OASIS: Writing & Recording Wonderwall

Join James Hargreaves to look behind the scenes at how Wonderwall was written, arranged, and recorded, and at which studio tracks the band laid down to create the sound of their biggest ever hit.
Check out the Album Sleeve Notes podcast here - open.spotify.c...
Check out the Oasis Podcast here - open.spotify.c...
EDIT - I accidentally put 'Acoustic Lead Guitar' instead of 'Electric Lead Guitar' for track 8 at 15:20. Oops.
Many images and videos in my KZbin content have been found online without any attribution or credit available. In many cases I have therefore not been able to add a credit in the videos themselves due to lack of information. If your image or video has been used and a credit is required, please email me with your details and evidence of authorship and a credit will be added into the video description.
Many thanks, JH.

[@c00p80]

Wow! Direct tweet from Bonehead himself! “We’re not worthy! We’re not worthy!” 🤣 Loving these vids James, from an old oasis fan who’s new to guitar, I’m hearing the songs on a whole new level and these track breakdowns make it all the more inspiring. Nice one fella! 👍

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Cheers Ben! Hahaha yeah was awesome. Even though he was telling me I got something wrong lol I just had a conversation with a member of Oasis! (ticks bucket list)

[@tieukhavu8832]

@@JamesHargreavesGuitar According to Wikipedia, Noel did Acoustic and Electric Rhythm Guitars / Bass Guitar and a Piano solo at the end

[@goops1071]

Love that Mellotron sound, as well as the piano outro. Really adds to the recording and makes the song sound even more special I find

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Yeah I agree. I especially like that mad long high mellotron note at the end. Sounds kind of spooky but cool

[@gdkey8025]

Piano was my favoutite part, until i heard thre cure's disentigration, and it's off one of the instrumentals...

[@WayneCatlin]

James Hargreaves makes the best content on KZbin, I'm quite happy to fight anyone who disagrees!!

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

BOOM! Thanks Wayne! 🍻🍻🍻

[@thelessworld]

Your channel is a treasure for Oasis fans, thank you for the great work! :)

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

My pleasure!

[@OperationBlueprint]

I believe that when Noel says "He wrote it in 5 minutes" he isn't necessarily incorrect. He generally sees the song as the chords/melody, hence the clip of him demonstrating the chord progression in the interview was probably what he really means by 'I wrote the song in 5 minutes'. He's said on multiple occasions the words only serve the melody. He may have finalised the lyrics on the train to be fair, which is why the final version was only played at Rockfield. Because he'd already played the lads a version on the tour bus :)

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Ah, interesting! You could be right

[@mryouvegottarollwithit4188]

Great video as usual. Staggering to hear the speed at which this was recorded. As a drummer myself, Whitey putting this down in around 30 minutes, with no prior knowledge of the song, is absolutely ridiculous.

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Yeah he's a hell of a player. I have it in my head he was already a session drummer? Not 100% sure on that one though.

[@TheGalwayFarmer]

@@JamesHargreavesGuitar his brother Steve isn't too bad either!

[@neil7994]

Owen Morris, James - that would be another beauty of an interview to get, mate!

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

I would REALLY love to actually get him on board to produce a future recording. One day!

[@neil7994]

@@JamesHargreavesGuitar Your channel is blowing up, mate. Anything is possible. You deserve all the success!

[@MrSit87]

the acoustic lead adds so much to the song and is so fun to play!

[@btherr]

I cannot believe how many years I've now been loving this song and the album it comes from. Really cool getting a look into all these layers. Really looking forward to seeing what else your channel has to offer.

[@aarphotos5]

I love that the ‘Wishing Stone’ actually ended up resulting in their biggest hit

[@casualtictac4130]

Amazing as always mate. keep up the good work

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Thanks for that! More to come as always :)

[@cassioscopelduraczenski3932]

I'm being very repetitive here in your channel, James, saying your contentes are great. But they really are! I bet there are hundreds or thousands Oasis fans here, just like me, delighted to watch you going back and researching and telling the tales on this behind the scenes stuff and audio tracks from the golden era of britpop! Thank you again! About the bare chords acoustic track, I still wondering: is it really Noel? I saw the Bonehead tweet and I'm not an expert musician, but it doesn't sound like Noel playing style to me.

