• on air
• artists
• music news
• gigs & tickets
• breakfast
• o2 academy

Oasis Confirm They'll Play Glastonbury

added 10 May 2004 at 10.19

Noel Gallagher has revealed that Oasis will be playing this year’s Glastonbury Festival, talks about his new album, has dismissed Liam’s supergroup rumours and spoken about who’s replaced Alan White on the drummer's stool.

While there has been no official statement from Glastonbury organisers, Gallagher confirmed Oasis’ appearance at the three day festival, which will be the band’s only live event this summer.

"We weren't planning on doing anything,” he explained in an interview with BBC 6 Music, “But Michael and Emily Eavis - last year when I went there - they sort of backed me into a corner and said `Look are you gonna do it or what?' And I go there quite a lot and we decided that the time was probably right.

Noel also confirmed rumours that ex Beatle Ringo Starr’s son Zak Starkey has been playing with Oasis. While he’s not a full time replacement it appears he fits in well (“He's a good boy he's got a good haircut. Good shoes - which is important.") and he’ll be handling drumming duties at Glasto (which Noel reckons will be better than their last appearance).

“It's a pity that we haven't actually got any new stuff to play but I think we kind of George Best'ed it the last time we headlined it,” he explained, “So this time will be great I think. Then again we're not doing ourselves any favours because Zak's first gig will be to 150,000 people but y'know. He's rehearsing all the Oasis songs now."

"We've known Zak for a while and we asked him if he'd play on a few songs and he said yeah, and he has done and it's been absolutely fantastic."

Whether the band’s new album will be released this year is also in doubt, though the departure of producers Death In Vegas wasn’t as acrimonious as was reported.

"We're in the studio at the moment, it's going alright, one step forward two steps back, but it's going alright.” He continued, “I dunno whether it'll be out by the end of the year. We didn't sack our producers we just ran out of time. They had to go off and do their Death in Vegas thing and we sort of gave ourselves about three or four weeks with them, and we just ran out of time but there wasn't a sacking.”

"We're trying to get this album finished and it's taking a little bit longer than expected but there isn't any rush on it really. We were trying to get it out by Glastonbury but it doesn't seem to be working out that way now. Not for any particular reason just that we've gotta get it right and if we get summit out by the end of the year it'd be great. If we don't there's no rush really Franz Ferdinand will look after the charts for us I'd have thought.”

Noel also laughed off the reports that Liam Gallagher has formed a supergroup with John Squire and Dhani Harrison saying, "Chance'd be a fine thing. I don't think he's forming any supergroups he's too busy sorting his court case out isn't he?"

There is no release date pencilled in for the as-yet-untitled new record as yet, but working song titles include ‘Stop The Clocks’, 'They Ain't Got Nothing On Me, They Ain't `Got Nothing On You', 'Longer', 'Singin' Your Life', 'You Wanna Feel My Shame', 'Say It', 'Revolution Man' and 'The Good Rebel'.

With thanks to 6 Music.

To discuss this story on the Xfm News Messageboard click here.

Back to Music News

Have you got a music news story? E-mail the Xfm News Desk below.

Matt Everitt

• send to a friend