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All Aboard To Tour Your Local Oasis














Some Might Say it’s been a long time coming.

But finally a music tour honouring and exploring the history of Manc music stars Oasis has been launched.

For £10-a-head, fans can be guided around landmarks in the life of Burnage’s most famous sons, Liam and Noel Gallagher. Sights on the two-and-a-half-hour tour include where the brothers went to school, where they first rehearsed together as a band and the record shop where they bought singles from.

The bus tour was the masterplan of Inspiral Carpets drummer Craig Gill who already runs a series of Manchester Music bus and walking tours alongside music expert Phill Gatenby revealing famous locations in the history of bands including Joy Division and The Smiths.

But Craig is more qualified than most to wax lyrical about Oasis - as he knew Noel from the days when he was then just a budding musician who ended up becoming the Inspirals’ roadie after failing to win a place as the band’s new singer.

The band, originally called The Rain, even re-named themselves Oasis after seeing the name on a poster of Inspiral Carpets’ tour venues.

Craig explains: "I first met Noel when he came up to me in the Hacienda and told me he was a fan of the Inspirals and gave me a cassette of him playing acoustic guitar. He was still working for the gas board back then.

"When our singer left in 1988, we asked him to come for an audition but we were after something really specific, so to break it gently to him we asked him to come and be our roadie, but he became more or less the sixth member of the band. But then he joined up with his brother and formed Oasis."

Craig gave a sneak preview of the tour, which will launch on June 6 ahead of the band’s huge Heaton Park gigs, but is available for private bookings before then.

The tour will take in sites including Cranwell Drive in Burnage, where the Gallaghers grew up, Fog Lane Park where they used to play football and shot early videos.

It also includes perhaps the most famous fan landmark - Sifters Record Shop on Fog Lane Burnage - where the lads used to buy singles, and credited in Oasis’s 1994 song Shakermaker with: "Mister Sifter sold me songs, When I was just 16."

Shop owner Peter Howard says he still regularly gets Oasis fans from across the world wanting a picture with the famous "Mr Sifter".

He said: "I remember the Gallagher lads used to come in the shop quite regularly. I read that they apparently pinched some singles from here, but I don’t remember that myself.

"I still get fans coming in - only yesterday a group of Japanese fans came in for photos."

The tour bus also stops off at the former Boardwalk nightclub on Little Peter Street in the city centre - where the fledging Oasis would rehearse seven nights a week, and where now a blue plaque commemorates the venue with the words: "Madchester venue, nightclub and rehearsal rooms".

Craig said he’s been surprised by how much interest there has already been in the tour. He said: "I put up some details on our website about the Oasis tour ahead of their Heaton Park gigs and there have been enquiries from across the world. I guess if people are coming all this way to watch the band play, they are interested to see where the lads grew up, where they played football, where they bought their records from too."

For information see manchestermusictours.com or myspace.com/mancmusictour.

Source: www.southmanchesterreporter.co.uk

Oasis' new single 'Falling Down' is available to download on March 8th and in stores March 9th, click here to pre-order the single.

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