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DISGRACELAND
Oasis Pt. 1: Hooliganism, Hedonism, Rock Star Anthems and the “Greatest Rock ‘N’ Roll Band on the Planet”
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Double Elvis. So I try to stay disciplined with work and I try to do my creative task, mainly the writing of the podcast in the morning hours. But you can't always control when inspiration is going to hit. So last night I'm up until about midnight researching and then I start writing, which I didn't want to do, but I had to go with it. I'm in the flow. I stay up way later than I want to. I still gotta get up early in the morning and I'm bone tired. Coffee isn't helping. So thankfully I've got my stash of five Hour Energy and they've got this new confetti craze flavor that I love. It's fantastic. Tastes great. Tastes like a party in a bottle. Which when you're dragging in the morning, believe me, is much needed. Fantastic flavor with this new five Hour Energy Confetti. Great. It's just vanilla y buttery. That's my jam right there. One of the things I also like about five Hour Energy, the bottles. As you probably know, they're tiny and resealable. I can take em anywhere I want. So if I'm gonna hit a wall later in the day, I'm prepared. I just tap into my five Hour Energy stash and I am good to go. Wherever I go. This is a little party in a bottle. It's gonna pump you up. It's gonna get you rolling into your day, whether it's the morning, whether it's the afternoon, whether it's nighttime. Five hour energy confetti is available online. Head to www.5h.com or Amazon to order yours today. You guys feel that that's the summer. It's starting to fade away. It's the fall creeping in with those cooler temps and quints. My go to brand for great fitting, great looking quality clothing. They got me covered with fall staples that are going to freshen up my wardrobe. I'm rocking the European linen chore jacket right now. It's lightweight enough to layer over a flannel, but heavy enough to keep you warm if you're just wearing a T shirt under it. And it looks awesome. The color is cool. It's this martini olive color and you know who doesn't like olives or martinis? Also, I bragged about Quince's Mongolian cashmere crew neck sweater before for a reason because it looks awesome and it's super comfortable. I've already got one in heather gray, but I'm going to nab the black one from Quince very shortly. Perfect for the fall. Quince is my go to guys. I've been talking about them for months now. They're my go to for durable classic clothing without the elevated price tag. What makes quints different? Well, they partner directly with ethical factories and skip the middlemen. So you get top tier fabrics and great craftsmanship at half the price of similar brands. So if you want to look like one of those icons we feature here in Disgraceland and not spend a fortune doing so, then keep it classic and cool this fall with long lasting staples from quints. Go to quints.com Disgraceland for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. That's Q-U-I-N-C-E.com Disgraceland free shipping and 365 day returns. Quints.com Disgraceland Disgraceland is a production of Double Elvis the stories about Oasis are insane. They started riots, sank Rolls Royces in swimming pools, physically attacked police officers, publicly brawled with each other in rival pop stars. They committed to a life of hooliganism and hedonism and vandalized, robbed, stole and drugged their way around the boredom of youth. Raised in Manchester, England's council estates public housing, Oasis bandleader Noel Gallagher and his younger brother Liam were determined to become the greatest rock and roll band on the planet. And remarkably, despite or perhaps because of their humble beginnings, they were able to achieve that goal. Through it all, they made great music. Anthems, pure pop, instant classics. And that music you heard at the top of the show, that wasn't great music. That was a preset loop from my melotron called mellow swag lager mk1. I played you that loop cause I can't afford the rights to everything I do. I do it for you by Bryan Adams. And why would I play you that specific slice of Prince of Thieves cheese? Could I afford it? Because that was the number one song in America on August 18, 1991. And that was the day Oasis took the stage for the very first time at the Boardwalk Club in Manchester and changed the face of English pop music forever. On this episode, hooligans and hedonists, Swaggy Lager and instant classics, the 100% committed and endlessly entertaining Gallagher brothers and Oasis. I'm Jake Brennan and this is Disgraceland. There were no screams, just cold chatter, German, hushed but angry in the background, a random shout here or there from a prisoner, a detective or a uniform barking orders. But back here, back in the pen, it was mostly quiet. And as