Live Review: Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds - Festival No.6, Portmeirion ‘Gallagher gives Fest No.6 an epic finale featuring Paul Weller’
NOEL GALLAGHER’S
HIGH FLYING BIRDS
FESTIVAL NO.6, PORTMEIRION
[07/10/19]
Noel fought the rain and the mud but came out victorious as his epic set managed to unite everyone in the crowd into a frenzy, even more so when he bought out surprise guest Paul Weller….
★★★★★
Despite vast amounts of rain and mud over the weekend and during his closing set, Noel somehow managed to bring the whole crowd together and with a sense of both nostalgia and euphoria allowing everyone even for just a minute forget about the weather and just have fun with a massive grin on their faces.
This is Noel’s penultimate show of his 2 year World Tour supporting the High Flying Bird’s second album ‘Chasing Yesterday’, a tour which has stretched into well over 100 shows but it’s fair to say you couldn’t tell as both Noel and the band bring an energy and determination which would make you think it’s the first show all over again.
It also has to be said for a relatively young and small festival on the Welsh coast, Noel and the High Flying Bird’s are a massive booking, used to headlining large arenas and festivals like Latitude it’s nice to see him end the tour with some smaller show’s, it proves he can bring the intensity of a large show and be able to make it intimate and personal and that’s all down to his brilliant crowd interaction which we’ll touch on later.
The Oasis brothers have both taken rather different paths post-split, Liam has recently announced a solo album for release next year but only time will tell if it fares better than his underwhelming band Beady Eye, Noel’s efforts however resulted in two No.1 albums with the High Flying Birds with a sound not too unfamiliar to Oasis. These translate brilliantly live with a very wet and soggy crowd joyfully participating in anthemic singalong’s to the likes of “If I Had A Gun”, “The Death Of You and Me” and “Ballad Of The Mighty I”.
But of course it wouldn’t be a Gallagher gig without a fair few Oasis classics thrown in for good measure, these obviously received some of the best reception of the night, “Champagne Supernova” had strangers singing together in arms, a lovely welsh man grabbed me and we sang out loud and proud, it shows how much Oasis’s songs still mean to many people including myself who missed the chance to see them first time round, even the B sides scattered throughout the set bring loud sounds of applause, “Half The World Away” and “The Masterplan” particularly went down well.
Noel’s lighthearted sarcasm and killer wit was on show throughout the performance, if he wasn’t pretending to pose for phone ready fans then he was eagerly encouraging the loud rabble chanting his name, at one point he goes “Are we really fucking doing this?” as he looks on in awe at the large festival crowd football chanting his name to him between songs, with such a large career behind him it must be rare to see him genuinely surprised by such a passionate audience, despite some awful weather at points, I too have been in awe at the Welsh spirit and passion shown at Festival No.6.
What followed was the ultimate encore, fans were left waiting a little longer as a second mic stand was prepared, whispers in the crowd on who it could possibly be?, Noel remerged and said two words which sent the audience into a frenzy… “Paul Weller!”. He appeared from backstage and they broke into two The Jam classics starting with “Pretty Green” before finishing with the mad and crazy spectacle that was a crowd going berserk to “Town Called Malice”
If that wasn’t enough, Noel still had a couple more tracks to finish the night with, A final one-two of “Wonderwall” and “Don’t Look Back In Anger”, Carried by pure euphoria, Noel hardly had to utter a word as everyone sung along at the top of their voices, I’d be surprised if you couldn’t hear the crowd from the Valleys.
It was a perfect way to end a standout year for Festival No.6, despite the weather and the issues it caused, it has to be said the music was firmly on point, Noel proved that his new material can stand next to his classics, he brought the perfect setlist consisting of just the right mix of old and new and he even brought a very special guest in Mr. Weller but best of all he brought smiles to some very soggy faces!
Setlist:
Everybody's on the Run
Lock All the Doors
In the Heat of the Moment
The Death of You and Me
You Know We Can't Go Back
Champagne Supernova
Ballad of the Mighty I
Talk Tonight
D'Yer Wanna Be a Spaceman?
The Mexican
If I Had a Gun...
AKA... What a Life!
Half the World Away
The Masterplan
Encore:
Pretty Green (The Jam cover) (with Paul Weller)
Town Called Malice (The Jam cover) (with Paul Weller)
Wonderwall
Don't Look Back in Anger
All photo's featured in this article were provided courtesy of Festival No.6