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June 2nd, 2005
Oasis - (Epic/Sony BMG)

Don't Believe the Truth
Jamie O'Meara

I'm tempted to toss this in the garbage so it can be with its own kind. With the exception of the Velvets-y album opener, Turn Up the Sun, the band manage to write just about everything except a memorable song. Cases in point: Mucky Fingers is a straight-up Velvet Underground rip-off; the hippie-ish single Lyla is just plain jarring; the vocals of Love Like a Bomb - as on a number of other tunes - are buried in the mix (perhaps in part to disguise the fact that the album is woefully bereft of melody); the Old West carny camp of The Importance of Being Idle doesn't fit well with my conception of the band that brought us Cigarettes and Alcohol, and that's only half the album. Don't Believe the Truth would be gold by any other B-rate band, but there's a higher expectation of Oasis, one that hasn't been met since 1995's (What's the Story) Morning Glory? Ten years and a handful of forgettable albums later, maybe it's time to lower the bar.


	Write your review of this record !

A self-encapsulated reality

Oasis exists in a self-encapsulated reality. Some would call it ego, others celebrity. I call it the UK.

How else would you explain the ability of a band to put out the same, redundant riff-rock album after album and still consider themselves, and be considered by their fans and critics, 'important?' We are approaching the locus of Oasis in an entirely wrong manner. Oasis are not important because they play music. It can hardly be said that what they do is playing music to begin with so much as being an Oasis cover band. Oasis are important because they are Oasis and because they are from the UK and because they know these two things.

Pick up any UK magazine. It's calling Coldplay, or Radiohead, or the Doves, or the Coral, or Badly Drawn Boy, the inheritor or a musical tradition started by Dylan. They are saying that these bands are curing cancer. They are saying that these bands are the biggest band in the world, a singular proclamation simultaneously contradicted by the fact that they will not be on the cover the next month. It doesn't make sense, but it starts to explain why Oasis is still around, how they get their albums into stores, and why we review them (and why I comment on it).

Remember when Oasis and Blur were having a 'feud' and one of the Gallaghers, I can't remember which, said he wished Damon Alburn would get AIDS and die? It was an unforgivable statement by our standards, and a master stroke by the standards of the UK music press. Immediately Oasis were submitted to the levels of scrutiny and hyperbole that we only really see here when we're in the supermarket check-out and reading the National Enquirer.

Is this album any good? Probably not. Does it matter? Not a whit. Oasis are the royalty of the music world - fretted over, analysed, obsessed about, given endless credibility and legitimacy, and totally, wholly useless.

Natalie Linklater

{24 votes}

June 3rd, 2005

Oasis

I got to see Oasis a few years back and really enjoyed them in concert. I know there has been a lot of controversy about them but you do have to admit, that the two brothers are quite talented. It makes me laugh when I see them playing their music and then the lead singer is just standing there staring into space for i dont know how long. He is weird but does have good songwriting abilities. i really like their kind of music.

Louise Lacroix

March 13th, 2007

Oasis falls flat with this record

Oasis use to be one of the best bands in the world but when the new decade hit they had trouble writing hit songs like what was on their first three records that were excellent to listen to. The album "Don't Believe the Truth" does not even have one hit single on the whole record. I wish that Liam and Noel Gallagher would stop taking drugs and drinking all the time and start getting serious about there music because this record was very poorly done. Only true hardcore fans should buy this record because it offers the same old stuff.

Carmela Sicurella

November 7th, 2006

Split up, Please!!!!!

This album is more of the same crap that they have been producing since "Be Here Now"

Just too many rip offs/the album sounds like a collection of other bands greatest hits/from the Beatles(its actually embarrassing at this point)The Stranglers,The Rolling Stones,The Kinks and The Velvet Underground.

You never had the balls to move on and diversify Noel(yes we know you`ve shit loads of money,you`ve told us often enough with your two fingers raised high as if thats all that matters/and to you it obviously is)

With each release you are becoming everything you once despised, tired musicians producing mediocre music.

Hello Phil Collins..

Chris Lorimer

September 21st, 2006

The right review

This album is called Don't Beleive the truth. Everyone song on it sounds like it belongs in a movie. Every track will bring emotion out of you. The album is so much more intelligent than that of "definitely maybe" or "what's the story". The first 2 albums a band makes is to start a fan base. The following albums after that are made to keep your fanbase happy. I have been an Oasis fan since whats the story. I never even heard Definitely maybe until after what's the story morning glory. I would recommend this album to anyone at any age. I enjoy each album better than the next. Although I feel Oasis will never have the beautiful melodies of the beatles, such as "the long and winding road", or "ticket to ride". But they are doing it the same way they have been doing it the past 10 years, however they want. If everyone would stop putting Oasis albums under microscopes, and start putting their ears to the speaker. You might just get the same feelings you got when you listened to DM, or WTSMG.

