Oasis review: The band were great, the service was not
Ellen O'Donoghue
I was never supposed to go to Oasis. It was a fluke of the ages. I tried to get tickets when they were released, like most others in the country, but failed, also like most others in the country.
I knew they were gold dust, and had given up hope.
But when I woke up on Saturday morning, I had a text offering me a ticket. Lo and behold, my cousin could no longer go. Knowing I live in Dublin, she offered it to me.
And who was I to say no?
So, a few hours later, I was on my way to Croke Park. Who'd have thought, right? Not me.
Everyone was in great form. In the upper Cusack Tier it seemed to just be gangs of old school friends living out a fantasy.
The support was great. Richard Ashcroft from The Verve played a belter of a set, finishing off with Bittersweet Symphony, getting the crowd on their feet and setting the scene for the night ahead.
Because that's what the night was, a Bittersweet Symphony, truth be told.
Don't get me wrong, Oasis were great. There wasn't much talking between the brothers, but did anyone expect that. There was a brief embrace towards the end of the night before the encore. But it was clear to every one of the 80,000 in Croke Park on Saturday that the brothers, Liam and Noel, were happy to be back on stage, singing with each other, to a crowd that knew every word.
However, it must be said that at least on the upper levels, the bar service was less than ideal.
I didn't go to the concert to get drunk, but even getting a soft drink would have been difficult.
After Ashcroft finished, I, like most of the attendees, went to grab a drink before the main act. What I did not expect, however, was to be waiting an hour for said drink and missing the Gallagher brothers arrival onstage in Ireland for the first time since 2009, and subsequently miss the first three and a half songs.
Personally, I was okay with this, because it was pure chance that I got to be at the concert. But amongst the throngs queueing with me were people who paid several hundred if not thousands of euros for their tickets and who missed that opening moment.
One man behind me, when Morning Glory began, said, "Great, that's literally the reason I came to this gig."
There were no pints poured in advance until Oasis had taken to the stage. Anyone who has worked in a busy bar before knows that when it is busy, and when the demographic is mainly pint drinkers, the pints must be poured in advance, not to order. The people I spoke to in the queue for the bar said the same.
When the woman in front of me ordered her drink, the barman disappeared for seven or so minutes. She said it to the barman at the till beside us, and he served her instead. When the disappearing barman reappeared, he took my order, then gave drinks to the woman behind me and let her pay before I got my drinks. (She got beer, I got Smirnoff Ice, so no - it wasn't a mix-up.)
In short, it felt as though Croke Park could have been better prepared for the influx of people there. Hopefully, these teething issues will be ironed out before Sunday's gig.
Yet Croke Park is supposedly not a novice to hosting events. There should not be teething problems for a venue this long in the tooth.
Of course, this is not the fault of the Gallagher brothers. To be fair, they were great. Save for the people I met at the bar, everyone was just extremely happy to be there.
Men were videocalling their young daughters to let them hear the backing track to their parents' youth, while others were time-warped back to their teens. There were couples reliving their first dance songs live, transported back to sweaty discos in the late '90s. This was nostalgia writ large.
Roll With It was dedicated to those from Charlestown, Co Mayo, hometown of the Gallagher brothers' mother. On this night at least, Mayo were champions in Croke Park.
Oasis delivered, and even for those who spent exorbitant sums on tickets, they could not complain that they were ill-served. Unless they happened to want a drink.
An encore featuring The Masterplan, Don't Look Back in Anger, Wonderwall, and Champagne Supernova would have been enough to get this attendee to pay €500 for a ticket alone.
Don't Look Back in Anger, they said. And a Champagne Supernova it definitely was. Just don't try and order it from the bar.