The Courteeners frontman Liam Fray has admitted that he was “a pale imitation” of Liam Gallagher during the band’s early days.
As the Manchester band emerged in 2008 with their debut album ‘St Jude’, a number of commentators were quick to draw comparisons between the then-quartet and Oasis. However, those comparisons prompted a backlash from fans of the Britpop band following the release of that album.
Speaking about that time period in a new interview with The Independent, Fray opened up about how he “hated [The Courteeners’] ‘new Oasis’” tag and understood the backlash to those particular comparisons.
“I was never the new Liam Gallagher,” Fray admitted. “I was a pale imitation, but then it was never my intention to be an imitation at all.” Admitting that he may have been partly responsible for the comparisons, Fray said: “Oh, I tended to shout my mouth off, but who wouldn’t after seven pints on a Thursday night?”
The Courteeeners will play a huge homecoming show at Manchester’s Old Trafford cricket ground later this month. Speaking to NME ahead of the gig, Fray declared that fans shouldn’t expect “bells, whistles and spaceships” come the big day.
“That’s not our game,” he said. “We couldn’t walk around Manchester Arndale if we had spaceships coming out the roof. We’d get hammered for it. They wouldn’t serve us in the chippy if we started doing things like that.”