‘Definitely Maybe’, from Oasis: an cover that is a declaration of intentions

Valencia. At this point in the century nobody is doubt that Noel and Liam Gallagher never housed doubts that they were destined for glory. In fact, that appetite, which always gave the feeling of being more than Carnaza to get headlines, is part of the fuel that has moved his work. The cover of his first album already reflected it, presenting a group that was enough to conquer the rock throne. Definitely Maybewhich this summer will turn 31, showed us an unknown group presenting themselves to the public with overwhelming confidence. A private world that was deployed in a photograph in which we are apparently not seeing anything special. In the composition, the figures of the band members are scattered in a capricious way in the room that serves as a set to the session; However, Oasis are showing us the rules of their game. Ten months before becoming a professional musician, Noel had already declared: “I can see myself acting with rock legends and when that happens, I will not feel out of place at all.” The cover of Definitely Maybe He confirms that vision with a simple appearance image that housed a very clear message: we have come to reign.

The British Brain Cannon is the author of today’s emblematic cover. At that time he was in charge of Microdot, a design agency founded in 1990 who struggled to make a name in pop music. His first clients were also the northern The Verve, who put themselves in Cannon’s hands to illustrate A Storm in Heaven (1993), his first album. The designer met Noel when he works as roadie For Inspiral Carpets, whose office management I was in the same Cannon study building. Gallagher told him that, when he had his own rock band, he would call him to make a cover. A few months later, one of Oasis’s first concerts invited Cannon and the designer was amazed. Once they signed for Creation, he was the first option when looking for a designer for Oasis albums. Noel was fascinated with the work he did for The Verve and, a while later, he would ask him to replicate the cobalt blue used in A Storm In Heaven For the single logo Live Forever. “I just wanted to make the best covers for the best groups of the moment,” said Cannon. That of Definitely Maybe It was the first step to achieve a status that would be enriched with other works for bands such as Ash, Suede, Super Furrty Animals and the incredible The Beta Band, of which he was also a manager.

Michael Spencer Jones, official Microdot photographer, was in charge of portraying the quintet. They chose to make the session in the Hall of the House of the then Guitar of the Group, Bonehead. The image inspiration was taken from the compilation back cover Oldies But Goldiesin which the beatles appear in a moment of distension during a tour of Japan. The objective was to show this debutant band in a similar state, in complete relaxation, as if they quietly await the moment in which the world will eat. Therefore, that globe placed on a side of the room is not there as a simple dare. No beginner group had chosen to present themselves in public that, but it is evident that Oasis never felt that they were beginners at all, so they posed in the Bonehead hall as if they were already a consecrated group. The composition of photography is either casual or fruit of improvisation. Spencer Jones spent four days testing frames and different compositions and possibilities with the help of Bonehead’s woman. Liam immediately liked one in which Jones appeared lying on the ground and chose to assume that position, becoming the central figure of the image. A star gathering even in the most anodine of the positions. That was also premonitory.

The snapshot in pastel tones transmits a misleading everyday life. The simplicity he exhibits is one of his main attractions. Within that static world in which Noel, sitting on a sofa, observes television while hugging their guitar, the fetishes send. He frame frozen on television is from spaghetti western The good, the ugly and the bad. The framed photographs belong to two turbulent legends of English football, George Best and Rodney Marsh. And in a corner, supported on the arm of the couch, a poster of Burt Bacharach. It is the only element that houses a failure. If the viewer is fixed, the key reflects the legs of the photographer tripod. Thanks to that little tribute, Bacharach became interested in meeting Noel and both would end up working together.

The cover of Definitely Maybe It is completed with the title of the calligraphy album and the group logo, which would consolidate them as a brand at a graphic level. Its design is a declared tribute to the original Decca, the company that published the Stones during the sixties and whose brand, as usual then, was part of the cover designs. And as for the photo, its concept may start from the Beatles, but it is undeniable that the intention is very similar to that which Dylan exhibited in the deck of Bringing It All Back Home, the album with which in 1965 his music electrified. On that cover, photographed by Daniel Kramer, Dylan looks at the camera, flanked by records and magazines, in a stage nothing pop, with an enigmatic woman dressed in red behind her. Trapped in a slightly psychedelic frame, he already showed a hieroglyph that, as of today, many still try to unravel. Dylan has never appeared among the idols of the Gallagher, but the cover of the debut of Oasis also used a series of private messages that only a legend of the stature of the Beatles, Dylan or the stones would have dared to exhibit. Definitely Maybe, or how to relive the art of transforming a cover into a declaration of intentions.