Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds @ Open Air Theatre (Scarborough, UK) on July 06, 2018 [Photos & Show Review]

“I thought only fuckin’ Cockneys sang that song?” joked Noel Gallagher as a half-hearted “Football’s coming home!” chant broke out amongst the laddish crowd during a break in the music. It’s Friday night in Scarborough and Noel Gallagher is in town with his High Flying Birds and “the lads” have turned up en masse for this one.

With a back catalogue as impressive as the one Gallagher has, it would have been easy for the frontman to turn his live show into a tribute to his old band but, thankfully, that isn’t the case. Fans joyfully sing along to “Fort Knox”, “Holy Mountain”, “She Taught Me How To Fly” and more from Gallagher’s post Oasis career however, unsurprisingly, the biggest cheer from the night came when Gallagher asked “I’m guessing some of you have heard of Oasis?” before launching into “Little By Little”. “Half The World Away” was dedicated by Noel to “the Royle Family” while his renditions of “Wonderwall” and “Don’t Look Back In Anger” would have seen the roof raised off this venue had it had one.

Banter between the former Oasis frontman and his fans was at a maximum tonight with one particular moment seeing Gallagher joke to one fan who’d ask to be adopted that she should “get ready for your new gaff, my fuckin’ swimming pool is bigger than this place”. Ahead of England’s World Cup Quarter Final match with Sweden, Gallagher laughed “it’s a good job the gig isn’t tomorrow because none of you fuckers would be here” but, given that in twenty-four hours, England’s would be playing the biggest game of their careers, there wasn’t a better way than this to set fans up for the weekend.