The Interior Life of Noel Gallagher: A Speculative History

this is the 2010 equivalent of GARU G in ilx lolstakes, would make a brilliant comic strip. the concept itself is endlessly fascinating. trying to think of other cultural/music post-peak-of-fame skits but all i'm coming up with is that vic & bob slade house sketch. the sheer tedium & pathos of the noel g episodes are what make them so poignant

When the great grandfather clock in Noel's chambers struck three, the fire in the grate was blown out by what seemed to be a great gust of wind down the chimney, and the chambers were left in darkness except for a few candles and a thin moonlight that cast itself through one of the tall windows plastered with rain and fallen leaves nearly obscured by thick crimson drapes. Now Noel heard the sound of footsteps on the grand staircase and his blood turned to ice. Were the footsteps real? Each day Noel had tried to convince himself that the previous night's phantasies were just that. By now he could not remember which had come first: the insomnia, the opium use, or the ghost that manifested itself at the top of the great hall and then disappearing once seen.

With great apprehension Noel tucked his hammer pants into his boots and tentatively made his way into the hallway...

Garu G as a comic strip? Picture a grandmother's flange....

Noel stared at the brown leather boots in the shop window. He stared for a long time. He looked down at the brown leather boots he was wearing. His gaze returned to the boots on display before him. "Boots," he thought. "Boots". The word sounded strange in his head. He looked down at the boots on his feet. "Boots." He wondered whether Boots the Chemist had started out as a shoe shop. Maybe in the olden Victorian times boots were worn by people with poorly feet. Like those Dr Skol things.

"I should get one them dictaphone things," thought Noel.

Noel had spent the afternoon drinking pernod in his shed with a near-comatose Alan McGee while waiting for his harried PA to return with four crates of Guarana Antarctica and 63 lbs of condensed milk powder for Geraldine, his favourite cane rat. 'They're not fuckin chinchillas', drawled Noel, irked by his companion's insincerity, but his psychomotor skills were inadequate to the task of writing CUNT on Alan's forehead, and Noel himself fell into a deep sleep, dreaming of himself as a liliputian Quixote, charging across the windswept plains of Old Castille with Geraldine, his trusty steed.

it's like american splendor starring noel g

i love it

Perhaps the direction to go for the Noel solo album was not more tributes to (or, as he sometimes even admitted to himself in the dark depths of the night increasingly tired imitations of) the greats of old, but a spoken word record in which he would share his insights on a range of everyday objects, thus marrying the mundane and the profound. In this way he would contribute to the transcendence of the human race from its vulgar origins.

Bouyed by this notion, Noel absorbed his surroundings with a new clarity. Potential inspiration was everywhere. "Cars!," he thought, "Cars are very... Er... They, like get you places an' that! Yeah!" He beamed. "Birds! They're kinda like.. Kinda like little planes! With beaks..." Like a cheap coke high, the sheen was rapidly burnishing. Time to sum up. "But at the end of the day, right, at the end of the fookin day, all you need is... All you need is, er... Got it! All you need is love!" He considered this sudden flash of brilliance for a second or two, and then something clicked. "Oh FOOKIN 'ELL!" said Noel Gallagher.

Woken by a small needling sound, Noel raised himself onto his elbows and squinted at the clock. "Fookin ell.." he mumbled, collapsing into his 400 threadcount Kenzo sheets. His eyes closed, he saw himself riding aloft the bush-hog accessory of a 1970s-era Massey-Ferguson tractor. Bits of grass and dirt pelted his ears and face. The swing band kept playing. What was that girl's name? Who fookin cares.

Noel turned off the fridge. He listened. It was still there, that noise. He tried to hum along to it. To understand it. What was a noise? Who was a noise? No, that was poof's talk, it was probably the telly. He began walking down the hall to the living room, then stopped. He went back to the kitchen and rolled up the culture section of the Sunday Times. The noise was there alright, in the telly room, lording it. He burst into the room, but the telly was plugged out already. Noel stopped and cupped his ears, in the background he could still hear it, it didn't sound like anything at all, it was a bit like the noise you get in a church with nobody in it, that bloody mmmm.

He collapsed into the couch. "Fuck it," he said out loud. The doorbell rang sharply several times. Noel paused. "We don't have a doorbell," he thought. It would be the man in the purple coat, Noel said to himself, smiling. Here for his nightly pound of flesh no doubt.

