Among the more interesting stories to emerge from Oasis' split was Noel Gallagher's claim that he felt musically constrained by the band. He told Mojo magazine that any suggestion of altering Oasis' sound would apparently cause Liam Gallagher to "start slinging shit around the room", which certainly isn't the least plausible of scenarios. Liam is, after all, a man who celebrated the fresh artistic start Oasis' split afforded him by releasing a song called Beatles and Stones. His brother, meanwhile, has been talking up his love of Ennio Morricone and techno auteur Derrick May, and employing a bloke to play a musical saw on his solo album. Expectations therefore run high, especially now he need not nurture the egalitarian urge to cede control of the songwriting and Let Ringo Have a Go, which accounted for at least some of the makeweight stuff on Oasis' later albums. What might Noel come up with?
It's true the opener, Everybody's on the Run, sounds a bit more interesting than Oasis: it is beautifully orchestrated and features the massed voices of the Crouch End Festival Chorus. Alas, the arrangement is there to serve precisely the kind of song you would expect to turn up on a Noel Gallagher solo album: a wistful acoustic mid-tempo plod on which Gallagher repeatedly pleads with us to hold on, advice presumably aimed at anyone among his audience not already holding on following the repeated instruction to do so issued by Gallagher in Stop Crying Your Heart Out. Or perhaps they've simply forgotten to hold on, in which case the fact that the exhortation to hold on is set to exactly the same four-note tune as it was in Stop Crying Your Heart Out should refresh their memories.
Not for the last time, the feeling that some of the advance publicity about Gallagher's change of direction might be a little overheated comes creeping. There have been claims that Dream On represents a diversion into "Dixieland jazz": it's got a trombone on it – which in fairness is one trombone more than Oasis ever featured – but then so did The Floral Dance by the Brighouse and Rastrick Brass Band. Actually, it sounds a bit like the Kinks' Dead End Street, as does Soldier Boys and Jesus Freaks, trumpeted in some quarters as Gallagher's move into protest song. It's nothing of the sort: it sets its cap at a Kinksy social vignette, but as a lyricist Gallagher doesn't have the acute focus to pull that kind of thing off. Still, better a muddled attempt at emulating Ray Davies than the fearful sound of Noel in philosophical mode. That duly turns up on the closer, Stop the Clocks. "What if I'm already dead? How will I know?" he ponders. Well, you might finally stop writing lyrics like that, although I wouldn't bank on it.
Maybe such complaints don't really matter. All three songs have such indelible melodies that they carry you blithely along, indifferent to the shortcomings of the rest of the song, which may have been Gallagher's big trick as a songwriter from the off: it's not like anyone loved Definitely Maybe for its devastating originality or lyrical insight. And that turns out to be High Flying Birds' big selling-point: it's got less filler and more undeniable tunes than any recent Oasis album. It's also got a tantalising hint of musical progression: AKA … What a Life!, a house music-inspired thump, is built around a piano riff Gallagher has claimed is inspired by Rhythim Is Rhythim's Haçienda classic Strings of Life, though it sounds just as much like the Rolling Stones' We Love You. Either way, the important things are that, first, it's a genuinely different kind of song to anything he has attempted before and, second, Gallagher's melodic facility remains intact even when detached from his guitars and his well-thumbed collection of classic rock.
It's hard not to wish there was more here like it: High Flying Birds pushes gently at some boundaries Gallagher might have considered kicking over altogether. Perhaps his trepidation has something to do with the relative commercial failure of his brother's album with Beady Eye. Certainly, these days Liam sounds like he's threatening, rather than promising, to release more material. Maybe the fear that he'd end up in a similar situation if he presented anything too radical reined Noel in: you can never underestimate the power of sibling rivalry. Maybe he's saving the big push into unknown territories for his forthcoming collaboration with psychedelic collective Amorphous Androgynous. Or maybe this is as good as it gets. For now, it'll do that it's a more enjoyable album than Oasis' latter-day catalogue. At the risk of handing out some well-worn advice, anyone hoping to hear a radical departure might be recommended to hold on.
