Liam Gallagher Beats Brother Noel to the Punch with Beady Eye

Music review: Beady Eye Look Back Toward the Beatles

By The Burg Staff on Mar. 09, 2011
By Matt Ashare

Every couple or three years, it seems, another English band steams across the Atlantic, their bags stuffed with the kind of hyperbolic press that's a Brit-crit staple, promising a nostalgic new twist on the sounds of swinging ’60s London or class of ’77 punk. In 1994, it was Oasis, a brother fronted group who were said to have one foot defiantly planted in both eras. Singer Liam Gallagher's fuck-all sneer was definitely — no, maybe — a third cousin twice removed from Johnny Rotten's spiteful delivery; guitarist Noel Gallagher wrote hard, indelible riffs that carried more than faint echoes of the Lennon/McCartney songbook; and Oasis were saddled by over-eager scribes with the unfortunate moniker "The Sex Beatles."

       All's well that ends well, I suppose: After years of brotherly squabbling, bad behavior, and big hits, Liam and Noel went out with a bang that erupted into a fist fight on stage in France two years ago. Since then, it's been Liam, not Noel, who's been working his way back to the USA babe, with three Oasis regulars, guitarists Andy Bell and Gem Archer, and drummer Chris Sharrock, in tow. This new band of non-brothers, strapped with the rather unsavory sobriquet Beady Eye (false modesty, or was "The Liam Gallagher Project" already taken?), aren't looking to make a break with the past so much as perpetuate the brand: "Different Gear, Still Speeding," as the title of their debut suggests, makes a few minor modifications to the machinery, but Liam's not shy about steering this trusty old chasis up and down the same long and winding road Noel's always favored.

       Ok. I'll stop with the Beatles allusions. There are simply far too many Lennonesque moments on "Different Gear" to enumerate here, not to mention direct cops from "Revolver," "Imagine," etc. . . There’s even “Beatles and Stones,” a retro Faces rocker that loudly proclaims “I’m going to stand the test of time/Like Beatles and Stones.” But first, Liam lets Noel have it, with a big, banging, wall-of-guitars monolith cheekily titled "Four Letter Word," as in "I don't really know what I'm feeling/A four letter word really gets my meaning." It's 1994's Definitely, Maybe all over again, only now we know exactly who rhymes like "It's about time your mind took a holiday/You're all grown up and you don't want to play" are aimed at.

If there's a revelation here, it's that Liam and co. manage to find plenty of fine, familiar melodies without Noel's guru-like guidance. Their several stabs at “Wonderwall” grandeur culminate with Liam earnestly crooning “it’s not the end of the world, oh no/It’s not even the end of the day.” But it’s not even end of the album: “Different Gear” fades to blue with “The Morning Son,” tempting tedium with a six-minute neo-psychedelic opus that ends in a mess of drums Noel might have nixed. 
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