Noel curled the dense ringlets of his mustache, and then curled the dense ringlets of his unibrow. Making his way through the dense, sooty avenues of Manchester in his horse and carriage, his small form, wrapped in black greatcoat and top-hat, lit by the few gas lamps along the street, the few passers-by out at this un-Christian hour--some tramp, or governess, perhaps--mistook Noel, who gazed at them out of the thick windows of the carriage with his magnifying glass, for some deranged lord of some ancient family driven mad by generations of intermarriage, venturing out of his country house. Little did these peripatetic ingenues know that in fact Noel was keeping them safe; and, though he was indeed a deranged lord venturing out of his country house, he did so only to solve crimes of great import.

Noel hurtled down aisle 1 at Tesco faster than, yes, a cannonball. Onions - check, garlic - check. He walked smartly across to the tinned tomatoes. Halfway there he raised a hand in greeting, a bit like the guy on the Morning Glory cover. There was nobody there though - he'd checked before he did it. He only wanted two tins but it was nearly as to cheap to get four. They were in this sort of carton-thing. Noel didn't know what that was called.

He ambled towards the back of the shop to get pasta. The spice rack was on the way and he got distracted by that for a while. How could there be so many different types of pepper? The oils were beside it and he spent a while looking at them. One bottle of olive oil - eight quid!

The dairy section. It were tough choosing a cheese - you never used it all, did you, before you had to throw it out. He did without cheese. That pissed him off - he liked cheese.

He sighed. There was only one item to get. He looked at the bacon cabinet, then at his list. 'Bacon smoked/unsmoked'. What the fuck did that mean? It was either smoked or it wasn't. They had smoked. They had unsmoked. Four hundred grams. Two hundred grams. He looked up at them. 'I don't even know the difference,' he thought.

He took everything out his basket and got a frozen pizza instead. You could cook it straight from frozen. At the checkout he looked at the front of Heat. Katy Perry and Russell Brand were on it. Noel flicked at his mobile but it didn't have Brand's number on it. It didn't have anybody's number on it. It had Bonehead's, but he'd got a new phone now hadn't he.

Noel's PA came round, the usual bunch of fan mail, "why does someone from Albania, think I'd write back? I've never even been to fookin' Albania". She's brought the latest copy of Mojo. "Dylan on the cover again. Surely must be time for a Roses cover. She tells me Joe Goddard has phoned. Joe Who? Turns out he's the fat, bearded bloke from Hot Chip. I met him at the Q awards and said we should do something, didn't think he'd think I was serious. He was telling me about funky houses. I don't know, I'm too old for this shit really, think I'll give it a miss. Still he said he worked with Robert Wyatt and Weller says Wyatt's alright. Our kid would know what to do, tell me to stop being a dickhead."

honest reaction - this thread really makes me want to listen to some Oasis

Hunched in rapt concentration, Noel stared at the typewriter before him. His mind turned over and over as he gazed through the sheet of paper, staring into the depths of his own psyche, combining and recombining words as he strove to reach the appropriate final sentence. Suddenly, all cogitation ceased and his fingers leaped forward, flying across the keys, pounding at them like a concert pianist rushing to a tremendous final crescendo. It took less than a minute. Spent, Noel leaned back in his Ikea "Markus" chair and pulled the finished page from the carriage. He carefully read back what he had written, aloud, testing each cadence and the rhythm of his prose.

"To attribute the Imitatio Christi to Louis Ferdinand Céline or to James Joyce, is this not a sufficient renovation of its tenuous spiritual indications?"

Noel smiled to himself, slowly. "Fookin' mint," he murmured.

Sir William Napier, who had until that time been enjoying a developing acquaintance with the beautiful heiress, the Duchess de Milamant, watched as a masqued figure, diminuitive yet of handsome carrriage, and dressed in black, danced a merry bourée with the Duchess. Sir William could not place the man, and as his patience grew thin approached him and demanded satisfaction. Little is known about the events that took place on a fog-laden moor at dawn the next morning except that the masqued man drew the first lot, and as his bullet smashed through Sir William Napier's heart, uttered the mysterious phrase, "Fookin' hell," before he and his second mounted a dappled steed and departed into the dim English sunrise.