far as the prisoner was concerned, there was no concern. He was out had been out since they piled him in the back of the cruiser. He had it coming. He was sauced. Handcuffs weren't enough. The nightstick, the butt of the gun, the pound of the clenched fist. Whatever it was. Who really knew? It was so chaotic. It did the trick. Knocked the drunk raving lunatic out cold. They dragged his lanky body in through the back, up the stairs, inside the double doors and into the first cell they could find. The last cell on the Munich Police Department's block, separated from the rest of the department. Back here there were screams. They had a better chance of going unnoticed. The big cop couldn't wait to get into it. He was the one who caught the drunk's trainer in his ribs. A sharp, hard kick delivered from the drunk's right foot. It smashed the bottom of the big cop's lower right rib and damned if it wasn't broken. But he'd worked that out later. For now he'd fight through the pain for payback. They held the drunk down on the floor of the cell. The big cop, all 6ft 5 inches, all 250 pounds. They'd rank him 18 stone back in Manchester. He kneeled on the floor above the drunk's head and put his massive mitts on his shoulders, pressed him into the cement floor and then with one hand, mitted the crown of the drunk's head, pulling it back toward him like he was opening a Pez dispenser. The drunk's mouth opened in the process. The other cop, the rookie, eager to impress, kneeled down on the drunk's chest. He took the pliers and into the mouth of the drunk, who was still out cold. The rookie cop latched the pliers onto the drunk's upper front tooth. That wouldn't do. Not enough leverage. So the rookie cop stood up with one foot on the ground and the other on the drunk's shoulder, just to the right of the big cop's big mitt. The rookie then bent over into a bit of a runner squat and got the leverage he needed. He was able to firmly fasten the pliers onto the tooth. The rookie gripped the pliers with the two hands like he was holding a rope in a tug of war. The big cop looked up at him, his eyes wide, angry, excited. He nodded to the rookie who in one powerful pull yanked the pliers downward, ripping out clean the drunk's upper front tooth. Vengeance was exhilarating and near complete. One more tooth to go. The drunk moaned a bit and the big cop quickly knocked him back into la la land with A swift smack and they weren't done. One tooth wasn't enough, not for the shit this little twat had stirred. 80 cops called into Quell, as during lunchtime, no less. The rookie got his pliers around the drunk's other front tooth again. The big cop beared down on the drunk shoulder while holding back his head, gave the rookie the nod and once more a quick forceful pull. And the second top tooth was gone as well, ripped clean out and they were done. Both cops were satisfied and the drunk, the singer and one of the biggest bands in the world at the time, Liam Gallagher of Oasis, was still passed out, obliterated, wasted, and now toothless and lying prone on the floor of a Munich jail cell. A couple hours earlier, Liam was bored at the table in the Bayerisherhof Hotel, drinking another and an endless stream of midday pints before the gig. That night, he was thinking about Mike Summerbee, fucking legend. Summerbee brought home multiple trophies from Manchester City's football club, the Sky Blues, way before Liam's time. But regardless, a legend and a fan of Oasis as he fucking ain't right should have been just like everyone else with ties to Manchester or with ties to anywhere, really. Oasis were the greatest band on the planet. Topps, the kids, the critics, other bands. They were all mad for it. So why wouldn't Mike Summerbee be as well? Supposedly, Noel, Liam's older brother and bandmate and by all means the leader of Oasis, remembered seeing Summer B play, but not Liam. He was too young. But he did get to know Summerbee a little bit. There was that time back in 95 or 96, at the height of Oasis mania, when the band had dinner with Summerbee and some other ex City players. Summerbee was dead funny. And apropos of who knew what the fuck, he turned to Liam, Noel and the rest of the assembled dinner party and blurted out, you know, lads, I can't do it anymore. Someone asked, can't do what anymore, Mike? Mike then deadpanned, drink five bottles of wine and shag all night. Liam thought that was funny. Not because it was easy to see how that was true. How a man who'd lived through his prime some 30 years earlier was finding it hard to live the rock and roll star lifestyle in his mid-50s, but that it was funny. The man Mike would give up, give up the thrill of it. Wasn't that what it was all about? Going for it, fucking committed to live the life the way it was supposed to be lived. Fast, hard, without two fucks given, leaving it all on the Pitch in a mad dash toward