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Hey CSD - thanks so much! Glad you are enjoying it Re the Bonehead tracks... I honestly don't know. It doesn't sound very precise, and when you compare it to Noels almost surgically accurate rhythm guitar, it sounds much more like Bonehead to me. But... I don't know. Noel was on drugs, Bonehead was mostly drunk, so it doesn't surprise me no-one can remember clearly hahaha

[@ticianoofficial]

In my opinion Noel is good enough to emulate bonehead if he wants…

[@pablogc2008]

Amazing video. Congrats on the reply from Bonehead! Cheers from Argentina!

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Cheers pablogc2008!

[@benthompson9608]

Wonderwall is the same chords as Pink Floyds ‘Wish You We’re Here’, I am sure there is an interview from Noel last year admitting using the same chords. I think that explains the intro for Hello, quiet guitar first part of song just like Wish You were here. Another great video!

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Cheers Ben!

[@johnupdate]

I just started out playing guitar and had that same kind of eureka moment 😀

[@alexneill130]

17.30 I had no idea that was a mellotron! I always thought that it was one of Liam's backing vocals put through some kind of weird filter. The way it continues after the final chord fades away gives the song's closing moments an otherworldly quality.

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Yep! I wondered what that was for years too. Just a weirdly high cello note on the mellotron, probably played by Owen Morris (Bonehead played the lower root notes I think)

[@nbctheoffice]

Ditto! Great content as always, James.

[@Conklinboys]

These videos are great James.

[@betsybk11]

Love Liam at the end! Ty.

[@TheEves]

Great video, very interesting to hear the background behind this! Nice one. 👍🏻

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Thanks! Glad you enjoyed

[@johnlionmusic]

these deep-dive videos are gems!

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Thanks John, glad you enjoyed!

[@Ritchie80]

in a tear here ❤️ that wonderwall

[@tomclifford1951]

This is just fabulous. Indispensable. Fascinating. One of my favourite things ever. Thank you so much.

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

You're very welcome!

[@TheGalwayFarmer]

18:19 not sure the grand piano would have fitted in that corridor though!

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Yeah true!

[@Miamiborne1969]

Damn, this is fascinating, the background recording details. And Liam's vocals were absolutely top notch! Quality!

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Cheers David!

[@grahamsmith1978]

Im not saying they werent top notch but did he did say they used autotune on the track didnt he?

[@sergiophsify]

Great as usual James!! Keep them coming

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Thanks! Will do!

[@simontunnicliffe2107]

Has anyone else ever noticed that in the "there are many things that I would like to say to you but I don't know how" bit (the "but I don't know how" bit mainly) that it sounds similar to the bit in Strawberry Fields Forever that goes, "I mean it must be high or low-oh-oh!"? I immediately thought when first learning the guitar years ago that both these songs had (I thought quite unusual at the time as a beginner guitarist) an Em7 in them and my immediately thought was, Noel used that chord 'cause it's in Strawberry Fields Forever lol!

[@frederikderoeck2944]

That high mellotron is one of the more defining elements of how I perceived the track the first times I heard it as a kid, some time in the second half of the nineties.

[@キラキラくりくり頭]

I feel like this is maybe the only place anyone would care about this - I hung out with Owen Morris for a night. He was in Thailand because he was producing some tracks for Sek Loso (the Oasis of Thailand, Loso is low society abbreviated. They were the working class band who became the biggest rock band in the history of the country). By some a random sequence of events, I tagged along with the band for a while. And Owen was there. We all wanted some beers, I went and got some, and to stop people throwing bottles or cans... The beer was served in plastic bags with a straw. He found that hilarious. I chatted to him for a while about making Definitely Maybe and Morning Glory, telling him how that was THE soundtrack of my teens. He was really nice.

