D'You Know What I Mean?

Chronique

The first ever boring Oasis single. It's kind of groovy, dancy, shaker-maker stuff, but whereas in the past indisputably great songs made up for Noel Gallagher's trite lyrics, there isn't much of a riff or a tune for his brother, Liam, to croon. And here Noel's words are more than trite, they're just plain awful, with a cavalcade of clichés, a bushel of boring columbaria for his heroes (lines taken from the Beatles, Dylan, Sam Cooke by way of Lennon, and another Small Faces allusion), and a worthless "All my people, you all listen-up" chorus -- a blatantly failing attempt at an "All You Need Is Love"-type worldly statement. This Rutles-like sham/opus goes on too long, too. This single probably has a lot to do with why the new LP sold half as many copies in its second week of release than it did the first. But one listen to the third LP, Be Here Now, shows Oasis had better songs to pick as a single, as further indicated by the (as usual) quality B-sides. "Stay Young" is the best, another bouncy stomp from a quintet who has the sass for the style. "Angel Child" is another installment of the Noel acoustic series that he does well, and the cover of David Bowie's 1977 Heroes classic, "Heroes," is surprisingly pulled off, with the elder Gallagher recreating Robert Fripp's spacey, echoing, cruising guitar lead that throbs through the song (his vocal is an anguished as Bowie's as well), even if they neglect the weird keyboard textures inserted by the song's co-writer, Brian Eno.

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