The year was 1995 and there was a war raging in Great Britain.
The feud between Blur and Oasis dubbed “The Battle of Britpop” was dividing the nation and British music flagship NME wrote, “Yes, in a week where news leaked that Saddam Hussein was preparing nuclear weapons, everyday folks were still getting slaughtered in Bosnia and Mike Tyson was making his comeback, tabloids and broadsheets alike went Britpop crazy.”
Sides had to be picked between the arty kids from the South and the proletarian brothers from the North, and many friendships broke apart.
Oasis’ Noel Gallagher wished Blur’s Damon Albarn would “get Aids and die” while Albarn is quoted saying “I can’t make up with Noel. Britpop would be over and heaven forbid that we’d ever admit we’d all grown up!”
And now, almost 20 years later, all these animosities seem to be forgotten and the hatchet buried.
Accompanied by Blur guitarist Graham Coxon and Paul Weller on drums, the former rivals performed Blur’s 1999 hit, Tender this week. It was all for a good cause, of course: Gallagher curated a series of concerts for the Teenage Cancer Trust at London’s Royal Albert Hall.
Although Albarn and Noel Gallagher seem to have finally grown up, there’s still one Britpopper who hasn’t gotten the message that the war is over. (Well, but that’s a different war – more Brothers in Arms than the great Battle of Britpop).
Liam Gallagher tweeted “Don’t know what’s worse RKID sipping champagne with a war criminal or them backing vocals you’ve just done for BLUE ! LG x” (and when he says BLUE he means BLUR).
It isn’t quite clear what he means, but NME speculates he’s referring to Noel attending a champagne reception at 10 Downing Street with then-Prime Minister Tony Blair at the height of ‘Cool Britannia’ in 1997.
But let’s be realistic, Liam Gallagher was all along the only one who took this war actually seriously.
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