[@jordifox]

Another brilliant video James! 🙌🏻

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Cheers bud - hope the recording is going well

[@Holonomics]

As always a really fascinating video and nicely narrated.

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Thanks Simon! much appreciated

[@dani351]

As usual, great research and great video!

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Cheers Daniel! 🍻🍻🍻

[@richfromtheligerz4922]

Loves these videos James they are always great ❤️

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Thanks Rich! I feel like I now know more about Oasis than anyone should who was never actually in the band hahaha

[@waynedavidson8531]

Another great vid James. Must take you ages doing all the research

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Hi Wayne - thanks! Nah it's not too bad, thankfully there's already tons of Oasis info out there, so it's mostly just getting it all together into one place and putting it in the right order ha

[@Boleskinebeatz]

Great video and always fascinating to hear the isolated stems. Surprised to hear Owen Morris blithely say he used Autotune on WTSMG and on Definitely Maybe as would have though that would create more of a stir than it has?!

[@RichRobinson]

I was thrown by that statement as I thought WTSMG was done on 2” tape. In 1995, it was a solid 2 years prior to auto-tune. That said, there was a lesser known technique where engineers would strap pitch/stereo/chorus units over a vocal track and manually crank a pitch control in real-time to adjust the vocal during a mix. I’d love to actually know what Owen was doing in more detail.

[@EthanDJC]

great video as always mate

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Cheers Ethan 🍻🍻🍻

[@tomskilling7216]

great video yet again. Keep it up!

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Cheers Tom, more to come :)

[@jandolezal9341]

Hi James, great video but do you think the lead part in the pre-chorus is the only electric guitar track in the whole song? I can definitely hear a rhythm distorted electric guitar track during the chorus.

[@rickyberry00]

James another great video 👍

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Thanks Ricky 👍👍👍

[@britman1966]

Great video, absolutely fascinating.

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Thanks britman! 👍👍👍🎸🎸🎸

[@jayquanvo5134]

Cool. A tweet from Bonehead himself. The only logical step would mean getting an interview with Bonehead himself!!! :)

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Ha! Would love that. Maybe one day!

[@uniwerksdesign]

Mega that Bonehead commented! Way to go mate, keep popping out these great videos that we love!,

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Thanks, will do!

[@garycorfield7312]

Great stuff . Keep the videos coming 👍

[@Nicolas-gt2dj]

You were 100% right about the second mellotron track being added later on, in the bass track you can hear the rest of the instruments through Noel’s headphones, and the second mellotron is not very clearly not there

[@teunputker]

These videos are my favourite! If u can make one for ‘I wanna be adored’ or more from the beatles, that would be awesome

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Hi TP - thanks for that! I did do one on the Beatles recently - kzbin.info/www/bejne/mYKZnGyZgaZkgdE

[@Emreyoutube100]

Really great channel. I admire your videos. Especially Don't look back in anger e bow video. Actually all videos are great. Hi from Turkey :)

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Thanks Jack! Hi back from England 🍻🍻🍻🍻

[@kenny75photography2]

Great video, James, really liked your analysis of the tracks and was good to hear that Bonehead insisted on playing the mellotrone on the song, even better he tweeted you! ;-) Just wondered if you would ever consider doing a breakdown of "D'you know what I mean?" as a video? There might be too many tracks on there to look at though with all the overdubs right enough lol.

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Hi Kenny - I would love to do some kind of analysis of any of the tracks from Be Here Now, it's just such a shame that there is so little out there in the way of demos, remixes, individual stems etc to actually establish what has been recorded. We only really have the recordings themselves, and that's it. Maybe in future if more resources become available?

[@davidwilcox5655]

Great vid as always , does anyone else think there’s some kind of auto tune on those long Liam notes or is it just my drunken ears ?