Jacob Goforth

March 13th, 2006

Oasis - Sub-par Beatles!

In the past 11 years Oasis have released 5 original albums, an album of B-sides that is better than most bands "Greatest Hits" albums, and a double CD live album that truly shows the incredible atmosphere that surrounds Oasis wherever they go. This year, Oasis released their 6th original studio album and toured the UK and US on a scale that no other band of their era can even imagine selling out.

Personally, I've been rather disappointed with the new material from Oasis since "Be Here Now" - "Standing on the Shoulder's of Giants" wasn't really Oasis for me, it certainly wasn't the album that I was expecting anyway, and with the exception of one or two tracks, "Heathen Chemistry" just seemed like Oasis by numbers. However being the sucker for punishment that I am, I still hoped and expected "Don't Believe The Truth" to be the album of the year and the best thing since "Definitely Maybe". It's a hard act to follow, I admit. I guess the Gallagher brothers aren't capable of following it up from what the new album sounds like.

Some people have stated that the new CD is a rebirth of sorts - not quite. The same old, same old recycled and churned out at the expense of the fans. Don't they realize that you can never truly go back and live the glory days. Disappointing.

Angelo Antonio Vernucci

{1 vote}

September 21st, 2005

Re-Reheathen Chemistry

I'm a huge Oasis fan. I went to see their gig in their hometown Manchester on July 3rd, I'm that much of a fan. After going absolutely nowhere for about one hour trying to write this critic, I asked myself what I really like about Oasis? What I like the most about Oasis is the pure rock'n'roll feelings they're offering on songs like Live Forever, Rock'n'Roll Star, Cigarettes and Alcohol, Columbia, the list could go on. Blend it with great rock'n'roll explorations like Morning Glory, Supersonic, Gas Panic and some easy ballads like Champagne Supernova, The Masterplan and Songbird and you've got what I like about Oasis.

Does Don't believe the Truth contain those elements. The highlights of the album: Lyla and Turn up the Sun provide pure rock'n'roll moments. Nothing to compare with the songs on Definitely Maybe named above, but which band can claim to have done an album as good as Definitely Maybe? Rock explorations are provided on about every song especially on Love Like a Bomb, The Importance of Being Idle and Keep the Dream Alive. Let There Be Love is the ballad of the album. Not bad but I prefer Songbird.

It's funny because I read my critic of Heathen Chemistry and everything I wrote was what I wanted to write for this album. Once again, I'm bugged by the constant Beatles allusions because they don't even try to hide it anymore (A Bell Will Ring, Guess God Thinks I'm Abel). I also said the lads are at least trying. This album is definitely decent material, nothing to make me forget DM though.

True: Mucky Fingers uses the same beat as Velvet Underground I'm Waiting for the Man

True: Mucky Fingers takes a total different direction that I'm waiting for the Man

Jamie O'Meara points out this "rip-off" and give Oasis 2 stars. At the same time, he manages to give Get Born of Jet a decent 3.5 stars while all the songs are rip-off of ACDC or The Who and does not mention that Look What You've Done is a word for word, note for note rip-off of Beatles' Sexy Sadie.

Maxime Rousselle

July 25th, 2005

A triumph for Oasis

It's nice to see a band that is no longer content to rest on their laurels. The last 3 Oasis albums have been place holders, and even with occasional flashes of brilliance, they just weren't awesome albums. With Don't Believe The Truth, Oasis steps up their game, big time. I could easily pick 5 or 6 songs to be single material, no problem. Some standouts include Mucky Fingers, A Bell Will Ring, and a great duet with Liam and Noel Gallagher called Let There Be Love. The selection of songs are very diverse, and there's a nice split between Liam-sung, raw barn-burners, and more melodic, Noel-sung tunes. Don't believe the haters, this is the truth!

Justin Leduc

June 27th, 2005

Full circle

Oasis, popular british rock act, is back with its 6th studio album, entitled Don't Believe The Truth, as if the band was trying to send a message to the fans and the press about everything that's been said and/or written about them. What to say about this new LP from the Gallagher brothers ? The unbearable inseperables are now the only surviving members of the glory days lineup as Paul McGuigan, Paul «Bonehead» Arthurs and Alan White have all left.

