Review Summary: A return to form... Sort of. If you didn't enjoy the last 3 albums, you'll like this, if you did, I'd still recommend it, although this may surprise you a little, it's still a very good CD.
Oasis' supposed return to form has been a long time coming.
Be Here Now was what many consider a big slump in their previously flawless (although only 2 albums long) career. I would personally disagree with this, but I'm telling it like it is.
Standing On The Shoulders Of Giants marked a big change in sound, receiving very mixed reviews. The slightly psychedelic sounds, the electronica and annoying buzzing noises (
Put Yer Money Where Yer Mouth Is) proved that Oasis had, to many people, lost it.
Heathen Chemistry was even worse, (this time I agree, although I still don't think it was that bad) and the production seemed to be suffering. For a band who had been on top of the world, this was inexcusable, and they needed to do something about it. Cue
Don't Believe The Truth:
This was actually the first Oasis album I owned in it's entirety, searching down the '2 for £10' row in HMV for something to accompany Razorlight's s/t (which I now regret buying), and I stumbled across this. I was looking for
(What's The Story) Morning Glory, only to discover HMV was ripping me off (yet again) with the price tag being £22! So I took my offer to the counter, made a sarcastic remark to the employee there, (who laughed, and agreed with me) and walked away. This would be the start of a big obsession for me (no, not taunting HMV employees).
As
Turn Up The Sun begins, your first thoughts may be 'wait, this is the same band that released
Wonderwall?' It's somewhat in the style of
Be Here Now's highlights, but less epic. The multi-layered Christmas-style intro leads onto a heavy guitar-based verse, which many people will be turned off by, until Liam's trademark snarl hits. Good to see he's got it back, after the somewhat weaker vocal performances on the last album. It continues at a slow pace, sounding quite heavy throughout, ending in the Christmas jingle acting as an outro this time.
Mucky Fingers is supported by a pounding rhythm, which sounds like it could go somewhere, but simply repeats for the whole song, Noel's vocals sounding very strained, even though he stays on the same note for most of it, in an an almost rapped delivery.
Does it sound like Oasis have regained their greatness yet? Not really, but
Turn Up The Sun was certainly promising, even if the whole song sounded very much the same.
Mucky Fingers is the problem, as it fails to ever get going.
Lyla continues in the same vein, sounding like a cross between the two previous songs, it's heavy chord based style (
Turn Up The Sun) working together with the pounding rhythm (
Mucky Fingers) to create something that never really manages to get going either. It's also over 5 minutes long, longer than the other 2, and gets tiresome, as it barely changes style during the song (like the previous 2, yet again). Still enjoyable, but nothing special, and you may be thinking at this time in listening 'So when does it get good? Does it continue on like this for the whole album?' Luckily, the answer is no, starting from the very next song.
Love Like A Bomb is the first song written by Liam on the album, and rescues it, with a 3/4 time signature doing a lot to help, acoustic guitar complimenting Liam's excellent vocals, light drumming (for the first time on the album) and a few other instruments thrown into the mix. The chorus and verse both have great lyrics as well, and it finishes after less than 3 minutes, which is a very good thing in this context.
Love Like A Bomb represents most of the album, in a way. It's different from the first 2 releases, but doesn't try to be epic anymore, marking a slight return and a step away at the same time. Liam's songwriting is, in fact, stunning on this album. All of
Love Like A Bomb,
The Meaning Of Soul and
Guess God Thinks I'm Abel deserve a mention, with much lighter drums,
The Meaning Of Soul sounds like it might even have been done to show Noel how to do the fast tempo songs well, basically by turning the drums down and putting more into the vocals. I'll get to
Guess God Thinks I'm Abel later. Liam is a star on this album, as he often is (whether just with vocals or with songwriting as well).
Unfortunately, Andy Bell's contributions are lacking.
Turn Up The Sun was fine, but
Keep The Dream Alive was, to be honest, poor. A lowlight of the album, although the intro is promising, Liam's vocals don't sound right, and the song drags on, making Liam sound almost small in comparison to the millions of layers playing over the top of him. It almost asks you to press the skip button, and I would heed that advice.
Gem fares better, co-writing
Love Like A Bomb, and writing
A Bell Will Ring on his own, which is a pretty good track, giving us hope for a decent album finale (which I'll also get to later). The drums are mixed at the right level, but the guitar is the hero of the track, carrying it's otherwise average parts (yes, even the vocals are nothing spectacular here) to a decent finish of a decent song.
Noel must have been worried about allowing so many songwriting duties to the other members, but seems fine about it when you listen to his contributions.
Mucky Fingers and
Lyla have been covered already, and are luckily his only unimpressive efforts.
The Importance Of Being Idle is a very relaxing song, which he sings himself. It may remind you of the structure of
Morning Glory (the song), and, while not as good, is definitely a worthy performance.
Part Of The Queue is another 3/4 song, and is a very interesting, if fairly brief, listen. Not too much to say about it, but it's almost haunting at points, and has some good lyrics. The chorus is well done, but the first verse is the highlight.
I haven't yet talked much about the lyrics. They vary so much that it's very difficult, but Liam probably does the best job overall:
Guess God Thinks I'm Abel is fantastic on the lyrics front, with the obvious pun of Abel/Able not being overused, but used to its full potential.
Guess God Thinks I'm Abel is my 2nd favourite song on here, with an acoustic guitar yet again perfectly complimenting Liam's voice, which is unusually soulful (as it can often be when he writes his own songs).
The best song on the album, however, is left until the close. It may even be the best ever Oasis song.
Let There Be Love has fantastic vocals, fantastic lyrics, piano and guitar. The drums are left out of the mix until they are absolutely needed (when Noel begins to sing in the bridge), and Noel shows his high voice has great merits when doing a duet like this with Liam. It's hard to describe how powerful this song is at the right moment, a beautiful ballad, fading out at the end of the bridge, holding on for several seconds before Liam's voice comes back for a repetition of the first verse, and the chorus is sung several times, a perfect finish to a perfect song.
A great album, a return to form, everything we all wanted from Oasis.
Pros:
+ Lots of different songwriters add a new element to the Oasis mix
+ Some spectacular songs
+ Liam Gallagher
Cons:
- The flow of the album is a little iffy
- Some songs sound very similar
- Mucky Fingers
Recommended tracks:
Guess God Thinks I'm Abel
The Importance Of Being Idle
Let There Be Love
![http://i240.photobucket.com/albums/ff302/slypuck2/ObamaHellNo.jpg[/img]](http://i240.photobucket.com/albums/ff302/slypuck2/ObamaHellNo.jpg[/img]){kind=link}