We’ve deduced why the roof is closed: to stop drones filming it when there’s a documentary coming next year.
Oasis reunion tour: follow the first gig in Cardiff – live! | Oasis
Published: 2025-07-04 19:00:35 | Views: 12
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Bono recently talked up the likely quality of the incoming Oasis set. “I’m still very close with Noel, and he sent a message to me saying he’s kind of shocked by how great the band is [sounding at rehearsals]. I think we’re going to have a good summer,” he said to Zane Lowe. I mean, you wouldn’t really expect Noel Gallagher to tell Bono that the band were sounding not very great, actually. But still.
The U2 frontman continued with some decent enough musicological analysis: “I remember what they did. Those big guitars, big Neil Young [inspired], generous sounds – they were against the law in the UK. But they were like: ‘No, I’ll do what I want.’ They had this rhythmic, beautiful quality to them … and Manchester was very influenced by dance music, so they were groovier than anybody, they were rawer than anybody.”
Alexis Petridis reviews Cast
It’s the binding agent of rock. It’s fine? They played the hits? How do you analyse a support set by Cast? It’s not as if Oasis had Two Shell supporting – Cast do the job a support act does. You don’t want to be overshadowed, you don’t want the crowd to burn out too soon, and Cast are definitely not at risk of doing either. It is slightly workmanlike. The other thing it demonstrates is that the sound is really booming around the venue, especially with the roof shut, which works for Oasis and their giant wall of guitars, but crushes everyone else. Maybe that’s why the tuneless space-prog song cut through, even though it didn’t work.
Far be it from me to cast (no pun intended) aspersions on the support acts, but instead of watching this bunch and Richard Ashcroft warming the stage for Oasis on Saturday, night two, you could be watching Wales make their debut in the Women’s European Championship. They may be the lowest-ranked team at the tournament, but the Guardian’s Louise Taylor reckons their performance might be surprising thanks to coach Rhian Wilkinson turning the team into tricksy opponents, with the “incomparable” Jess Fishlock and Sophie Ingle in midfield. I wish them luck – so that unlike the men’s Euro 96 team, they don’t have their defeat soundtracked by Walkaway.
First pic of Cast has dropped in. They look as if a doom metaller, a Madchester refugee and a white reggae artist have collaborated. That would go some way towards explaining the strange genre-mash Laura mentioned.
Cast have just played Flying. Even for a something of a landfill indie band, they’re a bit incoherent – tuneful whimsy; tuneless space-prog; this is a bit Americana lite.
But wait, now it’s Guiding Star – I actually do know this one! It provokes what I would call the first sign of life among the crowd. “So good to be here on a momentous occasion”, says frontman John Power.
In an example of opportunistic branding so brazen that we simply must applaud it and post it on the live blog, we turn briefly to Graham Conway, managing director of Select Car Leasing. “How can we crowbar our motoring company into the Oasis conversation, despite it having absolutely nothing to do with Oasis?” Graham beseeches his marketing corps in a break-out huddle-pod. “Erm, paint our EV fleet pink and dub it She’s Electric?”, someone suggests, but Graham senses the wokerati won’t like it.
Instead, he does some truly cerulean sky thinking and comes up with this, reported entirely straight by the Manchester Evening News.
“While it’s not illegal to wear a hat while you’re driving, there are rules around fashion items obstructing you while behind the wheel. Rule 97 of the Highway Code states you must have ‘footwear and clothing which does not prevent you using the controls in the correct manner’, while the Road Traffic Act says that anything obstructing a driver’s view is considered a hazard – including hats. And because bucket hats are generally pulled down low over the eyes to complete the look, that could be a serious problem when it comes to getting a full view of the road.”
Perhaps it was Graham’s influence that has so dented the aforementioned bucket hat sales trajectory. Your move, Adidas.
Thank you to X user Miss S, who posted this clip of sound emanating from the Principality Stadium on Monday. We must presume from this that Oasis are going in a bold industrial/musique concrete direction for a live album to be released on Black Truffle or the resurrected Table of the Elements.
Oasis Mania had this rather better quality recording:
Though Liam scotched the idea that he was actually doing the singing:
It’s Monday you nutter nobody rehearses on a Monday
— Liam Gallagher (@liamgallagher) June 30, 2025
Just now there was some fretboard tapping going on, creating absolutely horrible, squelchy spacey zapping sounds. Awful. From Alexis: “That response to that song indicates a crowd determined to enjoy themselves.”
But then there’s a really touching moment when they dedicate Walkaway to Diogo Jota, the Portuguese footballer who died in a car crash yesterday, aged 28. Jota had a storied career at Liverpool, in Cast’s home city, winning the Premier League and FA Cup with them.
I love watching Top of the Pops reruns on iPlayer, and especially discovering the megahits of the time that have no lasting cultural footprint – such as 80s megastar Howard Jones: who he? Etc.
Cast seem like a classic example of this. I was born in 1989 and grew up familiar with Oasis, Pulp etc, and have been a music journalist my entire adult life, but until I listened to them as homework for seeing Oasis, I’d never knowingly heard a note of Cast. And as Alexis reminds me, they had two platinum albums! The 90s: a hell of a drug.
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