Noel had summoned his PA to note down a message of congratulation for Noel's new favourite person, the estimable Mario Barwuah Balotelli. Noel gazed across the cane rat warrens at his forlorn amanuensis, unable to choose the right words and somewhat dismayed since being told of telegraphy's demise. 'Carrier pigeons! No, they're fucking cunts they are. Filthy little shit cunts'. No entreaties would overcome Noel's innate luddite disgust for e-mail, and it was getting late, so Noel left it for another day.

'Early to bed and early to rise,' thought Noel as he rose and pulled his nightcap from his clear head, 'means Noel Gallagher is fookin' wise.' Although the forecast had been fair, parting the curtains revealed the day to be stormy.

'It never rains but it pours'. He began to sing: "I'm getting outside early doors."

After a breakfast consisting of tea and the outside of a Warburton's loaf, rendered palatable by the dregs of a pot of raspberry marmalade, Noel abandoned his plan to visit town and instead retrieved Mojo from the day room. It was a Bob Dylan special this week.

"Dylan," he murmured, returning to his chambers.

Noel turned off the fridge. He listened. It was still there, that noise. He tried to hum along to it. To understand it. What was a noise? Who was a noise? No, that was poof's talk, it was probably the telly. He began walking down the hall to the living room, then stopped. He went back to the kitchen and rolled up the culture section of the Sunday Times. The noise was there alright, in the telly room, lording it. He burst into the room, but the telly was plugged out already. Noel stopped and cupped his ears, in the background he could still hear it, it didn't sound like anything at all, it was a bit like the noise you get in a church with nobody in it, that bloody mmmm.

He collapsed into the couch. "Fuck it," he said out loud. The doorbell rang sharply several times. Noel paused. "We don't have a doorbell," he thought. It would be the man in the purple coat, Noel said to himself, smiling. Here for his nightly pound of flesh no doubt.

― I see what this is (Local Garda), Friday, 5 November 2010 18:16 (3 days ago)

a+

Noel took a deep breath and looked back down at the picture. This time. Theis time he could get it. 'They look like… they look like a bunch of… students'. No. That wasn't it, Noel, that still wasn't it. They didn't look like teachers, or students, or Australian barmen, or men from the Boden catalogue (Christ, he couldn't even say that, why did he think that?) or postmen or cooks. Tramps wasn't good enough. Hippies wasn't good enough.

He didn't have it any more. He did not know what he would say if were asked about them. 'What do you think about Mumford and Sons, Noel?', 'I don't know they look a bit like tramps, student tramps, folk singer student tramps'. Pathetic. Witless. Pathetic.

He'd thought of something about Walter the Softie getting kicked out of Belle and Sebastian, but what use was that? Who cared about them now?

He pushed his face down into the NME. He did not recognise the smell. What did the NME smell like in his youth? Different from this. Had that smell faded from all original 1987 NMEs? Did it exist anywhere still? Was there a smell, or was he getting confused? He had money, but was not sure whether he could buy that smell, or even if it existed.

Like tinkers? Was that racist?

fantastic

who is the US Noel Gallagher I wonder

http://i54.tinypic.com/11l4yvn.gif

johnny depp?

or am i getting banned

apparently, now we can all say Romo without getting imageblipped, we cannot say Chaki now.

adam sandler

What did the NME smell like in his youth

mel gibson

the NME never smelled like mel gibson.

mel glibson tho.

It was a parallel universe. The time, between lunch and tea. Noel had finished his morning's compositions and was treating himself to hot buttered crumpets. He ate his crumpets with the rich satisfaction of a composer who is highly respected by society, and has reached an age where he may revel in his plumpness and state of wealth. Also, the lower part of Noel's body was that of a small frog. Aside from that though, Noel was quite content. Just then, however, Noel came to a stunning realization: his top half was also that of a small frog. Such, such were the days.

who is the US Noel Gallagher I wonder

― BIG MUFFIN (gbx), Monday, November 8, 2010 11:19 AM

Scott Stapp solo debut!

Former Creation label boss Alan McGee says Oasis will reform "in four or five years".

http://www.bbc.co.uk/6music/news/20101109_mcgee2.shtml

Noel awoke with a start, what the fuck were that on his jeans? "What the fuck were that on my jeans," he shouted angrily. Nobody answered. "Fuck off then," he roared, hearing his voice echo around the house. Noel 1 Silence 0 he chanted in his head. He had nodded off after a second pot noodle, and it was only fucking Tuesday. What was he, a fucking nonce. The seat and his jeans was soaked through with urine. "Fuck" thought Noel. He looked at the phone. It had been weeks.

