The Liverpool brothers who set Oasis on course for stardom

Tony and Chris Griffiths' band The Real People helped shape the Oasis sound

It was the early hours of the morning, but the bar of the Columbia hotel in London's Lancaster Gate was packed with musicians who were in the capital for gigs, or just hanging out at what had become the go-to haunt for artists and performers in the early 1990s.

Then, like a scene from a western, the noise gave way to a hush, then a near silence, and all eyes turned towards the door.

Ian Prowse, who at that time was in the signed Liverpool band Pele, was among the drinkers, and he too angled his gaze to see who or what had brought everything to a standstill.

"This guy had walked in, and there was just something about him, an aura, some sort of magic," he says.

Behind the enigmatic young man swaggering his way into the bar was Tony Griffiths, one of the two brothers who were the creative engine of the Liverpool band The Real People.

Prowse caught up with The Real People's bass player and singer and asked him who the guy was, and was told it was "his mate Liam".

At this point, the name Liam Gallagher meant little to most people, but to Tony Griffiths, he and his band were going to be "the biggest thing ever".

"This was a few months before they had anything out," says Prowse. "They were unknown. But he was able to just walk into a packed bar at four o'clock in the morning and turn heads."

Ian Prowse, left, in his early days with Pele

Liam Gallagher’s charisma had made an impression, but Prowse was yet to hear the fledgling band's sound. When he returned home to Liverpool, he asked his agent – whom his band shared with Oasis – to let him listen to something by this new group.

"He played me this track," he says, "and I just thought, 'Whatever we're doing, it's not this'. It just wasn't capturing the zeitgeist the way this was."

The recording he'd heard was Supersonic, which was written and recorded in one day in December 1993 at the Pink Museum Studio in Lark Lane, Liverpool, with The Real People's Tony Griffiths on backing vocals.

According to former Oasis drummer Tony McCarroll's 2010 book The Truth, Tony and his brother Chris were "integral" to the creation of the song, which would be released in April the following year to huge acclaim.

Oasis, which consisted of Noel and Liam Gallagher, McCarroll, Paul 'Bonehead' Arthurs and Paul 'Guigsy' McGuigan, were at that time as much a Liverpool band as a Manchester band, cutting their teeth at venues such as Le Bateau and The Krazy House, where they supported The Real People.

It was striking the relationship with The Real People that put Oasis on the road to stardom.

Liam Gallagher "had an aura, some kind of magic," says Ian Prowse

'Your kid's a star'

The Real People had been around since 1987, and by 1989 were signed to Columbia Records. Soon afterwards they sold 100,000 copies of their eponymous album, whose shuffling drums, overdriven guitars and Beatle-esque harmonies won them an international following.

By contrast, Liam Gallagher was still at school and Noel was yet to pen the soaring sentiments of Live Forever in the warehouse in which he had a decidedly un-rock 'n' roll job as a British Gas sub-contractor.

Chris and Tony would meet the Gallagher brothers in 1992, while The Real People were on tour with the Inspiral Carpets, for whom Noel was a roadie.

"I would always take my own Pot Noodles with me on tour and he'd come over and be after one, so that’s how we struck up conversation," says Chris Griffiths.

"But when we met Liam, we were saying to Noel, 'Your kid's a star, he is'. And this is before we'd even heard him sing.

"We were trying to get them a record deal, and we were saying to them, 'When you get a deal' not 'If you get a deal'."

But that didn't mean the band's music didn’t need work.

"They sent me this demo and of something they had done, and it was rubbish, really," Griffiths adds.

But, he says, there was a "rawness and an energy" to their sound that The Real People were able to help develop, culminating in the recording of Supersonic.

Chris Griffiths said he told Noel Gallagher that he could see Liam was a star before he'd even heard him sing

"We had the job of taking them into the studio and recording Supersonic," Griffiths says. "We all just went into the studio as a gang of lads, and our ethic about recording was that if we went in and had a good time, we would create good music, and we just needed someone responsible - in this case producer Dave Scott - there to record it."