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Hahaha there is autotune on there (a primitive version of it), and I also stretched them out miles longer than they should be

[@fallenprincehouman1114]

The piano part is the soul!

[@themenace3145]

Another great video 👍👍

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Thanks Themenace314! Much appreciated

[@alanwarren4587]

I love these James brilliant 🤩😎👍🏻

[@christiaanzeelenberg1907]

Fantastic breakdown of the evolution of the song and easy recording of back in the 90s! One thing that strikes me is how different the first rhythm guitar sounds compared to the final mix. What are you thoughts on this? Perhaps the track was sonically changed during the mixing and mastering? To my ear the album version opens with a brighter and stronger midrange sounding guitar and clear strumming with a soft plectrum...

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Hi Christiaan - thanks! Re the acoustic guitar tone: good ear! I had to replace the rhythm guitar tracks with my own playing so as not to trigger KZbin's copyright filter, so the two isolated acoustic rhythm tracks are me playing in exact sync with the track

[@christiaanzeelenberg1907]

@@JamesHargreavesGuitar That makes sense, so we are hearing your Seagul instead of Noel's Takamine :) Anyhow, you did an excellent take on Noel rhythm part. (the strumming is so often either incorrectly copied, or an uninspired interpretation) Still wondering how they got that distinct guitar sound. Do you have any idea? Does the Takamine play a big role? Does it have pickup or was it miced? Or is it mostly the EQ?

[@nbctheoffice]

Who would have thought you’d one day get to play the original Wonderwall guitar!

[@MrCimryadeal]

I think track 13 is actually just a bit of delay from the lead vocals track. The 2nd time they switch it on a bit too early and you can hear some of '...ne that saves me'. And the length of the ending notes ('mayBE' 'saves ME') are a giveaway too as they perfectly match the length of those notes from the lead vocals track.

[@ludiekmagick]

It's interesting that the engineers (Nick and Anjali) always credit Guigs for playing more bass than Noel and Owen do. The tracking sheets for Definitely Maybe show Noel has claimed credit for more than he actually did on that album. Perhaps he was referring to the Batchelor sessions when he said he did all the bass and guitars. It seems likely he would have done any acoustic songs and anything else where timing errors would stand out more (he did Up In The Sky, for example). Although the change after the Sawmills sessions from tracking rhythm guitar, bass and drums live to Noel doing an acoustic guide probably made it easier for him to argue for recording other people's parts.

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Yeah it doesn't seem possible to get to an actual definitive answer on that question. Too many drugs involved at the time I expect haha

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Although my hunch is to believe Nick B

[@Seror125]

Great vid. Congratulations for your music release. Where do you get these isolated tracks ?

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Thanks Igor 🍻🍻 The isolated tracks were drawn from the Rock Band stems (which are all over youtube - just search for isolated vocals etc) and the Super Audio CD

[@lewisfirth6502]

Essential info , you can't have enough, of one of the worlds best loved songs, when it first came out I heard snippets on the radio and was blown away , then I heard all of it and likened it to a Beatles best of song, if u know what I mean, if someone told me they didn't like I instantly labeled them musically neanderthal tone-deafers and that included " musician's.

[@DrunkChimp]

Think you've got the caption wrong at 15:20. Should it be "Electric Lead Guitar", rather than "Acoustic"? Or maybe I'm misunderstanding it... Fantastic video again James! Really love these deep dives.

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Woooooooooops. Yep you're right. Ha. My bad

[@DrunkChimp]

@@JamesHargreavesGuitar Sorry if I came across as a pedantic arsehole! Really didn't mean it that way. I think you're ace mate!

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

@@DrunkChimp Lol not at all dude. All good 👍👍

[@DrunkChimp]

@@JamesHargreavesGuitar 👍

[@ducoh2093]

This was really interesting. I didnt know Noel put that much work into it. Also, the part he plays on the guitart at 3:30, you can here that melody being played in Argentina in 2001: kzbin.info/www/bejne/oHO9hqRjlMpqia8 That is one of my favorite live performances of wonderwall (after Knebworth, Wembley, Earls court), but he had already made it 6 years before that.