He scrabbled around in his pockets. Where was it? There it was, an old fag packet with some phone numbers on it. He dialled one. "Hello could I speak to Bonehead please?"

"What do you mean National Accident Helpline? This is Bonehead's number. I'll not stop calling it, it's Bonehead's house. What? No you've got it wrong mate, put bloody Bonehead on. Don't know who Bonehead is? Read your history books mate. Well tell him I called. I said TELL HIM I CALLED. 77 times in 3 days? Yeah cos he's never fucking in innit!" Noel laughed, who was Bonehead?? Who was this cunt?

"Fuck off cunt. Bonehead will explain everything to the police when he gets in. Like I told you last time. Piece of free advice mate, if you're going to answer Bonehead's phone you might want to find out who he is."

Noel replaced the receiver, furious now. Where the fuck were Bonehead? He'd given him his number when they met by chance at the train station back in 2006.

He dialled a second number, thinking of numbers the Beatles might have liked. 3, 7, great fucking numbers them. "Hello, could I speak to Liam please? Is there fuck no Liam there? Get him on."

The line went dead. Noel squelched deeper into the piss soaked couch. He'd have to clean it soon. But it were a struggle just to stay awake.

haha amazing that one

also, tracer you missed the most telling quote from that mcgee interview:

"The reason that guy is quiet is he knows what he's got up his sleeve."

reads like a retort to this thread!

'Waterman can keep his fookin' train sets', thought Noel. 'Probably sits there wearing a uniform and cap, blowing his whistle and looking a proper cunt'. As for that wanker Liam, well if he was happy knitting scarves and sewing buttons onto anoraks, like a woman, then it just showed how little he understood then concept of having a real hobby.

Noel held the bunch of threads firmly but gently; one false move now and the whole thing would be ruined. He pulled with a delicate motion, eyes fixed on the tiny bundles of cloth and wood. For long agonising moments it looked as though nothing was going to happen, but finally, gloriously, the components separated and stood true: masts, rigging and sails, perfect in every detail. Noel's eyes prickled with tears as he looked at the 1:300 scale model of HMS Bellerophon, sealed now forever in a decorative glass bottle. He could almost hear the shouts of the crew, and fancied that he saw the miniature sails filling with a stiff southwesterly.

"Heh heh", he exclaimed aloud. "First fooking time and all!"

The Glass Waste wheelie bin swung noisily into the rear of the refuse lorry, whining hydraulics accompanied by a cacophony of breaking glass as it disgorged its laden contents into the crushing mechanism. Whilst this took place, a bin man busied himself placing a large notification sticker onto the top of a General Waste wheelie bin which had the letters "SH" painted on the side in crude letters. This bin wasn't getting emptied today, not when it looked like the contents were a mixture of empty ready-meal cartons and dozens of clear glass bottles, with broken wood and rags stuffed inside. Belsize Park had very clear bye-laws on recycling and there was no way this was going in, not on his watch.

Noel opened the CD case, "why were they so fucking hard to open these days, bloody student art cunts," and placed the CD in his stereo. Had he gone deaf, or did every bloody CD just sound like he hadn't pressed play. He looked at the remote control and pressed the large button labelled "PLAY/PAUSE". The timer stopped on the player. Could he hear more than he heard before?

"It were louder a minute ago," he said. Did he think that or say it, he wondered aloud. Or did he wonder aloud? He phoned Bonehead, but found himself standing in the garden with a spade next to his ear. "A fucking spade," he thought. When was the last time I phoned Bonehead? He awoke with a start, he couldn't move his arms, was he in hospital? Of course not, he thought, nodding off.

He awoke once again, back in his lounge. What's that smell he said, but the sounds might have only come out in his head? He picked up the dictaphone on the table and studied it. It had recorded something the previous day. He pressed the button marked "PLAY".

"That were piss that. That were piss."

flawless

Noel answered the door. It was Liam again. "Oh fook," thought Noel.
Liam began to say, "Let's 'ave it lar--" when a great, booming voice from the sky said, "Enough!" and in a great puff of smoke Liam was turned into a pillar of sand about the size of a Frappuccino. Thusly did God make his presence known to Noel Gallagher.

the last local garda one is the best yet

"Joyeux Noël", God said to Noel.