glory. Wasn't that the ultimate goal? Fuck yes, it was. So swap the wine for lager and five pints and an all night shag sounded right for Liam Gallagher Even now in 2002, a half decade removed from his band's meteoric rise and subsequent white hot fame. At the table in the barisher Hoff Hotel restaurant on that afternoon in Munich, Summerbee's comments seemed a lifetime removed. But they were top of mind. When the argument started over what Liam couldn't remember, it was amongst friends, bandmates, crew at their table. It got heated and everyone was drunk. And this was not out of the norm. Someone shoved someone else. Someone lost their balance on their chair and fell into the table of Italians sitting next to them. Someone shouted. Someone else shouted. Then came the insult. Sharp, loud, hysterical. No doubt. The Italians couldn't take a joke. Their birds were clearly offended. Their lads peeved machismo gassing their engines, they pounced. Liam's squad went full hooligan in retaliation. Instant melee. Fists, kicks, glasses being thrown, glasses being dodged, waiters dropping trays, waitresses is shrieking back into the kitchen, Liam watched it all unfold in slow motion before him. This was how the great ones saw it out on the pitch. In the fury of the match's final moments, when the pressure was most intense, it all slowed down for them. For Summerby, for Colum Bell, for all the greats. When the game got most intense, their determination, their focus brought everything around them down about 11 notches. And while their opponents trudged through molasses, powerless to stop them, the committed ones, the greats, men like him, like Liam Gallagher, thrived easily. Spotted their route, saw their angles, knew how to wee through defenses and when to take their shot. Amidst the melee, Liam sat in his chair watching bodies flail about. He felt two hands grab his shoulders and pull him up and back quickly out of his seat, there in front of him, falling from the sky. From the balcony of the restaurant directly above him, a glass table came crashing down onto the very same glass table he was just sitting at. Liam held focus on the chaos in front of him. There in the middle of the dining room, one of the many cops who quickly descended upon the scene was holding down one of Liam's bandmates, trying to handcuff him, struggling despite his mammoth size to keep down the wiry musician. Between the struggle and Liam was a sea of hooligan chaos. Overturned tables, broken glass, food tossed chairs felled bodies scrambling staff. Liam took off from the clutches of his own security, who'd rescued him from the falling table and broke away through the hotel restaurant. There goes Gallagher on the breakaway, away from the tussle, getting away from the defender. He's got a way to go, but he's nicked himself apart with great skill, excellent control. He avoids a defender from his left, another from his right. We are seeing what he's really made up here, ladies and gentlemen. He's got his sight on the goal. The big lad, the big cop kneeling over his mate. Here comes Gallagher with the boot, an absolute cracker to the back of the net, straight into the copper's ribs, sending him flailing about, making way for Gallagher's goal. A classic counter attack after Liam kicked the cop square in the rib cage, sending him reeling. Another cop knocked Liam unconscious just after he'd completed his violence and Summerby imitation. When he awoke hours later in that Munich cell, handcuffed with his two upper front teeth missing, the cops told him he lost them when he tripped up the steps to the station. But Liam was no dummy. Despite what the British tabloid said, he could tell the teeth were pulled clean out, not smashed in as they would have been had he fallen on cement as the police were trying to convince him was the case. Munich Liam had seen Marathon Man. He knew what was up. The cops, of course, denied it, and who cared anyway, really? Liam Gallagher, Alan White, the band's drummer, and their tour DJ Phil Smith, were all arrested, and justifiably so. They were indeed responsible for that melee back at the hotel, and the result meant that their show in Munich that night had to be canceled. And Liam's brother Noel, absent from the fracas that day with a brother out of jail and under the dentist gun, was left to cool as jets to Stu, to do what came natural to him, to pick up his guitar and put melodies to chord progressions like he'd always done. Big anthemic melodies. The kind that galvanized football stadiums, the kind that rocked ecstasy fueled dance clubs, the kind that dominated charts, the kind that rocketed him in the his brother out of poverty and into rock stardom. The kind that would give one a sense of invincibility. The kind of melodies that live forever. The kind of songs he committed to writing back in Manchester's council flats just a few short years ago.
