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Why Did Oasis Break Up? A Look At The Liam-Noel Gallagher Feud : NPR

Liam (right) and Noel Gallagher, pictured in London in February 1999.

Liam (right) and Noel Gallagher, pictured here in London in February 1999, were members of the much-loved band Oasis from 1991 until the band split in 2009.

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Fifteen years after Oasis demise, the warring brothers at the heart of the beloved British band have fulfilled fans’ unlikely dreams of a reunion tour.

On Monday, Noel and Liam Gallagher, the band’s main songwriter and lead singer respectively, both tweeted a 11 second video with the date and time of 8am on August 27th, flashing in the Oasis font. The Oasis Instagram account shared it too.

The reports came a day after the British Sunday Times reported that unnamed industry insiders are “determined” the two will reunite for a series of high-profile concerts next summer, including a headlining performance at Glastonbury Festival and what would be a record 10 nights at Wembley Stadium.

“I’ll see you at the front,” Liam said then. answered in a thread about the article on the social platform X.

He also placed a cryptic tweet of himself: “I never liked that word FORMER.”

Oasis, who started out in 1991 as a five-piece band from Manchester, are credited with reviving the Britpop music genre, thanks in part to through his rivalry with the London band Blur.

The group rose to fame with their 1994 album Sure Maybeand cemented his legacy with hits like “Wonderwall,” “Don’t Look Back in Anger” and “Champagne Supernova.” Three decades later, Oasis had sold 75 million records worldwide.

The Gallaghers, the only permanent members of the band’s ever-changing line-up, became known for their dazzling antics on stage and in the tabloids, as well as for their own increasing rivalry.

Years of insults, incidents and mutual fights reached its peak in Aug. January 28, 2009, when the band broke up, minutes before they were to take the stage at the Rock en Seine festival in Paris.

“People write and say what they want, but I just couldn’t go on working with Liam one more day,” Noel wrote in a statement at the time. He would later recount a backstage altercation in which his younger brother grabbed his guitar and “started swinging it like an axe.”

The Gallaghers went their separate ways but continued their music careers: Liam and other Oasis members kept the band going under the name Beady Eye, while Noel formed his own band, High Flying Birds.

The two have performed their old hits separately over the years, but never together.

And they’ve publicly floated the prospect of a reunion on more than one occasion, including in 2015 and 2018. But such a reconciliation has yet to happen — and the two have continued to openly berate each other on social media.

However, observant viewers had already seen indications that relaxation might be on the horizon.

During his performance at Reading Festival on Sunday, Liam dedicated the Oasis song “Half The World Away” for his brother and “Cigarettes & Alcohol” for haters of the band. When his set ended, the onstage screens flashed that same announcement video from August 27th.

On Tuesday morning, almost exactly 15 years after Oasis split, the brothers confirmed that they are indeed getting back together.

They shared identical videos promoting “Oasis Live ’25”, a series of concerts in the UK and Ireland in July and August, with tickets going on sale this weekend. The year 2025 notably marks 30 years since the release of their second album, (What’s the story) Morning Glory.

“The guns have fallen silent. The stars have aligned,” the brothers also tweeted. “The great wait is over. Come watch. It won’t be televised.”

The hints and subsequent announcement have caused quite a stir on social media, with countless fans of the group posting messages about the cultural significance – and the implications for their personal finances – of an Oasis reunion tour.

And many have joked that those who want to buy tickets should aim for the first night onlyso that the notoriously feuding brothers wouldn’t break up the band again. It wouldn’t be the first time.

A brief timeline of the Gallagher feud, from fistfights to legal battles

Singer Liam Gallagher (left) and brother Noel Gallagher of the band Oasis perform in San Francisco in 1997.

Oasis singer Liam Gallagher (left) and brother Noel Gallagher perform in San Francisco in 1997. After the band split, they each pursued their own musical careers and continued to publicly insult each other.

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Noel and Liam’s tumultuous relationship stretches back decades and has left a trail of venom and bad blood that is almost impossible to fully describe (although media outlets like Pitchfork, Rolling Stone And Radio X tried bravely).

