Noel Gallagher - Out of the Now
AXS TV, December 8, 2021
Dec 07, 2021
Photography by White Light International
Web Exclusive
Noel Gallagher has a TV special, and the first thing that comes to mind is: why? The 72-minute-long Noel Gallagher – Out of the Now, which airs for the first time Stateside on AXS TV on December 8th, marks the 10-year anniversary of Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds, the less charismatic Gallagher brother’s solo project, for all intents and purposes.
The special (which likes to think of itself as a documentary, but it isn’t) is part empty-venue concert, part narrative interview with Gallagher. Despite the beautifully shot performance footage at the stunning Duke of York’s Theatre in London, and the high-quality audio, the concert portion of the program is not the least bit engaging. Gallagher gives it a solid effort, but the absence of an audience feels weird and his excellent band, including sassy backing vocalists, don’t make up for Gallagher’s un-dynamic vocal range and forgettable songs, pardon, “biggest hits”—of his High Flying Birds era, not Oasis. From the former there are 10 songs included, from the latter, “Don’t Look Back in Anger” is thrown in for good measure.
Hope is pinned on the interview portion. As Gallagher has proved time and time again, he gives good chat. Except not on Out of the Now. The quick-witted and dry retorts he hands out in endless supply during media interviews are absent in the staged intervals between the performance portions. Instead, Gallagher sounds like the most boring dinner guest at the table with no fresh topics to talk about and repeating the same comments that everyone has already made.
Gallagher addresses the elephant in the special first: his breakup of Oasis. He shrugs off his decision to extinguish the band, as well as the nonchalant way it was done. That story is so old and so unimportant at this point, it’s totally redundant. Other things he talks about are his solo career, the pandemic, what he writes about and the music that influenced him. These one-sided conversations are the most boring ones ever had with Gallagher. His solo music may be dull, but these topics, which normally he would turn into hilarious anecdotes and quips, are stripped of any entertainment value. Plus, all of them have been covered ad nauseum over the last almost 27 years, so no fresh information is offered and hearing it again doesn’t shed any new light on Gallagher. There is an additional excruciating 30 minutes of interview material on the AXS TV site, which unfortunately focuses on the High Flying Birds material, and feels more like a punishment than a bonus.
Whether in his Once in a Lifetime Sessions with Noel Gallagher, or the fantastic Oasis documentary, Supersonic, or the more recent Oasis Knebworth 1996, Gallagher doesn’t reveal much of himself as a person—it just seems like he does. His humor is a deflection and a ruse to throw everyone off his trail. Out of the Now is no different in the lack of transparency about the self-proclaimed “one of the biggest,” except that the special is devoid of laughs and the truly wonderful cinematography and blinding light show notwithstanding, the performances simply aren’t interesting to watch. 72 minutes has never seemed quite so long. (www.noelgallagher.com)
Author rating: 4/10
Average reader rating: 8/10
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