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The victims were an elderly couple. It was up close and personal.
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I'm 48 Hours correspondent Erin Moriarty. I thought I had seen it all until I encountered the mastermind behind those murders.
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He's. I think the word is psychotic.
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This is 15 Inside the Daniel Marsh Murders. Follow and listen to 15 Inside the Daniel Marsh Murders on the free Odyssey app or wherever you get your podcasts. Thanks for selling your car to Carvana. Here's your check.
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Whoa. When did I get here?
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What do you mean?
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I swear it was just moments ago that I accepted a great offer from Carvana online. I must have time traveled to the future.
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It is the future. It's.
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It's all good. Happens all the time.
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Sell your car the convenient way to Carvana. Pickup times may vary and fees may apply.
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There were rules. You could drink and do all the drugs you wanted, but if you couldn't handle your shit on stage, you were out of the band. You could pick up with whichever bird you fancied, but if she prevented you from getting to rehearsal or to the gig, then she was out. And if you were going to get all arsed about it, you'd be out too. You could play an Oasis and play Oasis songs, but you could not write them. That was Noel's job alone. And if that didn't suit you, then you could fuck off back to your mom's couch. You could work whatever job you wanted, rob whatever house or shop you wanted, sign onto the dole if you had to. There was no shame in that. But come time for band practice, you were either there six nights a week or you were out. Fuck off back to digging ditches full time. This wasn't a hobby. It was a band. Not only a band, a commitment to being the biggest, greatest fucking rock and roll band of all time. As good as the greats. Bigger and better than their local heroes. The Stone Roses equals to the Jam, heirs to Johnny Mars Smiths. Ascendants to take their seats ahead of the who at the table of John, Paul, Ringo and that nipple George. Do what Noel said, show up and give a fuck when it came to music and nothing else, and his songs would take care of the rest. Noel's commitment to his band was absolute and so too would his bandmates, and that included his arrogant cunt of a brother, Liam Dickhead. Noel's vision for his band wasn't so much planned as it was felt. It was innate and it stemmed back to his days in Manchester as a youth, four years old with his dad at Main Road Soccer Stadium, the hallowed ground where Manchester City's sky blues hovered above the drudgery of working class Manchester, England. Noel Gallagher sat amongst 2,000 other kids stashed away in the stands by their fathers who'd fucked off to the stadium's bars. And it was here that one of the cornerstones of the Noel Gallagher's songwriting was cemented by the raucous sound of Man City's goal celebrations. Thunderous rolls of noise from the bounce of stadium attendees poing out of their seats and erupting into song whenever City found the back of the net. A full throated community wide chorus of the working class united in their support of and commitment to their club roaring their team's chance. Boys in Blue were really not here 1962 and the showstopper Blue Moon and not in the lame ass Rogers and Hart style that Elvis Presley popularized with his fall setup at Main Road. Blue Moon was shouted staccato style, a sort of pre punk gang vocal being hammered out by 35,000 strong. It was simple, easy to latch onto. Anthemic fucking epic. Noel Gallagher would never forget it. Nor would he forget the house music anthem's pummeling keyed up ecstasy crowds at Manchester's Hacienda Club in the late 80s and early 90s when he came of age Voodoo Ray by a guy called Gerald, you Got the Love by the Source with Candy Station Bangers and just as influential as anything he'd heard from the Manchester music scene prior to the house music explosion. An earlier scene that led naturally to Manchester house and appealed to Noel in no small part due to the the disaffected cool of the Stone Roses with their anthem I Want to Be Adored and the infectious melodies of the Laws with their earworm hit There She Goes together with the usual UK classic rock curriculum that every young aspirational rock and roll songwriter finds their way to. The Beatles, the Stones, the who, the Kinks, and for Noel in particular deeper into the sounds of Manchester and London via the Smiths and the Jam, respectively. These anthemic influences clashed inside of him with the pub sing alongs that were his Irish Catholic family's lineage. Anthems were his birthright. He could lay claim to them as justifiably as John or Paul or Mar or Weller, and with the hardness afforded those who came up in the crime and violence of Manchester's council estates. Who was going to deny him? Nobody, that's who. By the time Noel Gallagher picked up a guitar with a serious mind to write his own songs, he had organically amassed an arsenal of songwriting influences. And it showed from the first batch of songs that he would write and that would wind up on Oasis first demo, his younger brother Liam's band, that he would join as the final member and foremost leader of the group. There were multiple songs that would go on to become anthems. Columbia, with its infectious lyric I can't tell you the way I feel, cuz the way I feel is so damn new to me. And of course, Rock and Roll star I live my life in the city and there's no easy way out. It was a shotgun blast of a track, an instant anthem that would cement the Oasis demo as a classic and lead to their signing with Creation Records. Rock and roll Star would eventually kick off the band's debut album. Definitely maybe an album that would announce the arrival of the Gallagher brothers with absolute authority in absolute chaos. We'll be right back after this.
