Oasis
Be Here Now - Sony 1997
Tracks: 1. D'You Know What I Mean? / 2. My Big Mouth / 3. Magic Pie / 4. Stand By Me / 5. I Hope, I Think, I Know / 6. The Girl In The Dirty Shirt / 7. Fade In-Out / 8. Don't Go Away / 9. Be Here Now / 10. All Around The World / 11. It's Gettin' Better (Man!!) / 12. All Around The World (Reprise)
Comments:
This is by far my least favourite Oasis album. Though many songs are actually quite good ( a few very good ), the production makes it hard to listen to the album for very long. Most tracks are burdened down by numerous over-dubs of distorted guitars, and the songs generally go on for way too long.
Fortunately there are moments of pleasure too. "Don't Go Away" is an Oasis ballad like when they are best; a wonder this fine song was not released as a world-wide single. "Stand By Me" is almost as good, but it suffers a bit from going on for too long.
"All Around the World" is the perfect closing track. It has a fine acoustic intro and an extremely catchy chorus. Though it is the longest track on the album it really doesn't feel like it. I would have cut off 2-3 minutes, though. The Beatles-inspired "Girl in the Dirty Shirt" is also quite good.
The opening track, and the first single, "Do You Know What I Mean" may have sounded right in 1997, but the song has not aged very well, and it's more or less a drag listen though this overloaded and longwinded recording.
Most of the rockers are not up the standards of early Oasis. At a certain point Noel said something about remixing the album; that would really be interesting. I'm sure a much better album would come out of that.
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