Oasis: The Truth

by Tony McCarroll

  Noel had met Marcus and considered him savvy and good for us. He had told him about the verbal offer that Alan McGee had made us and this interested Marcus enough for him to agree to represent us. It would prove a shrewd move. On both sides. Marcus was Welsh, but despite this he was a good fella. His unimposing shuffle and crumpled suit made some people underestimate him. But his day-to-day management of what was going to be a full-on rock ’n’ roll hooligan band was bang on. And his conduct as a human being was even more exceptional. Marcus was born in Ebbw Vale, deep in the heart of Wales. The town was heavily reliant on the steel factories they had built and the coal seams that nature had provided. Marcus was a blast furnace operative in one of those steel factories until he removed his helmet and decided to educate himself. After teaching economics up and down the country for a decade or so, he moved into management by chance. A friend from the valley wrote lyrics for a band called Latin Quarter, who would eventually release seven albums. Marcus agreed to manage them. From his sterling work with them he had attracted the attentions of Johnny Marr, Bernard Sumner and the Finn Brothers (of Crowded House). As Noel had McGee for his fatherly influence, so Marcus would fulfil that role for Liam.

  We were at rehearsals and Guigs was running off about the Policeman, who had been arrested by the local bona fide constabulary. It seemed they had picked him up and warned him about his behaviour and criminal activity. He had simply asked them if they had any evidence to substantiate those accusations of criminal activity. They told him they hadn’t, so he told them to fuck off and left the police station. He was not happy about being picked up, so he arranged himself a holiday. While in Tenerife, he then allegedly coordinated a series of fire bombings across Manchester and Stockport. Cars of rival criminals, shops and schools were all targeted. It was a highly organised affair. Over £55,000 worth of damage was caused and the story ran on that night’s BBC Nine O’Clock News. When he returned to these shores, he sported a relaxed air and an all-over tan. The police once again wanted to interrogate him over the fires, but his solicitor said he would only agree to this questioning if the police had some evidence linking him to these fires. They didn’t. So the Policeman had made his point. He then made a charitable contribution to cover the damage caused. I was worried for him. His rise to power had been quick and ferocious and he had left many beaten and angry people behind him. He had now taken to taunting the police as well. In the national media. Could only end in tears, as far as I could see. I made a mental note to see him.

  I had lent Noel a videotape of our first performance at The Boardwalk, from the days before he joined. Liam had asked to watch it, so we went round to Noel’s flat in town. After we explained the reason for our visit, Noel looked extremely awkward. ‘Erm… You can’t watch it,’ he said.

  ‘What do you mean we can’t watch it?’ Liam asked.

  ‘It’s not here,’ Noel replied ‘I’ve lent it someone.’

  ‘It’s not yours to lend out. Get it back,’ Liam shot back, angrily.

  We never did get that tape back – it disappeared off the face of the earth. It was the only video footage of the band prior to his arrival.

  It was time to meet Alan ‘Ginger Bollocks’ McGee in London. This was an important day, the day we’d waited for. Three years of hard work rewarded. We were signing our record deal. Finally. A proper record contract. With Sony Records. We never actually signed to Creation Records. That was mainly due to the fact that Creation Records and Alan McGee had no money. McGee though, ever the shrewd sweggy, had begged and borrowed to finance what he (and we) considered the best demo ever created. Self-belief was running sky high again. On the back of this demo, Sony agreed to sign us and then immediately licensed all UK sales to the penniless Creation Records, making Mr McGee a very wealthy man indeed. But more importantly, it gave us that record deal we had worked all these years for. We would finally get to record the body of songs we had worked on with the Realies.