[@robwood8331]

Unbelievable how McGuigan had the audacity to say anything to Tony Mac.

[@UnrealGamer099]

This isn’t necessarily guitar related, but would you be able to do an episode on Noel Gallagher from a songwriting perspective lyrically? I loved your video on Oasis chord progressions but I always loved the vocal melodies Noel came up with, even if the lyrics are just there as a ‘musical instrument’ sometimes and don’t mean anything in particular.

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Hi Ansquez1 - interesting idea. Definitely a possibility for the future

[@daymobrown]

Plot twist, Nick recorded most of the Bass with bits by Noel and Guigs. lol. Bit disappointed there aren't any actual saws used in this.

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Hahahahaha yeah musical saws in wonderwall... would be interesting

[@daymobrown]

@@JamesHargreavesGuitar Joking aside, I did always think that the guys playing them in the vid were on the track. Assumed it was low in the mix with the cello/mello.

[@kenbolger1137]

hi mate another great video . really enjoyed this ,,have you got the original separate stems (13 track) I have heard a 5 track stems (backing / bass/cymbals /guitar/kick/snare /vocal ).if you have the full stems I would love hear them ,

[@betsybk11]

I am new here. But do you ever discuss Liam Gallagher?

[@pranavchaware]

Can you do a similar video on Bonehead's Bank Holiday !!!

[@neil7994]

Love that song.

[@pranavchaware]

@@neil7994 The song is technically simple & straightforward, but what I'm interested in is the funny story of the band members behind this song... who sung or played what part !!

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Interesting idea! Had alot of requests for that one. Might have to do it at some point...

[@rooneye]

8:10 Liam should be playing the fucking tambourine in the studio as well as live!

[@JohnWayne-bm1ty]

Hey man, to make this vids you need to have the tracks right? cos I was wandering about a vid like this about underneath the sky, but I think you said that there are no tracks of that song

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Hi JW - yeah there's no stems for Underneath The Sky. Wish there was! But unfortunately, loads of Oasis tunes have only ever been released in one format.

[@healore7892]

19:30 HOLY FUCK MY EYES ARE DYING WHY IS IT SO LOUD

[@ponzo1967]

Incredible drumming by Alan White RIP

[@ahappynigerian]

Alan White, the drummer for Oasis, is still alive lol. Alan White, the drummer for Yes, died last year though

[@rooneye]

Wonderwall is the BEST acoustic guitar riff ever man.

[@megistus9546]

Great vid! I've got to ask -- what did you use to separate the instruments from the mix?

[@TheGalwayFarmer]

Pretty sure Noel claimed to have written the Masterplan on a train too. Maybe he just means the lyrics?!!

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Hahahahaha it's probably never true... I bet he worked on them for months

[@indiekiduk]

10:30 It's strange to me the last bar of the bass line is AB AB A instead of starting on B the root note

[@Aspen_Chap]

listening to these tracks just made me realise that i underestimated liam as a singer

[@TheGalwayFarmer]

There are at least 3 more guitar tracks: A 3rd really sloppily played acoustic strumming the chords enters with the drums and bass A slightly crunchy electric strums the verses and the whole of the outro There is another picked part in the pre-chorus

[@kizza4911]

Love these mini documentaries you do for the songs James, so did bonehead not play guitar on any songs on the album, just the keys?

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Thanks Kizza! He definitely played on the electric guitar-driven tracks, Owen Morris says he usually laid down two rhythm guitar tracks on the electric tunes. I think he played piano on Dont Look Back In Anger too

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

@@kizza4911 It's a bloody pain the backside!!! I've tried telling them there is something wrong but they insist there isn't

[@indiekiduk]

19:32 why does "maybeee" last twice as long compared to the record?

