Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds Album.

Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds.

What an album! What an album! Noel Gallagher is back with vengeance to steal the limelight from Liam's little Beady Eye, and so far he's done a grand old job of it too. From the start of the album we get such a promise that this is going to be one of those albums, one of the greats up in history. 'Everybody's on the run' brings us in with a gothic church introduction which seems like a metaphor for the return of the God, our very own Avatar. Then this bloody strong vocal line comes in, in my opinion, the strongest Noel's voice has ever been and it carries on through the whole song, we even get to have delay on the vocal to have a second listen to the previous line just so that we can enjoy it even more! And that chorus! - Did anyone else feel like they had been shot in the gut?

'Dream on' is our second delight, though it's probably the weakest song on the album alongside 'Soldier boys and Jesus freaks' - now I only really say that because of how similar they are when the album differs so much in and out of genre's. I could feel myself saying "Noel, don't go back to where Oasis went wrong." Mind you it's the same with 'The Death of You and Me' which definitely echoes our old favourite 'The Importance of being Idle' - even my mam noticed that and she's the most unmusical person in the world. But I love 'Soldier Boys and Jesus Freaks', if the Kinks were a modern band I know they'd definitely have a track exactly the same as this on one of their albums, with, maybe, less metaphors.

Now for the biggie, for me, 'If I had a gun', how could I even describe it to you? The first time I heard any part of it, which I'm sure is the same for a lot of people, was the crappy recording of Noel in sound check of only a section - I never thought anything like this would come of it. The music, oh the music - it just uplifts you into such a good mood when really it's quite a melancholy tune - but I can tell it's going to be a crowd pleaser, one of those songs that no one could not belt out the chorus to. It's my favourite track from the album, mainly just because of the line 'My eyes have always followed you around the room' - what a beautiful sentiment. Everything else on the song is just a bonus for me, I love it.

We drift off into a 50's New Orleans feel of song when 'The Death of You and Me' makes an appearance, the instrumentation is so jazzy and effective that it does take you back in time. The horn/brass section has to be the highlight for me, it's the part I look most forward to hearing when I give it a listen and it's one of my most favourite sections of the whole album. I do love a bit of genre switching on an album.

We have two Oasis b-sides on here too, '(I wanna live in a dream in my) Record Machine' and 'Stop the Clocks' - most of us will have heard them before but, what Noel has done here is given them a new lease of life, almost like a second chance at being alive and breathing - and man can they breathe.

Aka... What a song! (how cheesy?). Yes 'Aka... What a life' - the heavy drums, the reversed intro, the piano riff - it's what makes it a classic upon classics, I'm still not understanding what Noel's obsessions with 'Aka' is - maybe he was just going through a stage, but, never the less, it's such a strong song, a musical explosion. There's one thing though, and I really hate bringing up Liam Gallagher in a post about Noel Gallagher but I do think the song would benefit from Liam's vocal, I really do.

I love the album, as you can probably tell by anything I've said on this post. It's one of the best albums to come out for a good few years, I've been waiting for a solo album from Noel for at least three/four years when rumours were swarming around - even though he was still in Oasis – and he has not disappointed me in anyway. The album is a lot freer than usual Oasis albums, you can tell that Noel enjoyed making this album just by the songs - he's definitely benefited from going solo.

... Does anyone know where the electric kettle appears yet?