  On 22 October 1993, Liam picked me up in a battered old Nissan taxi and Eugene the taxi driver sang Elvis songs as we headed to Piccadilly train station to meet Bonehead and Guigs. They stood waiting outside. Bonehead raised a half-demolished bottle of red. Guigs was red-eyed and his mind was clearly elsewhere. It was eight in the morning and they were already under the influence. We paid Eugene and as ‘The Wonder of You’ faded off towards the suburbs of Manchester, we hit the station bar in an attempt to catch up with Bonehead and Guigs. After we boarded, we cracked open a bottle of Jack and set about our business. Everybody was wearing that look. The smiles just waiting to burst. The mood was one of extreme jubilation. Punches were thrown playfully before Liam started to rip the piss out of a group of suits in the far end of the carriage. It was only playful banter, though, and the suits looked on bemused by the strange, hairy creature. Guigs had given us some of his weed, so me and Liam retreated to between the carriages and stuck our heads out of the window. Like a steamer of old, the smoke billowed along the side of the carriage before disappearing into the English countryside as the train sped its way along the tracks. Liam looked at me.

  ‘We fuckin’ done it. We fuckin’ done it.’ His smile was infectious. ‘Got to stick together now,’ he told me. ‘Gotta be strong.’ I guess that the feeling of comradeship was never again as intense as it was that day. We had always been so anti everything that it had made us tight as a unit.

  We returned to sit smirking, full of self-congratulation and elation. We had achieved what we had set out to do. It had taken three years of perspiration and arse-ache, but that was irrelevant. We had indeed fuckin’ done it.

  We arrived in Euston and were met by a sleek chauffeur-driven Mercedes that whisked us to Soho Square. There were bottles of champagne to be consumed quickly. We exited the vehicle to be met by the sight of Sony headquarters’ impressive facade. Staring up at the glass-fronted building, we noticed that each floor was lined with people, all of whom seemed to be clapping. We looked quizzically at each other before realising they were actually clapping us. Fuck me. We raised our half-drunk champagne bottles upwards and then headed towards the entrance, swaggering our way in and making for the top floor. The smell in the lift was a strange mixture of wine, champagne, marijuana and sweat. We all fell about laughing as the record company staff looked on, unsure of how to join in. We fell out of the lift where our bottles were removed from us only to be replaced with more champagne in glasses, and schnapps to boot. We were already well done from the train journey and this tipped us over the edge.

  In particular Bonehead.

  ‘Where’s the wine?’ he shouted, while he poured his champagne into a plant pot. Like clockwork, the Man who Can appeared with a bag that was bursting and simply sailed past us into the nearest toilet. Not a word was said, but we all followed in line.

  An hour or so of party later, we were ushered into a room and told that the document we were about to sign would leave us indebted to Creation and Sony for the next 18 years. Sounded good to me. We were given more champagne, and there was wine for Bonehead. A record company solicitor then rattled on for an hour or so in a language that occasionally resembled the same one that I used, though the rest of the time it sounded like Latin. We all stared at each other, smiling mindlessly.

  Finally it finished and then: ‘Tony.’ They waved me to the front. Fuck me, I was up first. I started my inebriated slalom to the boardroom table and tried to focus. On the desk in front of me lay a pile of paper that seemed to reach a foot off the table. Fuck me, I thought. Do I have to read all this? One of the legal team pointed his finger at the top sheet and I was simply asked to add my signature there. I read down the signatory list. In clear black print, it read Noel Gallagher, Liam Gallagher, Paul McGuigan, Paul Arthurs. Then my name. But not in print. Instead, it had been added in biro, with a less-than-straight dotted line beneath.

  ‘Are you happy to sign this document here and now?’ asked another member of the legal team. I now wished I hadn’t drunk all the champagne, glasses of which w
ere still being thrust at me. I couldn’t tell anyone that I just had a ‘bad’ feeling about this, so I reluctantly scrawled my moniker where requested and moved off to let the next man up. The rest of the band made their way up to the table and finally we stood together as the flashbulbs exploded and the office applauded.

  Next, we headed off to a large Mexican restaurant in the centre of London, where we stared at the food momentarily and then ordered more drinks. The toilet was most definitely busier than the kitchen in that restaurant.

  ‘You happy?’ I asked Noel, as we sat with a plate of untouched burritos between us. I thought back 10 years to the summer days in the park and how that unremarkable kid had transformed himself and us to the band we now were. I had to hand it to him, he forced all the issues and, with the help of The Real People, we really had a collection of songs to be proud of.

  ‘As happy as I’ve ever been,’ he replied.