[@jackwyllie3243]

Copyright reasons most probably

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Hahahahaha because I was farting around

[@davies010]

Did Owen Morris mention auto tune? I wasn’t aware auto tune existed in the 90s?

[@AgataDDDD]

Great

[@simontunnicliffe2107]

Noel wrote "Going Nowhere" on a train didn't he? or was that again, one of his roll off the tongue answers haha! he does sing, "going nowhere on a train" in it though which kind of backs up what I'm saying.

[@robwood8331]

So Liam WAS auto tuned according to Owen Morris

[@rooneye]

Wait...Liam was AUTO-TUNED?! Wow.

[@tpike32]

Here’s something I’ve been playing for a very long long time .. ( puts capo on and plays GCD) 😂😂 oh how original 🤣

[@Melosoulic]

That acoustic lead guitar can cure cancer

[@MrKeefelm]

Out of interest are any of the tracks doubled (then panned L&R)? If so do you count them as one track or two?

[@Yozhk]

What medium did they record on in the studio? On digital tape? Or still analogue?

[@matthewrider5906]

I always wondered why, take that #7 'lead acoustic & electric parts' track, why Noel would record parts that would NEVER be reproduced, at least til Gem joined up, live. Anyway...

[@robwood8331]

I'm sure Owen Morris and the Creation staff were told what not and what to say as truths..... as in the case of Tony Mac and other NDA stuff like everything surrounding the Real People

[@musicperson5090]

Is rockfield called rockfield as you rock in a field?

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Ha, I suspect it's something along the lines of 'Oh look I found a field containing rocks. I wonder what we should call it'

[@Dave2LA]

Where can I get the separated tracks?

[@julianxie101]

Has anyone ever told you that you look like Bonehead but using an instagram filter that gives him hair and good looks? Just kidding mate, great video as always. Love to nerd out about this stuff!

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Hahahahaha yeah I've been told I look like Bonehead a million times. Even more so during lockdown when I had to buzz my hair really short because the barbers were all closed!!!

[@pedro150.]

15:23 Electric*

[@johnupdate]

… and we all thought it‘s the gibson on wonderwall!

[@CircusNormal]

13 tracks? I doubt that mate. Just because you can pick out 13 audible parts doesn't mean there was 13 tracks in total. There was probably at least 10 bus tracks and also bear in mind everything is recorded in mono meaning everything apart from the main vox and keys was double tracked and hard panned lefy and right. Not to mention the drum bus which probably had about 15 tracks on it's own. You're easily looking at upwards of about 60 tracks. You wouldn't get any width otherwise.

[@john84896]

I luv zak starkey but Alan white is tops for me mate

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

Yeah, Alan White was the definitive Oasis drummer for me too

[@john84896]

@@JamesHargreavesGuitar And what’s even crazier is that as great as Allen White was behind the kit for Oasis…the fuckn Roses had a better drummer…how the Fuc do u do that(?! 😂)

[@gsw5503]

AW took oasis to another level - you should check out his insta, full of him doing old oasis tunes 👌

[@pauldavidson2415]

I love bonehead

[@JamesHargreavesGuitar]

He's a top bloke 👍👍

[@Axel-VR]

Morris is God

[@onufry_zagloba_s_pro_max_plus]

These Liam vocal's XD eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

[@neonamadeus2584]

Oasis using auto tune?? Nah, never!!!

[@johnupdate]

he might be not remembering it right, sinca autotune has been introduced in 1997 and wonderwall came out in 95. but you can clearly hear some edits or punch ins at 19:36, 19:39, 19:42 and a kind of loop from 19:48 on.

[@thesingingaccountant1]

Craxy to be bassist or ryhthm guitar in a band and not even play on the records! No wonder they left

[@robwood8331]

Wonderwall is one of the worst Oasis songs though imo and gets far too overplayed. Not bad for one of their worst songs though I guess!

[@pedropicasso4685]

Don’t look back in anger surpasses wonderwall james