(What's the Story) Morning Glory?, Oasis' 1995 follow-up to their debut album Definitely Maybe was recorded in just 12 working days, and went on to sell over 22 million copies, turning the Manchester indie rock band into global superstars.
"We're not exactly short on self-belief, but it is much better than the last one," Noel Gallagher promised to NME three months ahead of the album's October 2, 1995 release. "Everyone who's heard it says that as well, and I don't think it's just arse licking."
Bigger certainly. Better? Hmmm, that's a matter of opinion. But here's Noel Gallagher thoughts on every song on his band's best-loved record.
Hello
"I'll be told by someone in the States next year the meaning of the song Hello, which to me hasn't got no meaning," Noel Gallagher told Alternative Press magazine ahead of the release of his band's second album. "It's just words strung together."
"The lyrics are 'We live in the shadows/We had the chance and we threw it away/And it's never gonna be the same'," Oasis' songwriter quoted to Select magazine." It's just saying, Well, it's never gonna be the same for us anymore, I s'pose. If Definitely Maybe was about dreaming about being in a band, this one's about actually being in a band. So it's like, Hello, it's good to be back – back making records."
Famously, the opening song on What's The Story... carries a co-writing credit for glam rock star-turned-convicted paedophile Gary Glitter, as on an early take of the song, Noel Gallagher spontaneously sang a lyric from Glitter’s 1973 single Hello, Hello, I'm Back Again during its outro, which apparently caused much amusement in the studio.
"[Producer] Mark Coyle said, 'You're not going to have that bit in the fucking song: it's Gary Glitter!'" Gallagher recalled on a 2021 episode of the Matt Morgan Podscast. "And I said, No, no, no, I'm gonna write something else, but I'll put that in for now. And I could never come up with anything for it. And I just went, Fuck it, because we were high in the studio."
Roll With It
When Noel Gallagher gave NME a song-by-song breakdown of Oasis' second album ahead of its release he bluntly declared that Roll With It is "about fuck all".
Gallagher offered a little more insight when talking Select magazine through every song on the record.
"It's just a typical fuckin' Oasis thing," he explained. "Shut up moanin' and fuckin' get on with it. You've gotta say what you say, and be who you be. It's the same sentiments as there is in nearly every song we do. Y'know, Supersonic – 'You've gotta be yourself...' It starts to get a bit boring (laughs), but those are the lyrics I feel comfortable with.
"We got a lot of criticism for putting it out as a single," he admitted. "It's not the greatest song in the world, it's not even the greatest Oasis song."
Asked by Select if the song was written about his younger brother Liam, Gallagher replied, "Is it fuck!"
Wonderwall
"It's about my girlfriend, Meg Matthews," Noel told NME in September'95. "She had a company which folded, and she was feeling a bit sorry for herself. The sentiment is that there was no point in her feeling down, she has to sort my life out for me, because I'm in bits half the time."
In 2002 however, during an interview for a BBC Radio 2 documentary, the guitarist claimed that the song wasn't about Matthews at all. That he waited until a year after he and his ex-wife Matthews divorced to share this information may or may not be a coincidence.
"The meaning of that song was taken away from me by the media who jumped on it," he insisted, as if this misinterpretation had nothing to do with him. "How do you tell your Mrs it's not about her once she's read it is? It's a song about an imaginary friend who's gonna come and save you from yourself."
"Its original title was Wishing Stone," he revealed in another interview. "We played the Cathouse in Glasgow, I met some girl and we went back to my hotel room and she had this stone in her pocket that she insisted I had... I thought it was a great title and the song came out of that. It was called Wishing Stone for ages until we were listening to Wonderwall Music by George Harrison and it was like, Brilliant, I’ve got a Beatles connection."
"When we were first playing it, our Liam said he thought it was shit," the guitarist told Select, gleefully mocking his brother. "We were doing the backing track and our Liam goes, 'I'm not singing on that, it's fuckin' stupid, man, it's fuckin' reggae music...' So I said, Why don't you go off to the chippie then, and we'll see you in a bit, eh? Now that he's sang on it, of course, it's the greatest song ever written."
Don't Look Back In Anger
"It's about not being upset about the things you might have said or done yesterday," Noel told NME's Andy Richardson. "It's about looking forward rather than looking back. I hate people who look back on the past or talk about what might have been."
Gallagher performed the song for the first time at Oasis' first ever arena headline show, at the 12,000-capacity Sheffield Arena (now the Utilita Arena Sheffield) on April 22, 1995, having written the basic chord structure in Paris just 48 hours earlier, ahead of his band's gig at the Bataclan club. On the afternoon of the gig in Sheffield, the song was still lacking a chorus, but while Noel was strumming the chords during the band's soundcheck, his younger brother inadvertently inspired what would become its iconic refrain.
"Liam come up and said, 'Who's Sally?' Noel recalled in his commentary for the Oasis videos compilation Oasis: Time Flies 1994-2009. "And I was like, What the fuck are you talking about? And he said, 'Is that what you're singing? So Sally can wait?' And I was like, No, it isn't. But it fucking is now, nice one."
