The Night of my Life « Yield to Maturity: 8.762%

October 17, 2008...11:58 pm

The Night of my Life

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I have a headache. And I’m tired. BUT…..BUT I saw the greatest band in
history play last night for 105 blissful minutes that will never escape my
memory – I won’t even listen to them on my ipod for fear of washing out
their real sound. Yes, this is obsession. Am I ashamed? No.

Last night I attended the concert of Oasis. This is big for me on two
fronts. The first, most obvious one is that I have been (and I am not
shitting you) their biggest fan for 13 years. That, my friends, is longer
than half of my life. I still remember the first time I heard them, on
MuchMusic in
Canada, the spinning record with the Oasis logo rotating over and over – and
thinking, what the hell is that? This isn’t Alanis Morisssette because OMFG I LOVE HER, but when Wonderwall came through my television speakers, I was in heaven.

Through those years I owned every single Oasis album imaginable. I owned
all of their biographies, and I could tell anyone their life story. My dead
grandmother remembers their life story, I had told her so many times. My
bedroom walls were covered in Oasis posters, and all relatives who traveled
to Europe were required, required, to bring back any Oasis news
they came across. No doubt (not the band) my disappointment when
my grandmother brought me back
Spice Girls memorabilia from London in 1998 – she must not have had great
hearing. When I moved to London myself, the first thing I did was head over
to HMV and buy all of the Oasis singles I had outstanding. Canada unfortunately
didn’t stock everything.

Yes, I was an obsessed fan, but to my credit, I have never attempted to
stalk meet Oasis whilst
living in the same city as them. I used to work near Primrose Hill and yes, on
days I needed to restrain myself from wandering up there and spying
on Liam Gallagher, but I held myself together and remained to be a
good-spirited fan…until I, grew up.

I became a less-interested fan of Oasis over my years of living in London.
The realism of living in the same city as them, the thought that they were
pretty much like all the other British – and the wealth of other bands in
the UK distracted me, even though I was still loyal to the extent that I’d buy
their main studio albums.

And how I hated most of them

I didn’t say anything however, because a true fan would never do that.

So last night, I was at odds. I had known Oasis was touring, obviously. I
had been so pissed off to find out they had planned to travel to my
home city for the FIRST TIME EVER (and most likely never to return) when
I no longer lived there…and that there would be no chance of getting
tickets in the UK (they always sell out in about 2.4 seconds) that I had
pretty much given up on the idea of ever seeing them. So when my boyfriend
called me, and informed me his company had seated and standing tickets to
the opening gig that evening (16/10/2008), I simply replied, “Oh, that’s nice. Not
interested – that gig will be shown live on MTV anyway and how fucking much
are the tickets?! £250 each?!“

However, I will admit that I endured the most searing trepidation I had ever felt in my entire life – this was an opportunity – was God mocking me? What the fuck is happening?

Because this is the second major front – my boyfriend hates Oasis, loathes
them, detests them – he won’t even let them play in the car on random from my ipod,
let alone see them in concert – so for him to actually offer this was major and added to my trepidation, jubilation and
worry that yes, God is mocking me.

Nevertheless, my boyfriend convinced me that yes, we should go. I would
never forgive myself if I refused, I knew that. I’d be lying on my deathbed
having checked off all my other ‘1001 Things To Do Before I Croak’ and see
that one checkbox – “See Oasis Live” – was unticked, and be kicking myself
(or at least asking the nurse to punch me in the face) for compensation. So
I knew I couldn’t refuse. Those two tickets were bought for £300.00 in total, and no,
I didn’t throw up in my mouth when I found out their actual price tag was £44.50
each. This was a chance of a lifetime and totally worth the heart-attack inducing cost we’d
just forked out.

So at the office, I sat at my desk, looked at the my colleague (the only one in the room)
who was staring at me, and started saying calmly to myself, “Stop crying, WTF?
STOP CRYING!!!” as the tears started welling up in my eyes, and then the
hysterical laughter started bubbling, along with heroin-withdrawl shaking
and the turning of the colour of a turnip to the face. But I maintained myself.

Until my boss told me just to leave work early because in the space of ten minutes I’d
incorrectly named 3 files, and could still not contain my utter-spastic joy
that that evening, I had a date with Liam Gallagher.

And my boyfriend.
Ahem.