Well, nothing out of the ordinary, if only that this is a new Oasis album, made in the same way as the one we've been used to for the past 3 studio efforts. The band is still capable of writing some decent rock n' roll tunes. Tracks like Turn Up The Sun, Lyla and Keep The Dream Alive automatically come to mind. However, since the huge hit of Morning Glory in 1995, the band has been incapable of putting out an album that is good in its entirety, accumulating too many bad songs on each CD. After a tremendous start with the first three songs, Noel goes into a (long) 5-song acoustic set. If this sucession gives us good moments (Love Like A Bomb, Part Of The Queue), it also bring us some duds (The Meaning Of Soul, for example) on some occasions. And if the band always used The Beatles as a source of inspiration, never this admiration had reached blown out proportions except for on Heathen Chemistry. Well folks, you could swear that The Importance Of Being Idle and Let There Be Love were on Abbey Road. Not bad songs, especially the former, but that really do leave a bad taste in your mouth that prevents you from totally being hooked.

To sum it up, this Don't Believe The Truth is a fair opus, no more. Another frustrating record for the Leeds quartet that frankly, gives us more and more the impression that they will one day be able to compose a sequel worthy of Definitely Maybe or Morning Glory.

Sebastien Behnan

June 14th, 2005

Oasis rises above the trashed critic

What is with critic's (like Jamie O'Meara) and their hanging on statements such as "there's a higher expectation of oasis". You know what, NO there isn't, 'Definately Maybe' was 'Definately Maybe', the new album was titled ''Don't Believe the Truth' because it is a new album and not ''Definately Maybe'. That album was made over ten years ago, let it go already. The best bands are the ones that progress and don't copy the same sounds as their previous works. Why do you want a carbon copy of 'What's the Story (Morning Glory)' when you can just go listen to that album if you want to hear it. The band is rather testing their limits, including all band members in the writing and stretching out to see where they can take themselves as musicians. They don't truly care for pleasing the general public, by creating another "Wonderwall" because that would be going backwards.

Personally, I'm glad critics words mean nothing in the end, and what is really of true value is the longevity and success of a band. Say all you want about where this band has been for the last ten years, the important part is they 'have been', and they're still selling out Madison Square Gardens in under an hour, they're still headlining Glastonbury, they're still writing incredible songs that musicians such as Chris Martin are dubbing them tops for ('Songbird'). As for the new album, I have read countless reviews and not two of them have picked the same particular favorite songs off the album as being the same, which to me says that there is much to read into in this LP. The only question I have left to pose is, what will be the next single off 'Don't Believe The Truth'?... there's so many hits to choose from!!

Aaron Smith

{29 votes}

June 3rd, 2005

Don't Believe The Critic

I want to hate Oasis. I seriously do. Two friggin' brothers constantly fighting and stating they're the greatest band in the world. Although the latter is no longer true the fact remains that Noel Gallagher knows how to write a good song. The album is filled with great moments: Lyla is one of those gulity pleasures that will leave you humming the song for hours, Mucky Fingers is a definite standout to be a future single with a straight -on onslaught of Noel-inspired guitar riffs while Let There Be Love is a hope-filled song that will please any Oasis fan.

I seriously doubt Oasis will gain new fans with this album as it seems not too in-synch with what's popular today but it's quality music nevertheless. This may be the halo effect from the mid-nineties era where they dominated the rock world with one of the best rock albums ever in Definitely Maybe and mega bomb (What's The Story) Morning Glory. Be Here Now was a disaster but I liked the last two albums and this one will complement the discography well. Here's two fingers raised upwards for you Liam!

Ronny Pangia

{20 votes}

June 2nd, 2005

They Used To Be Good

Oasis use to be one of my favourite bands but in the last couple of years they have not been that good because there last two albums was really bad. I actually watched Oasis perform live in 2002 at the Bell Centre and it was a cool show. As for the album "Don't Believe the Truth" Oasis do the same thing and always repeat their music and tries nothing new and different. I believe that the fighting Oasis brother need to patch up and get to writing good music again because this latest album by them is terrible and there is not one hit single.

Gerry Samson

June 25th, 2006

Boring record

Only heard some parts

The album seems uninspired.

Nothing that caught my ear.

Better to get Coldplay's X & Y instead

Ming Wu

June 7th, 2005

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