Northern Ireland

Noel Gallagher chats with Q Radio about new album and 'flirting' with Bono

Noel Gallagher
Noel Gallagher Noel Gallagher

OASIS mainman Noel Gallagher has chatted to Q Radio all about his new album and whether Bono is trying to flirt with him.

Appearing on the Alternative show with Olga Kaye, the singer (56) explained the meaning behind his latest solo effort, Council Skies, the fourth album with High Flying Birds.

“The title track Council Skies is a song about growing up on a council estate and trying to find young love and all that,” he said.

“I’d just like people, I mean they can take from it what they will, do you know what I mean?”

The record includes some A-list support, with a remix by The Cure frontman Robert Smith.

“Without being a pure fan, I’ve always been a fan of The Cure if that makes any sense. When I was doing the track pretty boy it sounded to sound like The Cure,” he said.

“And one night I was just thinking, well maybe I’ll get (Cure frontman) Robert Smith to remix it, I don’t even know if he does remixes.”

Included is a bonus track of a new recording of the 1994 Oasis classic, Live Forever.

“The original version of Live Forever, which is what 30-years-old next year, sounds like it was written by a young guy that has his life in front of him and this version that’s on the bonus disc for the new album sounds like it’s sung by an old guy whose kind of reflecting,” he said.

“It adds to the feel of the album I think.”

Asked about comments by U2 frontman Bono, that he was the greatest songwriter out of the UK since Paul McCartney, he said: “I think he’s flirting with me. I can tell you if he is, it’s working.”

This August, Gallagher is to play a huge outdoor concert at Dublin’s Royal Hospital Kilmainham.

“That gig in August with Happy Mondays and Primal Scream. If that gig had happened in the 90s it would have contained fatalities at some point,” he said.

“It’s a good job it was in a hospital.”

Last week, news emerged that Gallagher was ordered to pay a court over £1,000 for failing to tell police who was driving his Range Rover.

The singer, who does not drive, was also handed six penalty points for failing to give information relating to the identification of a driver.

His car was spotted by a camera doing 41mph on a 30mph road in West London last October.

In April, he had told the BBC he gave up learning to drive after being mobbed by fans during a lesson.

“I have had one driving lesson in the 90s and I was driving round a housing estate in Slough and she (the instructor) said to me, ‘if you just indicate and pull over here’ then I pulled over,” he said.

“She got out the car she said, ‘I’ll be back in a minute’, she came out with her mum, she drove me to her house.

“Then the local comprehensive bell went and they all came out.

“This is at the height of Oasis-mania and I was like never, never again.”