I made sure we were promptly in our seats for the opening band – Twisted Wheel. I had heard
that Noel Gallagher hand-picked his opening acts and therefore assumed they
would be fantastic – Oasis fantastic – but they were so bad (ed note: on cd they’re alright but live. OMG BAD), that I managed
to spend most of my time on the hunt for booze and Oasis t-shirts whilst my
strapping lad remained, and faced the music. At this point,
we had consumed 4 Tsng Tao beers, 1½ pints of Carling, 1 pint of Fosters
and 1 cider each. I returned, just when these guys were finished, with 2 more
pints of cider and another Fosters, and we were properly ready for the show
of a lifetime. But first, before I go on, please, indulge yourself in the
opening act – Twisted Wheel:

Ugh. What did you think? And the lead singer was such a Liam Gallagher
copy, walking around like him, talking like him, smirking like him –
seriously bad form at an Oasis concert! Speaking of people acting like Liam
Gallagher – one thing to notice at an Oasis concert, if you should go, is
the phenomenon of “Liam Gallagher Through the Ages” where blokes walk
around in the various fashions of Gallagher – i.e.:

These were the serious fans – not those that looked like they’d mistaken
the gig with that of Fall Out Boy.

After observing one of the worst bands in history play prior to one of the
greatest, downing a sizeable quantity of booze, formally dressed in a
classic Oasis t-shirt, and finished making ourselves amused with others
dress-sense, Oasis approached the stage to the tune of ‘Fuckin’ in the
Bushes’ at 20:20. And that was when I officially knew God was not mocking me.

Deep down I considered I might die on the way to the gig: train derailment,
dodgy Chinese, overly fortified beer, etc.

They opened with ‘Rock ‘n’ Roll Star’ and I felt a wave of surrealism hit me that, to be honest, I still
haven’t shaken. I was supposed to email a friend of mine about the concert
last night as soon as I got home, but I was so happy, and so bent out of
shape by the whole experience, that I locked myself up in my head where, I still am…as can be seen by my large continous outpouring of
word vomit. Because, you see, watching Oasis in concert, with Liam
Gallagher howling into that microphone, and Noel Gallagher hitting those
chords, and Gem and Andy Bell looking pretty damn fine on their own to the
side, is like watching a Marks & Spencer Food advert where they slowly show
you the best tasting meal of your life:

After ‘Rock ‘n’ Roll Star’, Liam Gallagher broke out into ‘Lyla’, one of their
greatest songs since (What’s The Story) Morning Glory, followed by their
newest (and so far best) single ‘The Shock of the Lightening’. By this time
I had belted out all the songs, kissed my boyfriend 1.3 million times, and
had reversed my age by fifteen years. It was a scary sight. Their total
playlist was (for all those interested):

Fuckin’ In The Bushes
Rock ‘N’ Roll Star
Lyla
The Shock Of The Lightning
Cigarettes And Alcohol
The Meaning Of Soul
To Be Where There’s Life
Waiting For The Rapture
The Masterplan
Songbird
Slide Away
Morning Glory
Ain’t Got Nothin
The Importance of Being Idle
I’m Outta Time
Wonderwall
Supersonic
Don’t Look Back In Anger
Falling Down – actual live performance I was at, on mtv.co.uk
Champagne Supernova
I Am The Walrus

Just before ‘Supersonic’ was played, Liam Gallagher informed us that this
was the last song. I was gutted. By then they had played for an hour and I
was totally bummed – especially since I had been hearing a small voice in
my head telling me the end was near. My boyfriend and I checked around the
arena which held 10,000 people, took note of the total assholes in the
standing area who had been chucking beer and themselves at the stage all
night, and decided we’d better leg it to the train station, or we’d be
there until Sunday trying to fight our way past drunkards.

We were six steps down the stairs when the doorman shouted after us, “WAIT!
THERE’S AN ENCORE!!!” I span, faster then normally due to that little bit
of human rejection on the step, and bolted back up the stairs to hear Noel
Gallagher sing ‘Don’t Look Back in Anger’ and ‘Falling Down’. I still had
disappointment bubbling in me – I didn’t want it to end. I would be happy
to stand there for the rest of my life, singing along with Liam Gallagher,
in London – one of the greatest cities on earth – and I finally knew that
indeed, I had produced some serious karma at one point in my life, when
Liam Gallagher strode back on stage and said two words: Champagne
Supernova.

The gig was over, I was fully satisfied, and we boarded the train home,
without even having to wait. This was all a real treat. And to top it all
off, my boyfriend and I, along with about 70 other Oasis fans, belted out
Oasis classics on the train journey home – to the irritation of suits
trudging home at 11pm at night. We didn’t care though, we’d seen the
greatest band ever, one that can pull off anything, and knew that each and
everyone of us would pay any amount and travel any where to see them again.