Kent looks back without anger as Oasis reunite
As Oasis announce comeback tour, a venue Tunbridge Wells recounts their memories with the rock'n'roll star.
Finn Macdiarmid reports.
Finn Macdiarmid reports.
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00:00It's been 15 years since the brothers split, almost to the day, with Noel posting a short
00:05message on August 28th 2009 that he had quit the worldwide phenomenon known as Oasis.
00:13Now they're back after all this time, announcing a run of 14 shows in the UK and Ireland next
00:18summer, saying, the guns have fallen silent, the stars have aligned, the great wait is
00:22over, come and see, it will not be televised.
00:26Now when you think of Oasis, you mostly think of Manchester and Wembley Arena, but 30 years
00:31ago the Gallagher brothers had a humble start, right here in a converted toilet block in
00:35Tunbridge Wells.
00:37Well here at the Forum, 30 years ago in Tunbridge Wells, two brothers, Liam and Noel Gallagher,
00:42performed under the name Oasis.
00:44They were the opener for a band from Scotland called White Out, and little did they, or
00:48the band themselves know, that they were going to be going straight to stardom when they
00:53released their first single, Supersonic, shortly after their performance.
00:57Despite the low turnout and mostly mild reaction they got, some, including the Forum's co-founder,
01:03remember the gig for what it did for the local music scene and beyond.
01:06Oasis coming did genuinely change that venue in a really significant way.
01:11Suddenly everybody wanted to play there.
01:13But for the 116 people who were there when Oasis played, yeah, you got to meet the band,
01:18just like you can get to meet the band every Friday and Saturday, Thursday night now.
01:23It's a space to be around musicians and they were part of that.
01:27Rather famously, the bit that I do remember is that Noel couldn't get a drink at about
01:30five past midnight because we'd closed the bar, and insisted on letting us know that
01:35when he was big and famous, he'd be coming back to the venue to buy it just so he could
01:39sack us all.
01:40With Oasis performing there, the Forum became a great place for young, aspiring artists
01:44to perform, and created a community that still goes on today.
01:48Not too long after their stint at the Forum, they became a defining part of the 90s and
01:52early noughties, inspiring a new generation of music, including tribute acts like Kent's
01:57own Slide Oasis.
01:59Look, I think those tickets are going to sell out in minutes on Saturday morning.
02:02I'm going to be one of those people on the internet hoping to get one.
02:07And I think it's captured the zeitgeist.
02:09I've genuinely received more messages this morning about Oasis than I normally do on
02:13my birthday, which probably says more about me than anything else.
02:17Well, now that they are definitely maybe coming back, fans will hope the band will live for
02:22ever and that they don't go away.
02:24Finn McDermid for KMTV in Tunbridge Wells.