Noel Gallagher in Nottingham 10/09/2012

       As I walked out of the Capital FM arena on Monday night a man, who had clearly sampled the venues alcoholic drinks many times throughout the night, thrust his arms around me and said "That was f*cking incredible". He was most certainly correct. Despite being a massive fan of Noel I was slightly disappointed after the gig I had previously seen him at this year at the NIA. The Oasis legend seemed not quite at his magnificent best and this was matched by the reaction of the crowd. However there were no problems this time around.

   
       Support came in the shape of old Blur foe Graham Coxon. Clearly some of the past times had been forgotten between Noel and the Axeman from Colchester. However, this wasn't transferred into the crowd. Only a handful of the capacity seemed to enjoy Mr Coxon, who tore away heavily and energetically at his guitar but as often said, he never quite mastered the frontman role usually taken by Damon Albarn. As well as this the sound in the arena was atrocious, leaving me fairly concerned that this would occur for the Noel.

     
       And so to the main man himself, cheered onto the stage by the raucous crowd, he soon sprung into the now synonymous opening number of 'It's good to be free'. The first really spine-tingling moment of the night came next though with 'Everybody's on the run', the line "You can't fight the feeeeeeeeeeeeeling" is a personal favourite from the album and really gets the crowd going live. That mixed with the impressive Crouch End chorus choir led to a real spectacle with the choir being fantastic all night. Crowd favourites from the new album proved to be 'If I had a gun' and 'What a life' with the former getting a massive singalong, another pair of classic songs produced by the Chief. It was also fantastic to hear some old Oasis favourites as well 'D'yer wanna be a spaceman' especially. By the time the encore came around the place was in raptures and the final pair of songs, arguably Noel's most well known of his own vocals, 'little by little' and 'Dont look back in anger' almost blew the roof off with everybody singing along, arms aloft. The banter Noel had with the now notorious man with the hat also added to the brilliance of the night, which overall was fantastic. Mr Gallagher, you are a genius.

Setlist: (Its good) To be free, Everybody's on the Run, Dream On, If I Had a Gun, The Good Rebel, The Death of You and Me, Freaky Teeth, Supersonic, D'yer Wanna be a Spaceman, Record Machine, What a Life, Talk Tonight, Soldier Boys and Jesus Freaks, Broken Arrow, Half the World Away, (Stranded on) The Wrong Beach, Let the Lord Shine a Light on Me, Whatever, Little by Little, Dont Look Back in Anger.