Oasis
Definitely Maybe
Francesca argues for its classic status..
Well initially, back in 1994, at the grand age of 7, I thought it was The Greatest Album Ever to impress the boy I fancied. Now, at the slightly grander age of 21, having just had a massive row with my boyfriend, I think it’s the greatest album ever for its ability to make me think ‘Screw you, I’m still happy, music is what matters.’ The intervening fourteen years have only served to confirm its pole position.
It seems pretty pointless to describe songs 1-11. Everyone knows Definitely Maybe. It’s ingrained on the consciousness of anyone with a musical bone in their body. It’s how these 11 songs make you feel, make you happy, encapsulate the euphoria of being young and free. Some guitars and a cocky Manc with a monobrow, nothing special, but when set on the path to greatness by songs from Noel Gallagher, the melodies scorch themselves onto your soul. The basic yearnings of the rock’n’roll soul: a loud guitar, a brazen front man, a rhythm that matches your heartbeat, are met in a fashion that far too rarely occurs.
It’s not even just the greatest album, it’s an amalgam of all the greatest. The obligatory presence of John and Paul is there throughout Shakermaker, Cigarettes & Alcohol shamefully lifts the riff from T Rex’s Get It On, Columbia could just as easily have been delivered by The Stone Roses. It’s as though music was created and set on a process of progressive revelation, all working up until two mouthy lads from Burnage fused their record collections, brotherly love, drunken nights out, and, by association, their fans’ lives, into a masterpiece.
The classics such as Live Forever and Supersonic are known and loved by all. True Soundtracks To Our Lives. It’s the unrestrained energy of the less well known that makes Definitely Maybe truly exceptional. ‘Your friends will all go green/ For my lasagne’ may not be the kind of poetry that will have William Wordsworth spinning in his grave, but when listening to this William snarling out the words, who cares? Tintern Abbey never made me feel mad for it.
The best thing about Definitely Maybe is it’s so ordinary. It’s you. Rock’n’Roll Star: confidence building before a night on the town. Live Forever: those moments when you’re with your mates, drunk, thinking ‘man, I love these people’. Slide Away: love – unrequited, headoverheels, first dance, break-up – just love. But this is ordinary sounding amazing. Ordinary taken, mixed with melodies and merriment, into an absolute riot, and thrown back at you, until you, the ordinary person, feel you rule the world.
And that makes an album pretty special.
Live Forever? Definitely Maybe.