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Owen Morris, the mix engineer, sat in the recording studio waiting to meet the brothers Gallagher. He was either the second or third engineer brought in a mix, definitely, maybe Oasis debut album for Creation Records. Owen wasn't sure about this meeting. What he was sure of was that if Oasis didn't get this right, there would likely be no Oasis. The mix was underwhelming. There was no snarl, no bite. And the energy was fucked. Overthought, overproduced. Where was that notorious Mancunian attitude that Owen had heard so much about? The word from Oasis management was that Owen could do whatever he wanted, literally anything he wanted to do, to save the album. His first order of business was to re record Liam's vocals. That meant he'd need to meet the volatile young singer first, so he was anxious. The control room door burst open and Liam Gallagher stormed inside with his brother Noel behind him. On time, ready to work. Liam Gallagher walks dick first. His groin thrusts out ahead of the rest of his body. His long, gangly arms sway behind him. His body is perpetually leaning backward. When he's moving, it's as if he's clearly going somewhere, but also as if he could care less if he ever arrives. His dick gets into the room before the rest of them does. And you notice. You also notice that when he's standing still, or not walking, I should say, because he's never really standing still. Standing still, he's always moving at least a little bit, a short pace in place, his head bobbing around his eyes, sizing everyone and everything around him up. But I digress. When Liam Gallagher is standing and talking to someone, he always appears as though he's about to haul off and punch whoever he's talking to square in the face. His pretty looks aside, Liam Gallagher is a tightly wound ball of kinetic energy set to unfurl in violence at any moment. Owen Mars picked up on the vibe immediately. Offstage, Liam Gallagher appeared to be exactly as he was on stage, a raving lunatic of a frontman. Classic Liam skipped any introductions and got right to the matter, pointing his finger at Owen and proclaiming immediately that you're Phil Spector, and then hitching his thumb toward his chest and finishing his point with and I'm John Lennon. Noel spoke up quickly. You are not fucking John Lennon, and he is not Phil Spector. Now just shut the up and get on with it. And get on with it they did. Owen Morris stripped down the mix and Liam Gallagher put in some quick, visceral vocal takes. And the album was well on its way to its proper mix, into serving its purpose as the vessel necessary to transport Oasis to rock stardom. But first, before any proper release, there was a gig to play in Amsterdam. Young rock bands, especially those who can feel their ascent to becoming rock stars, have one common enemy. Idle time. After they reach rock stardom, idle time usually results in self destructive behavior. Heavy addictive drug use, deadly car crashes, that sort of thing. But before rock stardom, idle time for the ascendant rock star results in a different type of destructive behavior. The kind that is aimed outward, out at the world. Because after all, every good young rock band knows that it's them against the world. They also know if they're any good and have any type of sand at all, that at that moment in time, no matter what stage they're on, no matter what band they're following, no matter who is in the audience that night, that they are the greatest fucking rock and roll band on the planet. And they also know that no matter what street they're walking down or what room they happen to find themselves in, or what bar they're drinking at, that they are fucking rock stars. Any challenge to either belief or threat to their self perceived inevitable conclusion, world domination is to be met with one type of reaction. Ultraviolence. This isn't a strategy. This isn't thought out. This isn't determined in band meetings after fucking band rehearsals every third Saturday of the month, when the missus lets you out of the house to head down to your old schoolmate's garage to bang around Pete Townsend riff, smash too many pints of lager and ignore your expanding waistline. These are facts. They are felt innately. There is no denying them. Your band is the greatest. The world will soon know it. It is an inevitability. Idle time both fuels and affords the ascendant rock star. These beliefs, especially young rock stars as committed as Oasis were, and even more so when endless pints of lager, Jack Daniels and champagne are involved. And that's exactly what was involved as Oasis set sail to Amsterdam for their first overseas gig back in 1994. And