Sadly, I didn’t get to see Oasis on their reunion tour last year so am left to just reflect on the half dozen concerts of theirs I did see back in the day with the most monumental one being 30 years ago when they played in front of 250,000 people at Knebworth across two nights.

Hot on the heels of Euro ’96 it really was a memorable summer and the music scene at that time was at an all-time high in my opinion. Knebworth was mainly about Oasis of course but it shouldn’t be forgotten how good the rest of the day’s line up was too with the likes of the Prodigy, Manic Street Preachers, the Charlatans, Cast, Ocean Colour Scene and the Chemical Brothers on the bill over the weekend of August 10-11.

My Knebworth tale began a few months earlier though when tickets went on sale on May 11th. By chance I was back at my parents’ house that weekend where they had a landline which could be used and at 9:00 am that day I constantly hit the redial button on 0800 614595 but was constantly met by the engaged tone as an estimated 4-5% of the UK population were also trying to get hold of tickets. After a while my mum regained control of her phone, hit redial multiple times and eventually struck gold.

The maximum four tickets were purchased despite only having two confirmed friends interested. I thought I could make a fortune selling the other one on the day! I also didn’t really know Knebworth was or how we’d get there but fortunately it was located close to my grandma’s place in Stevenage so my dad very kindly said he’d drive us there and back whilst he went to do some gardening and help out at his mum’s house.

My original ticket is stuck in a photo album from the time!

The gates opened at 12:00 but I’m sure we were there an hour or two before. It didn’t take too long to find people enquiring after tickets but I was shocked to find they were only offering £5. A bit further along the route another tout offered £10 and I realised with time running out that I would just have to bite the bullet and take the loss. It should be said that tickets at face value were just £22.50 but it was still a significant loss for me back then!

What a line up!

Noel Gallagher has mentioned many times in interviews that these Knebworth shows were a time when there were no mobile phones. Not quite as my friend Ben was ahead of the time and had one. That brick he had in his pocket all day did prove to be slightly useful in contacting my dad after the show.

The vast majority of attendees at last year’s comeback concerts wore Oasis merchandise but the number of people wearing such clothing was much less three decades ago. Even though I had an Oasis t-shirt from the previous summer in Duren (Germany) I wore the new Leicester shirt for some reason! I did buy a navy-blue Oasis Knebworth t-shirt for £10 (and a programme too) and I still have it to this day.

Old, worn-out & creased. The t-shirt too!!

The first support act on stage were the Bootleg Beatles which was perhaps ironic given the comparisons between Oasis and the proper four-piece from Liverpool. They were pretty good and got the crowd going especially with their rendition of ‘Hey Jude‘. The Chemical Brothers were next and a little out of place as their dance beats were too much for a mid-afternoon crowd.

Ocean Colour Scene picked things up with some hits but their set was top loaded a bit too much and perhaps they should have saved one or two of them for the end, The Manics are one of my favourite bands (and were back then) but the feeling was a bit different when they were the support act. They put on a great performance but people sadly didn’t seem to care too much! The last act before Oasis were the Prodigy who had the crowd bouncing round with a high energy set orchestrated by their front-man Keith Flint.

Melody Maker review from 1996

My friends Ian, Ben and I got about as good a spot as was possible without being a VIP and we basically stayed put for the whole day much to the frustration of Ben who needed to go to the toilet early doors but ended up holding it in for hours and hours. It’s something we still talk about when reminiscing about Knebworth. I can’t remember eating or drinking anything and don’t even recall taking anything to the festival!

Oasis came on stage and threw some massive inflatable footballs around, said “This is history”, sang the chorus of rival band Blur’s ‘Parklife‘ but cleverly changing the title to sh*te lives!! They then blasted out a string of hits and everyone sang along to every word almost drowning out Liam’s voice which really was at its peak during this era.

Oasis’ third album was on the horizon but at that point they had only released two albums but they also had a wealth of very good B-sides with five included in the set along with two new songs. The strings and harmonica added to the likes of ‘Whatever‘ and ‘Cast No Shadow‘ were beautifully epic and as the fireworks brought the night to a conclusion, we left the site and headed back to the area where we’d been dropped off that morning.

This is history!

There was just enough juice left in Ben’s mobile to call my grandma’s house and my dad then left to pick us up. It certainly wasn’t easy to find each other in the dark but after a while we somehow prevailed which I still find quite unbelievable. No doubt we all fell asleep whilst our chauffeur drove us the 70 miles home. We got back in the early hours of the morning but that wasn’t quite the end of my Knebworth experience.

Setlist: 1. The Swamp Song; 2. Columbia; 3. Acquiesce; 4. Supersonic; 5. Hello; 6. Some Might Say; 7. Roll with It; 8. Slide Away; 9. Morning Glory; 10. Round Are Way; 11. Cigarettes & Alcohol; 12. Whatever; 13. Cast No Shadow; 14. Wonderwall; 15. The Masterplan; 16. Don’t Look Back in Anger; 17. My Big Mouth; 18. It’s Gettin’ Better (Man!!); 19. Live Forever; 20. Champagne Supernova; 21. I Am the Walrus

The following night’s performance was broadcast live on BBC Radio One and I was ready with a couple of blank cassette tapes to record it all. They weren’t allowed to broadcast the two new songs so once ‘Don’t Look Back in Anger‘ had finished they played in the previous night’s final three songs.

With only 45 minutes on one side of a cassette, it was always a nervy time as you approached the 40-minute mark and had to decide whether to risk a song not being completed or quickly switch tapes. I changed tapes after ‘Cigarettes & Alcohol‘ and then later recorded the next 45 minutes on to the other side of the first part. Different times eh! The recording of that night’s show took pride in my collection for many years after that and replaced my memory of the Saturday performance until the DVD was released five years ago.

A few days later Melody Maker and NME came out and were essential purchases to see the review and photographs from the day back at a time when the internet had yet to really take off and become the beast that it is today.

Select magazine was the best monthly music publication of the 90s and that came out after that with two different covers featuring each of the Gallagher brothers. I only ever saw the Liam one though.

Inside the magazine was a much-cherished aerial shot poster which really shows the scale of it.

There is a lot of speculation that the band may play there again next year and if they do then one thing that is certain is that I’ll be banging on about having seen them originally play there back in 1996.

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