Noel Gallagher On Oasis Being Asked to Play Maine Road & Knebworth Gigs in 1996

From theaters like the Apollo and the Town and  Country Club, we did one arena in Sheffield,   and then we went straight to stadiums... football  stadiums. I remember our promoters coming to me,   saying, "We're thinking of putting you lot on at  Maine Road." I asked, "Whereabouts?" They said,   "Well, on the pitch." I was like,  "Why?" They said, "It holds 60,000;   you'll sell it out. You'll do two nights."  It's a good job I've got a lot of trust   in these people and still do—like my  management and my promoter. So I'm like,   "Look, if you think we can do it, do  it." You know, we'd only signed off   about a year before we were walking out into  the football stadium that I'd grown up in. I mean, they were really,  really, really great gigs.   The Knebworth one was because it was the biggest,  but those Maine Road shows, that's it—that's what   Oasis was at that time. That's where I'd seen Pink  Floyd in '88, and I'd seen Guns N' Roses and The   Rolling Stones, and then I was playing there.  We were playing there. Do you know what I mean? Final preparations are being made for  the arrival of a quarter of a million   rock fans at Knebworth in Hertfordshire for  one of the biggest ever open-air concerts   in Britain. Two million people tried to get  tickets, many to see the band of the moment,   Oasis. Of course, the one thing that  no amount of hype can guarantee is the   weather. If it rains this weekend like it  did today, Hertfordshire could be treated   to the sight of a quarter of a million Oasis fans  completely drenched to their rock and roll bones. Meeting Oasis is a little like going to see the  Queen these days, except for all the swearing. Of   course, you don't get to stand anywhere near the  great star, let alone interview them. Instead,   the media just stand back and listen to their  words of wisdom. Today's photo call was to   publicize the two Oasis concerts this weekend at  Knebworth Park—the biggest music event in Britain   this decade. The figures speak for themselves: £5  million worth of tickets sold, 50 miles of cables   laid, and enough logistical problems to keep  everybody busy. We've got to get 125,000 people   into this greenfield site off the edge of the  A1 motorway, get them out again Saturday night,   back in again Sunday morning, and out again Sunday  night. And that is, um, a considerable difficulty. It's been spoken about, like, after this  gig, what are we going to do next? You   can't do anything but do the biggest gigs. So  we can't play anywhere bigger than this. I mean,   the only other thing would be to come back  and do a residency, playing every night of   the week from 8 to 11 or something like that.  But we're not going to do that. Fucking hell. They're quite an adjustment  to make because, like I say,   we went from theaters where we were all playing  close together, and then we walked out at Maine   Road. Bonehead would be in a different postcode;  Liam was over there somewhere. We were like,   "Why are we so far apart?" And that's the  adjustment you've got to make. Where you   were playing on a tiny small stage and your sound  is filling the room, you know, shaking the floor,   and then you're on a massive stage which in  itself is the size of a football pitch. You’ve   got monitors, and it's all posh, and you can hear  yourself for the first time, and you're like,   "Oh, fucking hell, how about that?" But we  powered through and did the best we could.

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