When Noel sent one of the tracks Johnny features on, ‘Pretty Boy’, to Robert Smith for remix purposes, the cheeky get not only added his own guitar solo but also got his Cure bandmate Jason Cooper to supply the spacey drum track that he jams along to.
“He can be cheeky anytime he wants,” Noel deadpans. “What I didn’t know about Robert - and the reason he’s such a geezer – is that he’s a northerner. He was born in Blackpool and moved as a kid to Crawley so, yeah, he’s one of us."
“After we’d finished the track, my record label – who are ‘content, content, content!’ – were at me for another angle they could work and I thought, ‘‘Pretty Boy’ does sound a bit like The Cure; maybe we can get Robert Smith to do a remix?’ I wasn’t having it that Robert Smith was an Oasis fan or fucking anything like that, so I got someone to ask him, ‘Would you be receptive to receiving an email from Noel Gallagher?’ I was expecting an ‘Er, no, you’re alright…’ but word came back that he was, and eventually I sent him the track, which he loved.
“Fuck me, if I thought it sounded a bit like The Cure when I sent it to him, it sounded completely like The Cure when it came back!” Noel laughs. “When I said to him ‘Do whatever you want’, I didn’t expect it to include a whole new solo. It took a few plays before it dawned on me, ‘That’s Robert Smith playing guitar. That’s Johnny Marr playing guitar. That’s me playing guitar!’ It’s the collaboration you didn’t know you wanted – one of The Cure, one of The Smiths and one of Oasis!”
In the same way that Noel’s spent ten minutes gushing over Johnny Marr, the Gothfather spent a goodly part of his pre-Electric Picnic interview with Hot Press extolling the virtues of Philip Lynott.
“Robert’s into Lizzy? I didn’t know that. Johnny’s the same with Rory Gallagher. Yes, they’re these huge rock stars, but they’re also massive fucking fans who’ll talk to you for days about this singer and that band.
“I’d never met Robert, nor had I even seen The Cure until 2018 because every time they were on I’d arrive the day after. So, anyway, I caught ‘em at Roskilde and was blown away – the tunes are fucking undeniable. You don’t have to wear lipstick to be into them. Then I got to meet Robert and he’s a funny, funny man.”
