(Credits: Far Out / Drew de F Fawkes)
Sun 16 November 2025 16:45, UK
Even the biggest musicians can get starstruck. Noel Gallagher, who so often seems untouchable and unmovable, isn’t immune to getting giddy when he meets those who inspired him.
If you ever want to see “cool” personified, look no further than Noel. When you watch the most recent Oasis reunion shows for instance, that’s a man who, regardless of what your opinion might be, is sure of himself. You’re taking to the stage with a band that you’re very much responsible for creating and that the world can’t get enough of, yet you brush it off like it’s nothing. He keeps it cool, maybe a quick smirk, a wave if you’re lucky, but after that, he picks up the guitar and plays these gigs as if he wouldn’t have expected anything less than the reaction he was greeted by.
Being sure of himself doesn’t just manifest in his performances, but in his opinions. In his mind, since he is the genius behind these songs that so many obsess over, he reserves a divine right to pass judgment on those within the same field. More often than not, he’s sat waist deep in hot water thanks to his (somewhat entertaining) inability to hold his tongue. Rubbish, garbage, overrated, no descriptors are out of touch for Noel Gallagher.
Some of Gallagher’s highlights include comments he made about Oasis’s rival band, Blur. The two were at each other’s throats for years; the only thing more entertaining than the music both bands released during this time was the shit they spoke about one another in the interim. “Damon Albarn is a fucking knobber. And his guitarist – who I thought was all right – seems to think that he’s some intelligent superhuman being, the fucking idiot,” said Gallagher, “I never met the drummer and the bassist, who I first didn’t like and thought he was a cunt, turned out to be quite all right. But I don’t like the music, and I don’t like the singer.”
(Credits: Far Out / Matt Crockett)
He also had some choice words to say about Jack White, as he opted to poke fun at the White Stripes guitarist’s appearance and career choices. Despite White being an incredibly respected voice within the world of rock, who the majority of music fans are pretty quick to heap praise onto, even a seven nation army couldn’t protect him against the scathing words of Gallagher.
“Jack White has just done a song for Coca-Cola. End of. He ceases to be in the club. And he looks like Zorro on doughnuts,” he said, “He’s supposed to be the poster boy for the alternative way of thinking… I’m not having that, that’s fucking wrong. Particularly Coca-Cola, it’s like doing a fucking gig for McDonald’s.”
So, when you’ve got someone as effortlessly cool, confident, and unbothered as Noel Gallagher, who on earth could leave him starstruck? While chatting about the various celebs he’s bumped into over the years – and we’re talking proper music royalty – he admitted there was only one person who genuinely stopped him in his tracks.
“I’ve met everybody including Beatles and Rolling Stones but the only person I’ve met and was like ‘Fuck’ was Neil Young. Cos it was like, he was at Woodstock. The end,” said Gallagher, “Do you know what I mean? And I’ve loved him since I was, since I started playing the guitar, you know?”
As if meeting Neil Young wasn’t surreal enough, Gallagher had a particularly strange experience when he found out Young knew who he was. The two were talking, and it turned out Young was aware of Oasis, something that Gallagher still can’t come to terms with. It turns out that even when you’re as cock-sure as Noel Gallagher is, there are still some celebrities that can reduce you to an excited bubbling fan once again.
“He knew my name which freaked me out, you know,” he recalled, “I mean, I knew my name obviously, it wasn’t that weird, but the fact that he said my name… ‘Hey Noel’, I was like, ‘Fucking hell’. ‘What do you want, I’m busy’ (laughs) Do you know what I mean? Neil Young. Incredible.”
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