After playing 41 raucous, sold-out stadium shows around the world with Oasis this year you could forgive guitarist Gem Archer for being a bit winded. “I still don’t know my ass from my elbow,” said Archer, who first joined the band in 1999 following the departure of founding guitarist Paul “Bonehead” Arthurs and performed with them until their break-up in 2009.
Speaking to Guitar World magazine, Archer said it’s now time to “decompress” after what he described as an overwhelming experience. “None of us expected it to get this kind of reaction. It’s kind of unprecedented that the feeling between us and the crowd was the same in every city. Every gig was just this joyous celebration,” said Archer about the rapturous response from crowds in every city, where streets were packed with bucket hat-wearing fans who lustily sang along to every song.
“At one gig, just before ‘Don’t Look Back in Anger,’ Noel said to the crowd, ‘Now you’re gonna feel what it’s like to be in the band,’ or something like that. And that’s what it was – 80,000 people in the band at that moment. That didn’t really hit us until maybe three gigs in,” Archer added.
Archer also weighed in on the tour’s famously rigid 23-song setlist, which did not deviate from show-to-show, despite fans having lots of ideas about which tunes should be added to the roster. The guitarist said he knew as soon as he saw the setlist that the tour would be mega, revealing that there actually were more songs in the mix before the tour kicked off.
“I couldn’t believe it. I was like, ‘Wow – and we haven’t even gotten to ‘Supersonic’ yet!,’” he remembered thinking. “It was just ridiculous from there. The boys had been sorting it out for ages. It got amended; we’d started with, I think, 27 songs, and it ended up being 23.” Though it didn’t happen, that was good news for diehards who are hoping for more shows in the future, including ones with a switched-up setlist. “Those songs, played in that order, are just unbeatable,” he said of the crowd-pleasing mix of huge hits and album tracks.
Archer also confirmed what the nightly brotherly hug seemed to show us, that the formerly battling Gallagher brothers “absolutely” enjoyed sharing the stage again. “They’d immediately start cracking each other up on the ramp while we were walking up,” he said. “It’s almost like they were just in each other’s ears and faces. But when the curtain opens it all changes; it becomes the show. But they’re brothers – and that’s tangible.”
One thing Archer did not do is answer the one question on everyone’s minds: when are the next shows? Singer Liam Gallagher has been playing a sometimes frustrating game of definitely, maybe with fans for the past few months, suggesting that he and brother guitarist/songwriter Noel are definitely going to play again, at some point, but probably not next year.
“It’s not just something you can flick on. We’ve all said we won’t know what this was ‘till next year. It really was a bit of a whirlwind,” Archer said while swatting away questions about what he knows about future plans. “I’d be up for more,” he added. “But right now, it’s only a couple of weeks since we were doing a gig in Brazil. I’ve got stuff laid all over the floor that’s from the tour. It’s still kind of like, ‘What just happened here?’”
Spokespeople for Oasis have not returned Billboard‘s repeated requests for comment on potential future tour dates.
Pressed again, the guitarist swore that he doesn’t “know anything about what’s coming up,” while leaving the door open just a crack. “It’s not my place to say. Anything could happen, which could include nothing,” he added. “If stuff was happening, I think I might already know about it. But Noel has said, ‘No rest for the immensely talented’ — so take that how you want!”