"Someone came up to me at an Ian Brown gig once and asked me, 'Was Sally, the girl in question, actually Sally Cinnamon from the Stone Roses song?', which I thought was fucking brilliant. She'd obviously sat down and worked this out, and I didn't want to spoil it for her, so I said, Yes, it is Sally Cinnamon. Which it's not, really."
And Noel's memory of the song's iconic video?
"Bag of shite. A waste of an afternoon."
Hey Now!
"One of the best songs I've ever written, and one of the simplest," Gallagher declared in 1995. "It's a cross between I Wanna Be Adored by The [Stone] Roses and summat Neil Young might've done when he was better than he is now."
The song's lyrics, he said, are "about being in a group".
"There's no regret in there," he insisted to Select, "definitely no regret. But Definitely Maybe was a very 'up' album, because we were dreaming of what was gonna come our way... This is about looking back and going, Well, we've got where we wanted to be, but it's been fucking hard work... it's not been as big a laugh as we thought it'd be."
Untitled (aka The Swamp Song)
Originally called The Jam, this short instrumental features Paul Weller on harmonica, and lead guitar. "It's only about 40-odd seconds, but I think the full version will come out eventually" Gallagher predicted. And it did, on the B-side of the Wonderwall single.
Some Might Say
"We'd just signed and I was living in a bedsit in Manchester," Gallagher told Uncut in 2006. "[Creation records boss] Alan McGee would phone up on like a Wednesday, 'Alright, we're having a party in the office, come down.' If somebody's got their own record label and they're having a party 'cos its Wednesday, that's where I fucking need to be. So I come down to London with a guitar, jeans, trainers - not even a toothbrush - and had a fucking brilliant time. The offices were out in Hackney and he sent the staff round the pub to come back with a tray of Jack Daniel's and cokes, it was like: Fucking hell man, no way am I going back to Manchester, I can't live there any more. I finished with me bird, moved down, and I remember just writing this song, I think I was off my head on drugs."
"It's psychedelia-meets-social comment, man," he commented in Select magazine. "The verses are quite deep. Some of them are about homeless people, and people who can't always get what they want, and how people who can get what they want always seem to be moaning more than people who can't. I wanted something deep and meaningful for the chorus, but, in the end I just gave up and thought, Fuck it, might as well just go stupid and have stuff about fishes and dishes and dogs itchin' and all that..."
Cast No Shadow
"It was inspired by Richard [Ashcroft] from The Verve," Gallagher told NME. "I sussed Richard wasn't very happy for a while so l wrote it for him and about three weeks later he quit. It's about songwriters in general who are desperately trying to say something. I'd like to be able to write really meaningful lyrics,but I always end up talking about drugs or sex."
"In my head, I believe I wanted it to sound like Pink Floyd because it's the same chords as Wish You Were Here, the opening chords are the same," he added in a 2021 interview, revisiting the album track-by-track at Rockfield studios. "I was listening to it today, and it sounds a bit half baked to me. There's a country thing going on, and it's kind of falling in between two stylistic stools, but it's a fucking great song... some of the best words I ever wrote."
She's Electric
In an interview with Select's Andy Perry, Gallagher cheerfully admitted that he'd ripped off the melody and key lyrics for She's Electric from a British educational TV series for children called Stop, Look, Listen.
"It's a very childish song, even more than Digsy's Dinner," he acknowledged. "Of course, as soon as our Liam heard it, he goes, 'That should be the first single!' I'm goin', Don't be so fuckin' ridiculous! You knob! We had a lot of fun doing that one. Is it a Blur piss-take? You said that, not me, mate."
Morning Glory
"It's a cynical song about drugs", Gallagher told NME in 1995.
"Cocaine and fucking razorblades and mirrors," he expanded in an interview with Uncut 21 years later. "I'm amazed we got away with it at the time. I love it when we play it live. Somebody said to me on the phone once, it's an American saying: 'What's the story, morning glory'?, like we say, All right, how you doing? And I was like, fuck, hang on a minute, while I write that down, that's fucking starters, I'll have that."
"I do remember writing that fucking line, 'All your dreams are made when you're chained to the mirror and the razor blade' in this room," he said during an interview filmed at Rockfield. "I sound like I was just in the zone there, where everything that I was writing was meaningful."
Champagne Supernova
"When I'm out of it on drugs I get a seriously cocky bastard," Gallagher told the Sunday Times in 1996. "Champagne Supernova - for Christ's sake, how big is that title? It's like I'm saying, I am Mr Noel Gallagher. Do you know who I am? I am the greatest. I'm like Muhammad Ali."
The song, which Gallagher says took influences from Led Zeppelin's Stairway To Heaven, and The Beatles' Dear Prudence, features a guitar solo from his hero and friend Paul Weller, who later called Gallagher "a cunt" because he felt the Oasis man had deliberately kept his contribution low in the final mix.
"It was crying out for a guitar solo because mine was a shocker," Gallagher admitted.
To this day, the songwriter isn't at all sure what the song's lyrics are about. However, the world's most famous Manchester City supporter has become all too familiar with the feeling of "Sham" pain in 2026...