After scrapping what they were initially recording, the backing track that would become Supersonic was recorded.

"Then Noel came up with the melody and lyrics after we'd had a break in the Albert pub. By two in the morning, it was all done," Griffiths says.

Following the single's release in April 1994, Definitely Maybe came out in the August, and the Oasis star rose fast.

For Griffiths, their success was as much down to Liam's star quality as the music or musicianship.

"Noel was a good musician, but he was no [Ocean Colour Scene lead guitarist] Steve Craddock. A lot of it was down to Liam, his attitude and his voice.

"As soon as they started, they played the game: offering other bands out [for fights], saying they were the best band in the world. It was like they were going, 'Let's say we're the best band in the world and we will convince everyone we are'.

"When you look at the early days they were just standing there staring at their shoes. They weren't like The Who or the Rolling Stones, jumping about. It was the attitude that made them rock 'n' roll more than anything."

Oasis played their first Liverpool gig in Le Bateau in Duke Street

'A Liverpool band'

Kevin McManus was DJing at Le Bateau in Liverpool's Duke Street when Chris and Tony Griffiths brought in Oasis one night in 1993.

The brothers approached McManus and asked him if their mates could play.

Without any gear of their own, Oasis borrowed from a band who had been playing earlier called Smaller, the group fronted by Pete 'Digsy' Deary, whose name was borrowed for the title of the bouncy Definitely Maybe track Digsy's Dinner.

"The lighting guys weren't very happy about it as it meant doing more work," says McManus, "but they got up and they played Cigarettes and Alcohol and Rock ‘N’ Roll Star. Not Supersonic, because this was before that had been written."

The reception was positive, says McManus.

"It was a small crowd, as it was only a little venue. Liam was literally right on top of the audience, and they went down really well with a crowd who hadn't come to see them."

Other city gigs followed, during which the band honed their performances, and by the time of their Krazy House gig in support of The Real People they were "absolutely stunning", says McManus, who is now the head of UNESCO City of Music.

So, given the time Oasis spent in Liverpool, were they a Liverpool band?

"I think they were," says McManus. "They spent a lot of time here, they were obviously influenced a lot by the Beatles and The Real People.

"When I went down to London to interview Noel and Liam for a magazine I was writing for, it was clear they loved The Real People, had lots of interest in Lee Mathers [of The La's] and they really loved Mick Head and Shack.

"So I think, while it's a bit tongue-in-cheek to call them a Liverpool band, the debt they owe to Liverpool is massive."

And it was the issue of a debt that was to become a bone of contention between Oasis and their great mentors, The Real People.

Chris Griffiths: "We are just proud to have been involved with the best band and album of the last 30 years."

Proud

Oasis would ultimately make an out-of-court settlement with The Real People for their contributions to some of the band's songs. Such compromises and agreements are a reality of the music business, but it is a source of frustration for Chris Griffiths that some people would believe there was any acrimony between he and his brother and their former proteges.

"Obviously a lot of people know there was an out-of-court settlement, and in the end I got a credit on Rockin' Chair," Griffiths says.

"With [the song] Columbia I would get promised every few weeks that we were getting our names on that.

"It got to the point where we had to send a solicitor's letter. But we’re really not bitter at all."

In September, The Real People embark on a tour, playing Liverpool, Bristol and London. While the crowds they draw are far smaller than those Oasis's 2025 dates will muster, the band still has a significant following and can, to this day, count the Gallagher brothers as fans.

Liam has been known to heap praise on the band on Twitter, and Noel has spoken fondly of his time in Liverpool and the relationship he struck up with Chris and Tony.

"We're proud to have been there to give them the support and the help we did," says Griffiths.

"And we are just proud to have been involved with the best album, and the best rock 'n' roll band, of the last 30 years."