Shortly after 9pm on 23 May 2012, Liam Gallagher stood amid the crowd at Warrington’s 1,000-capacity Parr Hall, watching an adored 1990s North of England band stage a reunion few had believed would ever happen. “The Stone Roses getting back together. It’s all too much,” Gallagher confessed to filmmaker Shane Meadows, who was making a Channel 4 documentary about the return of the iconic “Madchester” quartet behind hits such as “She Bangs the Drums” and “Waterfall”. “They’re the best band to ever come out of Manchester.”
Oasis fans will know how he felt. Three years before the Roses got back together, the quintet Liam established with his older brother Noel in 1991 – for many, also the best band to ever come out of Manchester – had imploded following Noel’s abrupt departure. If Liam felt like a kid whose Christmases had come at once, imagine how Oasis fans responded when he and Noel announced last summer that they were patching up their differences and putting the group back together in 2025. Or, as Roses bassist Gary “Mani” Mounfield told Meadows as the original Roses lineup prepared to play their first date together since the early 1990s: “And so it begins. Bloody World War III.”
