Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds at O2 Academy Bournemouth on 18.3.2024 with Adam Zindani supporting.
As the smallest of three warm-up gigs (Portsmouth and Poole were the other two) for Noel’s March Royal Albert Hall show, he played at the 1800 capacity O2 Academy Bournemouth (my venue blog link). He must like it – we all do eh – as he played here last year as well.
This was my fourth gig in four nights so a seat upstairs beckoned. I was going to wander down later on but had a great view so thought I’d stay put, having been greeted to ‘The Gods’ seats by an ex-work colleague Russell, now doing some Show Sec security work. He still let me in anyway. (This top tier is not always open and when it is, is usually capacity restricted by the issue of free wristbands.)
Support was from Adam Zindani to ease everyone in gently. Adam is rhythm guitarist with The Stereophonics, playing tonight with a keyboard player. Sounded very good and his cover of the brilliant What’s So Funny About Peace Love and Understanding was appreciated by my ears.
There are flowers lining the back of the usable stage, behind are the amps, the Manchester City emblem and a cardboard cutout of City manager Pep Guardiola. There was a time that football and rock’n’roll didn’t mix.
The first part of the set is Noel’s High Flying Birds material and the latter part Oasis. The first five songs are all from the last High Flying Birds album Council Skies (2023), and it’s the title track that’s best for me.
The Chasing Yesterday album (2015) section has In the Heat of the Moment as the stand
out piece. Noel’s not saying much, just ploughing on with the songs. Great sound. Great delivery. The only time he gets a bit animated is when he picks up some football banter and has a dig at AFC Bournemouth up the road, feigning ignorance of their league position in the shadow of his oil sheik powered Manchester City.
There’s a fair old crowd in Noel’s High Flying Birds: up to 13 on stage at time, with backing singing trio. It gives so much depth to the sound, behind Noel’s acoustic guitar and vocals.
I was hanging on the intros to grab a video clip and settled on If I Had a Gun from Noel’s first album. (@grey-hairedgiggoer YouTube channel)
It must be frustrating that Oasis material always gets the best reception, but he doesn’t fight it. All the Oasis material is in the latter part and there are nine songs, broken up only by the last song of the main set: a cover of Joy Division’s Love Will Tear Us Apart. Nothing added to the song but a Manchester tribute I guess.
The three Oasis encores are pretty tremendous to hear live, still: Stand By Me, Live Forever and Don’t Look Back in Anger but Little by Little and The Masterplan run them close. I really like The Masterplan.
Great opportunity this one. My gig of the year to date. I’ve only seen Noel with his High Flying Birds a few times – Bournemouth BIC in 2012 and at Glastonbury in 2022. I saw Oasis three times plus a festival but I wasn’t right there at the beginning. I prefer the kick arse snarling of Liam, if pressed to choose, but they both have their distinct talents and tonight was a real good ‘un.
Gigs with Ivan 