Noel Gallagher continued his UK and Ireland arena tour Wednesday night with a 90 minute performance at Dublin’s 3Arena. Ireland’s largest indoor music venue saw the singer-songwriter and his High Flying Birds play a string of songs from his two solo albums as well as some Oasis classics.
Arriving onstage at about 9pm, Gallagher opened with two tracks from his first solo album ‘Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds’. ‘(Stranded On) The Wrong Beach’ and, in particular, ‘Everybody’s on the Run’ injected energy into a crowd that had been relatively static during the Black Rivers support performance. He brought the mood back down with the first Oasis track of the night, a slow acoustic version of ‘Fade Away’. A nice touch during this song was a series of nostalgic photographs on the screens behind Noel and the band.
“What about you Dublin?” Gallagher says, addressing the audience for the first time. “I don’t say this many places but it’s truly great to be back. Thank you very much”.
Three tracks from new album ‘Chasing Yesterday’ followed as the band played ‘In the Heat of the Moment’, ‘Lock All the Doors’ and ‘Riverman’. One of the highlights of the night was when Noel, backed by a choir, invited the crowd to sing along to Oasis classic ‘Champagne Supernova’.
Last week on The Saturday Night Show we all got a good laugh at Kathryn Thomas’ expense and we were treated to some more Gallagher humour when an assistant attempted to hand Gallagher the wrong guitar before ‘The Dying Of The Light’. “You just can’t get the staff,” he laughed.
Noel later played back-to-back Oasis tracks – a rocking version of ‘Shout It Out Loud’ and ‘Digsy’s Dinner’ – before closing with his new album’s final track, ‘Ballad of a Mighty I’. But Gallagher had saved the best for last and re-emerged for a four track encore that blew the crowd away. In particular, ‘Don’t Look Back in Anger’ sparked another huge sing along with the crowd, with the vast majority of the seated fans brought to their feet.
‘AKA… What a Life!’ and Oasis anthem ‘The Masterplan’, backed by brass section and choir, closed a great show. Next up for the #NGHFBTour is a trip to Nottingham playing the Capital FM arena on March 6th.
Thank you Dublin, what a great 2nd night of the #NGHFBTour! See you soon Nottingham, Glasgow, Manchester, London… pic.twitter.com/dJv9wrXEJJ
— Noel Gallagher (@NoelGallagher) March 4, 2015
By Dónal Lucey