they were completely sauced before they even arrived at the ferry, having quickly downed two bottles of Jack Daniels on the bus ride over. Once on the ferry, they hit up the duty free, stole numerous bottles of champagne and then brazenly popped them at the bar with that look on their faces and said, what the are you gonna do about it? Idle time. The ferry was inexplicably packed with Chelsea Football Club supporters who were spurred, sporadically, erupting in their team's chance keep the blue flag flying high. Somehow a fight broke out amongst the supporters, a fight that in its early stages at least didn't involve Oasis. But that would change soon enough. Liam Gallagher and Oasis basis Gwigsy were actually heading to their room, wasted, about to get some rest before arriving in Amsterdam for their gig, when all hell broke loose. It was of those moments where everything is one way normal, and then in an instant everything changes to the complete opposite with zero explanation. There were Chelsea football supporters screaming, running about every which way, tourists ducking for cover, scurrying back to their rooms trying to avoid the melee. And then a security guard tearing ass straight toward a clueless Liam with his truncheon held high above his head, about to bring it smashing down into Giggsy singer's head. No way. Not in this lifetime. Guigsy, without thinking twice, hauled off and punched the guard straight in the face, saving his singer from an unsuspecting wallop and who knows what kind of damage. Immediately a gang of security guards tackled Wigsy and began beating the piss out of him. Liam screwed off as fast as he could, straight into the mayhem, headfirst into the brawling, Chelsea supporters throwing fists, kicks, whatever he could add to the chaos, to lash out, to protect himself, to get even for Gigsy, who was getting walloped at the moment, and the guards at the top deck of the ferry wrangled Liam. Soon enough they dragged him to the stairs and threw him violently down to the waiting security on the second floor, who picked him up, dragged him to another flight of stairs and then threw him down again to the first floor where he was thrown into the brig with Gwigsy. One of the guards held Liam down on the floor in the cell while another drew a chalk outline of his body. They rolled him over, over face first onto the floor within the chalk outline and informed the singer that if he moved outside of the lines, they'd pound him with their truncheons. And there he remained for the next three hours. His and his band members passports were confiscated when they arrived in Amsterdam, they were quickly deported. Needless to say, Oasis first overseas gig was canceled. Noel Gallagher, the band's leader, had the unfortunate range responsibility of ringing up their record label boss, Alan McGee of Creation Records, and telling him about what had happened. Alan, are you sitting down? I've got some news. Everybody has been arrested. Alan McGee answered sharply with one word. Brilliant. Liam Gallagher was waiting on the side of the stage to make his appearance. His brother Noel was already on stage with the rest of the band. He was bending the opening notes of Rock and Roll Star out of his Gibson Les Paul. The rest of the band was filling in behind him. The crowd in front of the stage, the small clothes club outside London that Oasis was headlining, was pitched to lose their in anticipation for this new notorious band of pop star hooligans from Manchester. Waiting in the wings, Liam Gallagher said to his roadie while nodding toward his brother on stage, he's good, isn't he? Fucking great, the roadie replied. Yeah, Liam said, but not as good as this. And then sauntered on stage to ravenous applause. The snare picked the tune up and kicked the band in just as Liam appeared. And Oasis were off on a tear and the crowd were mad for it, as Liam would say, as Liam would expect, tonight, they were rock and roll stars. A right that belief, that self confidence, that commitment to the bit, that snarl, that attitude and those songs hits. Prior to the release of their debut album, one music rag plastered the band across their cover under the headline Nevermind the Bullocks. Here's the Sex Beatles. And they weren't wrong, at least not in the moment. Everything was in place to make that bold proclamation true. The bid on the ferry over to the Netherlands and subsequent press interviews by the Gallagher brothers had the UK hyped for the release of Oasis debut album. And you could hardly blame them with what Noel and Liam were delivering. They were unvarnished, highly comical, highly entertaining quote machines and unlike anything the UK press or record buying