Here are some highlights, or lowlights:

  • April 1994: Shortly before their commercial breakthrough, the brothers sit down for an interview with NME’s John Harris and bicker the entire time — about the meaning of rock ‘n’ roll, a drunken incident on a ferry a few months earlier and how much they hated each other, and much more. A year later, they release the audio as a single called “Wobbling rivalry(subtitle: “fourteen minutes of verbal chaos”).
  • September 1994: During a concert in Los Angeles, Liam hits Noel over the head with a tambourine and hurls insults at both the band and the American audience. Noel storms off and leaves the band briefly, but returns later that tour and uses the incident as inspiration for the song “Talk Tonight.”
  • Spring 1995: While recording (What’s the story) Morning GloryLiam brings a group of visitors to the studio while Noel tries to work. Noel, trying to get them to leave, ends up hitting Liam over the head with a cricket bat. Years later, the rescued cricket bat was auctioned with certificate of authenticity.
  • August 1996: Liam pulls out of their “MTV Unplugged” taping at the last minute, citing a sore throat, and then spends the entire performance booing his brother from the audience and drinking champagne. Later that month, Liam also pulls out of a U.S. tour just before it begins — he eventually joins them a few days later, but the tour is canceled after two weeks.
  • May 2000: During a night of drinking in Barcelona, ​​Liam questions the paternity of Noel’s daughter, prompting Noel to leave the band again. He does not return for the remainder of the European tour.
  • December 2002: After having problems with his voice and walking off stage early at several shows in the fall, Liam ended the year by kicking a German police officer in the chest, leading to a brawl in a Munich bar and losing several teeth. “I haven’t spoken to him directly yet,” Noel said at that moment. “Why should we talk after what happened?”
  • October 2005: Noel said in an interview that his brother is “terrified” of him: “I can read him and I can f****** play him like a slightly beat-up arcade game. I can make him make decisions that he thinks are his, but are really mine.”
  • 2008-2009: Liam reflects on this in several interviews, in which he says Q magazine at one point that Noel is “the angriest man you’ll ever meet. He’s like a man with a fork in a world of soup.”
  • August 2009: Oasis abruptly cancel their appearance at the V Festival in England, with Liam blaming it on a case of laryngitis. Years later, Noel claims his brother was actually hungover, prompting Liam to sue him for libel (he eventually drops the lawsuit). That month, Noel leaves the band for good. He told NPR about it in 2012: “We were backstage waiting to go on stage in front of 30,000 people in Paris. The tour manager came in and said, ‘Five minutes!’ Within those five minutes, we broke up. I’m not proud of it, but all good things must come to an end.”

The brothers continued to exchange insults years after the breakup

The Gallaghers continued to feud long after they were no longer band members, insulting each other in award show speeches, interviews, and social media posts (including the infamous “potato” tweet from 2016which became a personal piece for many years).

Occasionally during the drama, public calls for reconciliation were heard, giving fans a glimmer of hope.

Liam hinted at a truce in 2017, but called it off a month later. In 2018, he said: tweeted to his brother which suggests a reunion, but then no answer wrote: “Then I’ll take that as a NO.” During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, Noel released a previously hidden track recorded in 1995, much to Liam’s apparent dismay.

But in 2023, both brothers appeared to take the idea of ​​a reunion more seriously.

It is striking that Blur, their Britpop arch-rival who had been inactive since 2015, reunited that same year. release an album and perform at a number of summer festivals. The Ballad of Darren was critically acclaimed, with media from the BBC to Mojo to NPR and put it on their best-of-the-year lists. The group closed out its triumphant 2023 with the announcement another break.

“If Oasis hadn’t reached its potential and there was still something to do, it would be different, but I just don’t see what the point would be,” said Noel said in an interview in January 2023. “It would make a lot of money, I have a lot of money. To do a monumental (location), I’ve done them already.”

But he left the door open to the possibility, adding: “That doesn’t mean it won’t appeal to me in 10 years…”

Two months later, Liam responded to a fan’s tweet asking if there was a chance of Oasis getting back together.

“It happens,” he wrote.

And now it’s official.