ScottishNews.com

From a tiny music club on Glasgow’s St Vincent Street to playing to 300,000 fans at Celtic Park, Scotland can take credit for playing a major role in the Oasis story.

Noel and Liam Gallagher have often spoken of their affection for Scotland – though some might say quips about Lewis Capaldi and the nation being a third world country suggested otherwise.

But the Manchester band have never forgotten their big break came at King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, back in May 1993 – having blagged their way onto the stage.

Liam told me: “It’s all your fault that we got signed. Blame it on the Glaswegians.”

The band had scraped £25 each to fund the trip north after rehearsing alongside another band Sister Lovers at Manchester’s Boardwalk where one of the members promised the support slot in Glasgow.

Liam added: “They said they were going up to support some band – I think it might have been 18 Wheeler. Sister Lovers suggested we come up and see if we could get a gig, so we were like, ‘All right, cool’.

“We got a splitter van, jumped into it with a couple of mates and drove up to Scotland. We had a nice day.”

When staff at the venue took exception to the Adidas-clad Mancunian walking in with his gear, Liam wasn’t having it.

“As far as I can remember the geezer was going, ‘Who the f*** are you lot? You’re not going on’.

“I said, ‘We’re cool as f***’. There might have been a bit of an argument, but we weren’t there telling him we were going to give him a paper cut or anything like that.”

Oasis got their bottom-of-the-bill slot, but nobody was there to see them and only a handful of people watched their short set.

Among them was Glaswegian music manager Alan McGee who’d turned up early to meet his sister, Susan, and maybe get back with his ex-girlfriend, who was in Sister Lovers.

He’d downed a few double Jack Daniels by the time he witnessed Liam Gallagher’s swagger and listened to the Manchester band’s set – which comprised Rock ‘n’ Roll Star, Bring It On Down, Up in the Sky and a cover of the Beatles song I Am The Walrus.

Egged on by Susan to sign them, McGee famously cornered Liam’s brother Noel when they came offstage. He offered the band a deal with his Creation record label and the pair shook hands on it. 

Liam said: “He was there, but I had never even heard of Alan McGee. I’d never even heard of Creation Records, because none of my favourite bands were on the label.

“When we came backstage, some guy with ginger hair asked us if we wanted a record deal and we were like, why not? We went down to London and did the deal.”

Noel is more philosophical.

He said: “Fate is just a word to some people, but I understand it now. Alan McGee was meant to be in that club that night.

“The myth which says we threatened to smash up the club if they didn’t let us on just isn’t true.

“As anybody who’s ever met a Glasgow doorman will tell you you’re not smashing anything up in that town, particularly if you’re five skinny kids from Manchester, you’d get your head kicked in.”

In July 1994, Oasis returned to Scotland for the first T in The Park festival, held at Strathclyde Park and with an overall attendance of 17,000.

Again,the band were low down on the bill – in the tiny King Tut’s tent and sandwiched between Mike Peters and Greenock band Whiteout.

Within weeks, Definitely Maybe became the fastest selling debut album in British music history.

They played three Glasgow gigs that year, at the Tramway as support to the Boo Radleys, Cathouse club and Barrowland – as well as dates in Dundee and Edinburgh.

They also performed live at a Sony Music seminar at the prestigious Gleneagles Hotel, where Oasis recorded I Am The Walrus. It became the B-side to Cigarettes and Alcohol – billed as Live at the Cathouse.

Noel admitted: “We went up to do the Gleneagles Sony Seminar. It’s where all the suits get together and they roll on the new signings.

“We were doing the soundcheck and we did I Am The Walrus. There was no-one there, it was empty.

“That song was recorded at a soundcheck in Gleneagles and the crowd noise was taken from a Faces bootleg album because how would it look if you put ‘Live At Sony Seminar In Gleneagles’.

“We had a version from the Cathouse in Glasgow which sounded quite similar, but it was rubbish so we thought, ‘no-one’ll know’.

“It was [recorded in] an absolutely empty hall.”

12,000 Scots fans would catch Oasis at Irvine Beach on July 14 and 15, 1995.

Held under a 12,000-capacity marquee, songs included the first ever live performance of Roll With It.

Noel said: “I always have a good time up there. One of the best gigs of our whole thing was Irvine beach under the big top.

“The Barrowland was good but it’s a bitch of a gig. I was physically sick after that.”

Roll With It stormed to No.1 in the charts shortly after the Irvine beach shows, thanks largely to the ‘Battle of Britpop’ that had seen Oasis and Blur release their singles on the same day.

By 1996, Oasis were the biggest band in the UK and, according to the Gallaghers, the best band in the world.

Their second album, (What’s the Story) Morning Glory sold 350,000 copies in the first week alone.

Scotland got in on the act  with two massive outdoor shows, staged on the banks of Loch Lomond.

80,000 fans saw the two gigs at Balloch Country Park, including a handful of fans without tickets who swam across loch to see them.

Co-promoter Donald MacLeod called the first of the two shows, “probably the biggest, most significant gig Scotland’s ever put on”, while McGee insisted “Loch Lomond was a better gig from what I remember” than Knebworth.

33 years after that breakthrough gig at King Tut’s, Oasis remain one of the biggest bands on the planet.

Fittingly, they launch their latest world tour on Scottish soil, when Oasis Live ’27 kicks off at the Parkhead stadium in Glasgow on Friday, May 21.

Fans from around the world – those who have received a ‘sale code’ – will be able to log onto Ticketmaster to buy tickets from Friday and throughout the weekend for shows that will bring Noel and Liam Gallagher’s band back to the city where it all began.

As Noel put it: “Scottish audiences have always been great. Right from the beginning they were always up for it.”

The story of Oasis in Scotland will continue with the second instalment of this article tomorrow.