public had seen since, well, the Sex Pistols or the Beatles. During their first televised interview, Noel, in dark sunglasses to mask the effects of the ecstasy he was on, was asked, how has being famous affected your friends, Noel? I haven't seen my mates in about six months, apart from the ones that work for us. The interviewer pressed, do you get your friends to work for you so you can tour around in a big group? Noel replied, if we didn't have them working for us, they'd be burgling our houses, so it's best to have them with us. Soon after, both respected UK music mags NME and Melody Maker made Oasis second single Shaker Maker their respective singles of the week. Melody Maker doubled down, claiming the single was one of the hundred greatest songs ever written. The hype Machine was winding up. The band's third single, Live Forever, cracked the UK top 10. And by the time the full length debut, Definitely maybe, was released on August 29, 1994, all of the hype, all of the hard work and the careful seating of singles by Creation Records led to Oasis first record entering the charts at number one. Quickly, very quickly, it became the fastest selling debut album of all time in the uk. Now it was time for the band to double down. They'd arrived as they knew they would, and why the fuck not? They had the commitment now it was time for the world to commit to them as they had committed to being the greatest rock stars on the planet. Time to work and time to celebrate. With every day came a new obligation. A presser or a televised performance or a show, and always a party. And then an after party and usually an after after party. And of course, to make it all go. Drugs, ecstasy, as always, weed, because it was weed, and cocaine, because they weren't fucking students, they were from Manchester. With Definitely maybe selling like mad. And with their live shows selling out in the uk, Paris and elsewhere in Europe, the United States awaited to be conquered. First stop, Los Angeles, the famous Whiskey a Go go on Sunset Strip. The band landed at LAX and were quickly wrangled aside at customs. The customs agent asked Liam Gallagher, what's the purpose of your visit? Liam responded in all honesty, to become a fucking rock star. I'm here to steal your soul. And then it was off to the hotel where they were greeted by awaiting scenesters, fans, groupies, new friends and of course, opportunistic drug dealers. At the ensuing party, someone laid the lines out big fat white rails. The band, all of them and the crew dove in head first, idle time be damned. And to their surprise, the cocaine they just snorted was not cocaine at all. It was the more powerful Ninja Speed Crystal meth. And the band were shocked, but undeterred. And they dug in for more and more, and then more. And they didn't sleep. And neither did the crew. They stayed up for days before their debut show with the Whiskey, a debut that had the brass from their American record label, Epic Records, all in attendance, as well as influential members of the American music press and a of course, hip fans stateside. Readers of NME and Melody Maker in on what was about to go down. One of the best kept secrets in the music industry was about to no longer be a secret. Oasis were poised to become the first great UK band to cross over into the American mainstream since the Sex pistols had almost 20 years earlier and then showtime. Wired from the meth, wired from no sleep. Liam was so rattled by the drug, he had to set up rails of it behind the amps to hit in between songs to keep him going. Noel was the only one who'd gotten wise to what they were ingesting and what effects the drug might have on their music. He was also wise to the immense pressure this gig, their American debut, carried. It was make or break, and the band walked on stage to a totally hyped audience. The crowd was with them for the jump. If this was any indication of things to come on their first tour, they that America was firmly in the band's reach. The squawk of feedback signaled with energy the start of something thrilling and new, something sexy and world changing. And then Oasis turned in the worst performance of their career. I'm Jake Brennan and this is Disgrace. Disgraceland was created by yours truly and is produced in partnership with Double Elvis. Credits for this episode can be found on the show notes page@gracelandpod.com if you're listening as a Disgraceland All Access member, thank you for supporting the show. We really appreciate it. And if not, you can become a member right now by going to Disgracelandpod.com Membership members can listen to every episode of Disgraceland ad free. 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