When a band is dismantled and its members begin new careers, they either fall short of their ambitions, maintain the same level of fame they once had, or surpass all they’ve done. Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds does the latter, and this debut album does not just surpass everything since (What’s the Story) Morning Glory?, it soars above it.
Perhaps Noel Gallagher had the extra motivation, as he was the only who actually left Oasis after its break-up in August 2009; his former bandmates, including brother Liam, stuck together and are now recording under the name Beady Eye. So Noel formed the partially self-titled band, Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds, a nice ode to Peter Green’s Fleetwood Mac, and is displaying the same singing, guitar, and song-writing skills that helped shoot him to fame in the 1990s. Except this time around, Noel is taking the reigns as lead singer.
“If I Had a Gun…” surprisingly is not morbid, or vicious, but is actually poetic. The music is reminiscent of ’90s British Rock, but the lyrics are all new: “I’d shoot a hole into the sun, and love would burn this city down for you.” The gun acts as a metaphor for love, which is the means by which we decide to push our limits. You could feel the emotion in Gallagher’s words and tell that he has carefully crafted every line with delicacy, tying it back to the title. The cohesion of pairing music to lyrics holds true for the entire album, especially in the more fast-paced “AKA…What a Life!” and the psychedelic “(I Wanna Live in a Dream in My) Record Machine.”
Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds brings back that poppy-psychedelic rock that we loved about the ’90s, but in a revamped style so we’re not re-living the past. As for Gallagher, he’s hitting every lyric, note, and chord showing everyone he can kill it in any fashion.