Beady Eye

Speaker: Mark Worden (Standard British accent)

In December 2011 Speak Up interviewed Noel Gallagher. This time we get to meet his brother Liam. Relations between the two have not been good since their group Oasis broke up in 2008, although it has been said that they made peace last year when their favourite team, Manchester City, won the Premier League.
Oasis are unlikely to get back together, and the two are pursuing separate projects; Noel Gallagher with his High Flying Birds, and Liam with Beady Eye, who released their second album, BE (or “B.E.”) with Sony last month.  
When the band presented the album at a press conference in Milan, there was naturally a question about Noel. Did Liam feel that he now had greater artistic freedom working with Beady Eye’s producer, Dave Sitek, than in the past with Oasis?

Liam Gallagher (Standard British/Manchester accent)

Noel’s a bit stubborn in the studio, you know what I mean? And a bit uptight. And that’s not a dig, it’s just, you know, Noel likes to... with Dave Sitek, we sort of just let him get on with it, you know what I mean? And we sort of stayed out of the way, whereas in Oasis Noel thinks he’s the producer, you know what I mean? He sort of gets in the way a bit, so I don’t think that would have happened.

THAT’LL BE THE DAY...

Liam Gallagher is often in the papers for his controversial behaviour, rather than his music. He recently had a very public “spat” or argument with Robbie Williams. But are all these stories about Liam true, or are they the invention of the press?

Liam Gallagher

Unfortunately, they’re true, yeah. I have a big mouth and it gets a lot bigger! What I meant about this Robbie Williams thing, it seems to me like the entertainment and like someone coming down a ladder dressed as a clown is more important than real music, you know what I mean? And that seems to be winning: idiocy over talent, you know what I mean? Well, listen, the day I take musical advice off Robbie Williams, mate, is the day I piss in my own mouth and then shoot myself in the dick! Taking musical advice off a guy who writes candy? Don’t think so!

PUBLIC RELATIONS

Liam has also been accused of being difficult with journalists, but he denies this:

Liam Gallagher

I like talking to journalists, it’s part of it, innit? You know what I mean? You know, someone asks the question, you try and answer it as honest as you can, you know what I mean? That’s what it’s about. And you get a couple of smartarses, but that’s right, I can handle the smartarse!   

So does he pay attention to album reviews?

Liam Gallagher

You read them, sometimes you get to it and you go, “Yeah, he’s actually listened to the record,” and that’s great, but then you read some and, you know, they’ve not even listened to the record, they’ve already made their mind up. Obviously, there’s people in the band that people ain’t going to like, no matter what you do, you know what I mean? ‘cause (of) his character and that, so it doesn’t matter. We like our album, and that’s the most important thing and the gigs that we’ve been doing, the last three gigs that we’ve done, all the fans seem to like it, you know what I mean? They’re singing all the words, so we’re going in the right direction, you know what I mean? It doesn’t matter if some spotty little Herbert from Hastings doesn’t like it.

SUPER MARIO!

Inevitably there was a question about Manchester City, who recently sacked their Italian manager, Roberto Mancini. Last year they sold their Italian player, Mario Balotelli:

Liam Gallagher

I love Balotelli, man, he’s... I wish I’d met him, you know what I mean, when we (he)played for City, he’s a dude, you know what I mean? You need more people like him in the world. You know what I mean? And the reason why he gets a lot of bad… half of the press that he got is ‘cause everyone was just square, weren’t they? You know what I mean? A lot of footballers are squares, aren’t they? So he’s just having his good time, but I think next season City will do well.