 years.
Raucous stomper Bag It Up, a song my mum would describe as a “racket”, gets things moving. The second, The Turning looks like meandering along harmlessly until Liam leers “So cumon, shake your rag doll baby” as only Liam can.
Waiting for the Rapture, my favourite song on the album, continues the in-your-face feel. A foot-thumping intro, the definitively Oasis elongated vowel rhyme: “A big love to fall down from the sky / She put an apple in my eye” in which Liam sounds like he’s right back where he belongs, almost eating the mic, and a whole lot more in three psychedelic minutes. This is the band at their best, when it sounds there’s a fight going on between vocals and instruments.
The first single off the album, The Shock of the Lightning, sounds like a beefed-up Strokes racer, but that’s no problem.
Liam then joins the songwriting stakes, and threatens to steal the show from his big brother. Sampling a John Lennon interview, I’m Outta Time is a beautifully wistful ballad, Liam’s delivery convincing you that he’s really opening his heart.
Next comes the relentless shuffling rhythm of (Get Off Your) High Horse Lady. Ruined slightly by the affected vocals, it would have been better as an instrumental. They give you a much-needed 30 seconds at the end to get your breath back, but unfortunately the album doesn’t really recover its momentum from there.
The rest is pretty forgettable. Bassist Andy Bell’s contribution The Nature of Reality, which sounds like a one-dimensional AC/DC rip-off, is worse than that. Liam rescues things with the atmospheric Soldier On, a fitting finale to an album that shows the Gallagher brothers trying to hide their growing lyrical maturity behind good old rock n’ roll tunes. Who else could malign “we live a dying dream”, and follow it with “if you know what I mean”?
Thursday, October 9, 2008
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
Palin for (Vice) President!
Just over a month back now, Jon MacKane was heard muttering under his breath “I don’t care what the papers say about me, as long as they spell my name right.”
And so he unleashed a Miss Palin upon the world.
The 2008 US election, which had been very much about Barack Obama, has since been very much about the Republican running mate.
Sarah Palin, photogenic, gun-touting, Evangelical Christian, inexperienced governor of Alaska, mother of five, including a pregnant teen, has since hogged newspaper inches and radio and TV seconds here, let alone across the pond.
She’s captured the imagination and the empathy of small-town America, and John McCain’s benefited by association. Embarrassment in a Katie Couric interview aside, she’s emerged relatively unscathed from intense questioning, while even managing to reverse the Republicans’ poll deficit.
The Democrat running mate didn’t matter – it’s all about Obama. McCain had to make a gutsy choice. But playing Obama at his own ‘biggest celebrity in the world’ game might have been a big error. The Republicans should have stuck to their guns, played to their number one strength – experience.
McCain was never gonna win because of who he is, but only because he’s not Obama, 47 and black. But now he’s given the all-important swing voters in states like Ohio something to vote against.
Of course, you vote Presidents into the White House, not out. (An idea for next time round perhaps). But, psychologically, it is easier to vote against someone because you dislike them than vote them in because you do have faith in them.
For politically ignorant Americans it will come down to who you take a fancy for, but most importantly – given the level of fear of a worsening economic crisis right now – who you trust.
Both Obama and Palin appear to be Brave New World politicians. Of course, considering Obama’s traditionalist education and Palin’s focus on family and home, those judgements are only correct on a superficial level. But these are the judgements that I think will be made by the people who will make the difference in less than a month.
Now’s the time for someone Americans can trust to guide them clear of the recession that threatens to overshadow the election. McCain had experience on his side, but, with Sarah Palin, his greatest popularity tool, I can’t help but think that he might just have shot himself in the foot.
And so he unleashed a Miss Palin upon the world.
The 2008 US election, which had been very much about Barack Obama, has since been very much about the Republican running mate.
Sarah Palin, photogenic, gun-touting, Evangelical Christian, inexperienced governor of Alaska, mother of five, including a pregnant teen, has since hogged newspaper inches and radio and TV seconds here, let alone across the pond.
She’s captured the imagination and the empathy of small-town America, and John McCain’s benefited by association. Embarrassment in a Katie Couric interview aside, she’s emerged relatively unscathed from intense questioning, while even managing to reverse the Republicans’ poll deficit.
The Democrat running mate didn’t matter – it’s all about Obama. McCain had to make a gutsy choice. But playing Obama at his own ‘biggest celebrity in the world’ game might have been a big error. The Republicans should have stuck to their guns, played to their number one strength – experience.
McCain was never gonna win because of who he is, but only because he’s not Obama, 47 and black. But now he’s given the all-important swing voters in states like Ohio something to vote against.
Of course, you vote Presidents into the White House, not out. (An idea for next time round perhaps). But, psychologically, it is easier to vote against someone because you dislike them than vote them in because you do have faith in them.
For politically ignorant Americans it will come down to who you take a fancy for, but most importantly – given the level of fear of a worsening economic crisis right now – who you trust.
Both Obama and Palin appear to be Brave New World politicians. Of course, considering Obama’s traditionalist education and Palin’s focus on family and home, those judgements are only correct on a superficial level. But these are the judgements that I think will be made by the people who will make the difference in less than a month.
Now’s the time for someone Americans can trust to guide them clear of the recession that threatens to overshadow the election. McCain had experience on his side, but, with Sarah Palin, his greatest popularity tool, I can’t help but think that he might just have shot himself in the foot.
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