  The draft contract that I’d seen gave Noel all the songwriting credits, which was fair and just, and then we each received a 20 per cent split of the rest. There was no key member agreement and the band owned the rights to the name Oasis. Standard stuff. As I said, this was agreed on and everybody thought it fair. But, as I was to find out later, the contract that had been signed that day also gave him and Liam the name Oasis. What’s more, it had given him the power to fire any member of the band he thought unfit for purpose. Myself, Bonehead and Guigs had been relegated to the sidelines. It seemed that I had signed a document that was different from the draft agreement but I would not come to realise this until I had finally left the band.

  In our ignorance and drunken state, we ploughed on to the Falcon Pub in Camden. We were on our second wind now, and Liam was shouting at us from the bar. The band Whiteout were playing, and they were a good set of lads.

  ‘C’mon To’, we’ll get up and play,’ he slurred, crashing into people at the bar. After he laughed this off, he headed towards the stage. I looked at Bonehead, who crossed his eyes and put his fingers in his glass of red and then blessed all around in wine before following me after Liam. We were all fucked out of our minds and I couldn’t keep rhythm. Bonehead was spinning a 360 while playing the guitar. Liam had forgotten who he was, let alone the words to the song he was singing. It was shambolic but funny. And after all, it’s not every day you sign a record contract.

  We partied on, with the Man who Can showering us in appreciation. Noel was not at all impressed by our musical outburst and spent the evening at Alan McGee’s place.

  We were feeling good. The news of our signing had spread like wildfire across Manchester and there was a real buzz of excitement in the air. All sorts of merchandise was now being thrown our way. Three huge boxloads of Adidas trainers were delivered. They were stored in the back of the transit and would later prove a vital commodity.

  Things were hotting up. In early November 1993, we jumped once more into our trusty white transit and headed off towards the M6, to perform in London for the first time. Someone needed to speak to Marcus about the transit vans. The backbone of England they may be, but it was my spine that was being rattled and thrown around the country. As usual, Liam was excited, although by the time we reached Newport Pagnell service station, various substances had exacerbated that natural excitement. This now made him dangerous.

  ‘Fuck you, Noel.’ This was thrown from nowhere. Liam’s eyes flashed danger. Noel gave him a little smile, which he knew would only serve to wind him up further. ‘What the fuck you smiling at, you little shitbag,’ continued Liam.

  Noel’s eyes lit up ‘Sit down, you prick, before you fall down,’ he sent back.

  Liam sent an arc of Holsten Pils lager through the air and it caught Noel full in the face. As he wrung his eyebrows and stared down at his lager-stained lucky shirt, anger spread across his face. ‘You’re nothing short of a prick,’ he hissed.

  This had become the norm. I guess it was pretty obvious that the media had latched onto the fiery relationship between Noel and Liam. Or rather, they were being force-fed juicy morsels by the record company. Before we had even released a single, the record company had already started marketing the image of the warring brothers and their rampaging rock ’n’ roll band. It was the beginning of an age of celebrity-obsessed culture and the two battling brothers were just perfect for the times.

  In truth, the media attention was having an adverse effect. In the past, a confrontation between Noel and Liam might sometimes end in threats of violence. Now they always did. Noel was very aware that the barbs thrown today were the soundbites in tomorrow’s papers. It was like a running commentary on our very existence. The machine had started to warm up. The chief stoker of that machine, Alan McGee, was jumping up and down at the front of the audience a few hours later. We were midway through ‘Shakermaker’ when I noticed his bright-orange hair bouncing up and down as he pogoed.

  In the dressing room afterwards, Liam began smashing a plastic chair against a brick wall. Shards of it were flying around, which made everyone back away. He had just read a review that Johnny Cigarettes had written for NME. He was not very happy. It read:

  If Oasis didn’t exist, no one would want to invent them. For a start they look and sound like they are a long overdue product from a bankrupt scally also-ran’s factory. Vaguely trippy guitar, almost tunes with vaguely late sixties rock tendencies, vaguely Ian Brown as Tim Burgess slob of a front man, singing in vaguely tuneless half whine, vaguely shaping a tambourine, vaguely… well you get the picture. But most annoying is the fact that they’re too cool to have a personality or be more surprising than the dullest retro indie fops, too well versed in old records to do anything new, and evidently have too few brains to realise any of the above is true. Sad.