"Stay...who goes there," Noel announced to the hallway, a foreboding general amongst the ranks of the many rooms of his house. His voice merely echoed back at him. Had he heard nothing at all? His head was filled with triumphant flutes, playing the most wondrous symphonies he had ever heard.

"What is this fucking nonce music, I can't shut it off," he thought, each word barely audible inside amongst the swooping brass tones filling his mind.

Then it happened again. Liam entered the king's court, the buttons on his fine jester's costume winking at Noel with delight. "Alright NOBHEAD," he chuckled, cartwheeling across the floor while a bawdy King Bonehead nodded his approval. Bloody nobheads.

"What the fuck is this shite," Noel wondered aloud. But it were too late, the guards had seen him. "Andy, Gem, how's it going lads," Noel offered, delighted to see his old friends. But the trumpets were sounding and it was time to lead Noel back to his cell.

He awoke again. He were back on the couch. The phone rang, "Noel it's Bonehead." "Ah Bonehead, mate, great to talk to you, I've been trying to call you for fucking weeks."

"Sorry mate I probably couldn't hear you. I'm King of England now and I've been learning the flute."

Noel was waiting in the anteroom of a TV studio smoking kreteks and rehearsing his contribution to 'I Love the 00s', a scathing aside about the lamentable 'new acoustic' movement, about how much he hated them and how they were all fucking cunts, when he considered that he didn't really want to be there, whereupon he fell into a catatonic stupour unresponsive to the fraught solictitude of the malnourished script girls and wished that he could just fucking die.

LG i hope you somehow incorporate these into yr new job.

god i wish i could get paid to write stupid shit

Is that the latest Noel epistle?

Noel's PA rushed upstairs to find him perched on a coffee table, screaming incoherently and fighting off a cane rat insurgency with a ceremonial katana he had recently bought on eBay. But the cane rats were nowhere to be found.

"Who's lived up to Oasis? What, since us?" Noel took the last miniature roll from the basket and tore at it to gain thinking time. "Nobody, that's who!" he exclaimed. The roll had something soft in it. A sultana he thought it was. Why would you want a sultana in a roll?

He pushed his spoon about in his soup. It was cold and thickened and he could trace dents in it, which slowly filled to become lines on the surface. This wasn't going anywhere. "The Libertines, they were pretty good," he conceded. "That singer though, he were a lightweight."

Two waiters shuffled noisily near his table. Noel shot them an angry look, but he'd turned his head too far round and everything lolled about for a moment. He turned back to the interviewer. It was a woman this time. He tried the exchange again and this time he said Razorlight but it sounded stupid. They tried again and this time he said The Libertines. That would do. The Libertines, they were alright. That sounded alright.

Every single time I see this thread, 'The Interior Life Of Noel Gardner: A Speculative History' is what I misread it as.

"I should have picked out Burnley. Bastard."

"I tell you what mate, fookin' right weird dreams I've had lately. Don't know if I'm even awake half the time. What's that about, eh? Tony?"

McCarroll just smiled enigmatically from across the kitchen table.

Noel remembered how that smile had always unnerved him. It was like he fookin' knew something. Actually, that was one of the reasons he'd sacked him in the end, wasn't it, although he'd never told the others that of course. He pretended to be reading a leaflet about patios that had come with the post. Couldn't be arsed much to read these days. Who had time for all that bollocks? Not him. When he looked up again the chair opposite was empty.

"Fookin' drummers," Noel muttered. "A good drummer is like a...like...um..." He shivered suddenly. What had he been thinking about? Kasabian, they were alright. "That's a proper band that is," he informed the empty kitchen. "Real songs."

Would've expected the margarita thing in the other direction. The pizzas more of a thing than the drink in the UK?

also had a good lol at both brother updates. top shelf.

This is such bullshit and it’s the same bullshit he’s been talking for ages. The music industry doesn’t give a shit if you’re on drugs and make it money. The music industry will *give* you those drugs. Harry Styles is a good pop star. Noel is increasingly boring. pic.twitter.com/95015t56ER

— Mic Wright (@brokenbottleboy) May 24, 2023