Former Oasis star Noel Gallagher has launched a stinging attack on modern music and today’s bands, stating that if you score a Number 1 single it “automatically means you must be s**t.”

In an interview with NME as part of a round table discussion alongside fellow artists La Roux, Sleaford Mods and Courtney Barnett, the 47 year old guitarist said “Every single song in the Top 10 is the same s**t with a different voice. If you’re number one in the charts now, it automatically means you must be s**t.”

Noel Gallagher
Noel Gallagher gave the modern music scene both barrels during a recent interview with the NME

When asked about the tendency of artists to avoid political and social commentary, he also claimed that “It's because they're s**t scared of social media! They're s**t scared of somebody killing it before it's started. One of the main differences for me is that bands these days are careerists.”

He also reckoned that if Oasis, who had enormous hits with ‘Wonderwall’ and ‘Don’t Look Back In Anger’ during the ‘90s, were to begin their career today they wouldn’t have the same impact. “Radio 1 judge you on how many f**king followers you’ve got on Facebook”, he said.

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Gallagher, whose post-Oasis supergroup Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds releases its second album Chasing Yesterday in March this year, is renowned for being outspoken about the state of the music scene at any given time. Back in December he told BBC Radio 4: “Music is very middle class. I'd have eaten Bastille alive in an afternoon in the Nineties, one interview, destroyed, gone, never to be heard of again.”

In other recent interviews, he has criticised Arctic Monkeys and Kasabian for not inspiring more working class bands, and has bemoaned the tendency for new artists to use teams of songwriters rather than rely on their own abilities. There’s something of the crotchety old man about Gallagher’s comments of late, but few have done more in the last twenty years to improve the visibility of British guitar music in general.

Since Oasis split in 2009, rumours have more or less continuously circulated that they will reform sooner rather than later, with some touting them for a money-spinning reunion tour and a headline spot at Glastonbury this year. Noel’s brother Liam’s post-Oasis group Beady Eye split up late last year, adding more weight to the rumours.

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