  Liam had marked Cigarettes for being rolled in a carpet. ‘Dead man,’ he said.

  NME reviewed another Oasis gig almost immediately. This time they allocated reporting duties to Calvin Bush, who wrote: ‘Oasis are frankly incredible. They leave, I gasp and ache. The thought of having to wait a whole ten days before they play here again is already cramping my lifestyle.’

  We seemed to have created something of a difference of opinion down at NME.

  On 4 December 1993, I headed down to our gig at Warwick University in the van with no Noel or Liam. Noel had had enough of travelling in the transit and drove down in a hire car instead with Coyley – Mark Coyle, who’d worked with the Roses and the Inspirals. (More of him later.) Liam made his own way on the train, for some reason, and did not arrive until we are just about to go on stage. Noel hadn’t seemed concerned about Liam’s lateness until Liam actually arrived. Then he screamed at him and threw a plastic chair in his direction. It seemed that Liam had started a trend for hurling plastic chairs. Noel looked around afterwards, though, to make sure that all the relevant music journalists had recorded this altercation. We then headed on stage and played a blistering set.

  December 1993 saw us head for Liverpool’s Pink Museum recording studio. We literally had a welcome party waiting for us. The Real People were in town. Even before we’d unpacked the instruments, the recreational had started. The Real People had a way of lifting a room. Their non-stop banter and lunatic behaviour left everyone in a good place. Chris Griffiths was already wrestling with one of his group, who had decided to steal the goldfish from the tank in reception. He had brought the little tank to our room, then held it aloft and drank the unlucky little fish right down. I’m not making this shit up. Chris had tried to stop him, but was too slow, and now he was rubbing the other guy’s back and holding the now empty bowl out. All of sudden there was a hurl and a whoosh and the kid threw everything back into the bowl. His stomach contents now swirled in the bowl as a very shaken-looking goldfish started to eat away at it. Chris looked at us apologetically before he returned the bowl back to the receptionist with the words, ‘I’ve give him a bit of food, love.’

  We all laughed and were glad to be back. The Real People were ecstatic for us and for our success. I to
ld them that if it wasn’t for them we wouldn’t have achieved anything, but I think they already knew that. We’d still got no money, so I began to unpack my kit, which had not stood up to its recent hammering. I started running a sound check and practising a lazy beat I had been working on. Chris came up and told me to keep my head up with Noel; he had also spoken to Guigs and Bonehead. Then: ‘Get your arse out there, La, and give it some. Just jam away,’ he said, with a smile. Out I went. Chris’s attitude and big fuck-off zest for life really rubbed off on all those around him. He was a true musician and a true Spartan.

  I started to drum. Boom-cha, boom, boom-cha. Bonehead quickly began nodding his head in tempo and began to play his rhythm guitar over my beat. The rhythm kicked in and I adjusted as Bonehead changed chords. Noel started to pick at his lead over the rhythm guitar while Liam rattled his tambourine. Guigs nodded his head in time. Soon Noel was humming a melody over the rhythm, but then called the jam to a halt as it was time to start recording.

  The door to the studio suddenly flew open and an incredulous Tony Griffiths burst in. ‘What you fucking doing?’ he asked, his Scouse accent as high pitched as humanely possible, leaving every dog within a 3-mile radius howling.

  ‘We’re gonna record “Bring It on Down”,’ replied a surprised-looking Noel.

  ‘Like fuck you are,’ Tony Griffiths replied, with a chuckle, informing us that our ‘jam’ had the makings of a hit record. ‘Bring It on Down’ was shelved and thirty minutes later, after a brief interlude during which Noel scribbled furiously in the corner, we were almost ready to record a new song. Tony Griffiths guided Liam through the tune and provided backing vocals. ‘Supersonic’ had been born – and it really was that easy. We didn’t even remix it. When we got it right, we got it right. That moment of that evening would be our first-ever offering to the public. The Realies were having their effect again. They were producing us, as agreed. Life was beautiful. Now, I know that Noel is the main songwriter for Oasis, but there were many instances like this where the band as a whole – and The Real People too – were integral to the composition of a song.