Noel Gallagher has said he now almost gets “goosebumps” when he performs Oasis song Don’t Look Back In Anger, due to its relevance following the Manchester Arena bombing.
The track became a song of unity in the wake of the terror attack in May, after a crowd started spontaneously singing it at a memorial event, and Gallagher has shared his pride at how it has now become an “anthem for defiance” when the words of politicians “weren’t enough”.
Gallagher performed the hit song, originally released in 1996, to a crowd of thousands at the Manchester Arena when it reopened in September.
The rocker told Frank Skinner on Absolute Radio: “It was amazing how people rallied round that song in the days after that, it was quite a thing.
“I get asked about it a lot, and I have been doing it recently and it almost gives me goosebumps really, that in the days after that, politicians’ words weren’t enough.
“The comforting words from experts on the news weren’t enough. People rallied round a song, like old school.”
He added: “And the night I did it in Manchester, you’ve got these mixed emotions of – you live for these moments where what you’ve created has gone into people’s lives.
“So you’re there, and it’s for all the wrong reasons. So, that song is, without it being an extraordinary song, it’s an extraordinary thing, because for 20 years it was a song of no regrets, it’s about a girl who’s, maybe, was toasting her life passing her by, and now it’s become this anthem for defiance.”
Suicide bomber Salman Abedi detonated a device in the arena foyer killing 22 and injuring scores of others at the end of an Ariana Grande concert on May 22.
The full interview with Noel Gallagher will air on Absolute Radio at 8pm on Sunday November 26.
