Standing on the Shoulder of Giants

History

The album's title was taken from the words made famous by Sir Isaac Newton:

If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.

Noel Gallagher saw the quote on the side of a £2 coin, first released to the public in 1998, while in a pub and liked it so much he thought it would be a suitable name for Oasis' new album. He then wrote the name on the side of a cigarette packet while drunk. When he awoke in the morning, he realised he had written "Standing on the Shoulder of Giants".

Due to the departure of Alan McGee and two original band members, Bonehead and Guigsy, while the album was still in production, their parts had to be re-recorded for legal reasons. Thus, the album only features the Gallagher brothers and Alan White, and the sleeve of the album also features them.

Noel decided to drop the equipment used in the three previous albums and instead buy "loads of really weird pedals, old guitars, and small amps", as the lack of deadline to deliver the album allowed Gallagher to "take quite a few days just messing around" and attempt new musical sonorities.

Album cover

The album's artwork features the photo of the Manhattan skyline taken from the rooftop of 500 5th Avenue (5th Ave/W 42nd St). Some famous buildings can be seen here, for example the Empire State Building is seen in front and the former World Trade Center is seen in the back. To create the cover photo, the photographer captured the same frame every half an hour in 18 hours during the whole day's course; the photos were digitally composited into the final picture. All of the singles released from this album contained artwork that was based on the album artwork; the shot used for "Go Let It Out" can be seen above one of the buildings at the front, which depicts five men playing football. This shot was taken from the roof of a football stadium, and the footballers from the car park were edited onto the rooftop on the final cover.

Reception

The album at first received generally mixed reviews from the media. It was a darker album possibly reflecting the times, or perhaps reflecting the loss of two original members. Noel has said, "Even though it wasn't our finest hour, it's a good album born through tough times. I worked harder on that album than anything before and anything since." Noel was forced to play nearly all the instruments on the album, with help of some additional musicians.

It was more warmly received when Q Magazine gave Standing on the Shoulder of Giants 4/5 stars and the B-side to "Go Let It Out", "Let's All Make Believe", was featured in Q's top 500 lost tracks and said that if "Let's All Make Believe" were on the album "it probably would have carried the album to another star." However, Q later included the record in their list of the 50 worst albums ever made.

Although it received lukewarm reviews from the music press, both Liam and Noel Gallagher have praised certain aspects of the record. During a radio interview with Gary Crowley in 2002 Liam said "Some people reckon the album is shit, but I think it's a great album ... it's just a bit different", whilst Noel Gallagher has stated that he regards "Go Let It Out" as "up there with some of the best things that I've done." He also stated in a 2005 interview with Rock Profiles that he thinks "Fuckin' in the Bushes," "Go Let It Out," "Gas Panic!," and "Where Did It All Go Wrong?" are "real pieces of music".

Standing on the Shoulder of Giants spent 29 weeks on the UK album chart, the fewest for any Oasis studio album. It was the ninth biggest selling album of 2000 in the UK.

Standing on the Shoulder of Giants debuted at #24 on the Billboard 200 in the US, selling about 55,000 units in its first week, but sales slumped its second week and fell to #84 with a 64% sales drop. The album received a huge sales hike following the VH1 airing of the group's Behind the Music in April 2000, jumping from #194 to #113 on the Billboard 200 the week following the episode's airing. In March 2000, the IFPI certififed Oasis for selling one million units of the album in Europe.

Eleven years after its release, Noel Gallagher said he regretted releasing the album, saying he was not feeling inspired as a composer, particularly for going off his drug addiction with prescription drugs, "which is fucking worse because they come from a doctor." This was partly a motivation to delegate the songwriting to the other bandmembers in later albums, as Noel considered "I'd slowed down as a writer and didn't feel like I could keep writing 20 songs every two years."

Track listing

All tracks written by Noel Gallagher, except where noted.

Personnel