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Album Reviews
Album Review: Oasis – Time Flies (Big Brother)
By Marc Samuels | Published on Tuesday 8 June 2010
And so, with the Oasis coffin barely in the ground, it’s time to start exploiting the back catalogue. First up is this two CD ‘all the singles’ album, arranged in non-chronological order, presumably so that people don’t leave the second disk in its wrapper (though all the big hitters – ‘Wonderwall’, ‘Live Forever’, ‘Supersonic’ – do appear quite early on disk one).
Conventional orthodoxy has it that Oasis, like any group with an imperial phase, are hardly worth investigating post ‘Morning Glory’ but, whilst the first two albums are undeniably their career high point, there were still gems in the years that followed. In fact, the likes of ‘Go Let It Out’ and The Importance Of Being Idle’ are far superior to the lumpen ‘Roll With It’ or pointless ‘Shakermaker’, and even the ten minute, preposterously coke-addled ‘All Around The World’ is enjoyable enough; while Liam’s pretty ‘Songbird’ and ‘Stop Crying Your Heart Out’ (no doubt on hand again to be used by the BBC as soon as England crash out of the World Cup on penalties) remain two of their best songs.
It’s a single collection rather than a best of, so the likes of ‘The Masterplan’, ‘Gas Panic and ‘Champagne Supernova’ are all absent. Presumably when it’s time to milk the cash cow again, a double CD with all the singles plus assorted memorable b-sides and album tracks will become available and, really, that will be the definitive Oasis compilation. But until then, ‘Time Flies’ is a heady nostalgia ride and, even… an ideal Fathers Day present. What fortunate timing. MS
