It’s easy to forget that when Oasis’s debut album ‘Definitely Maybe’ was released in 1994, it was a genuine revelation: the sort of anthemic, confidence-fuelled pop-rock that had been absent from the UK music scene for a good while. Following that the Oasis story was a fractured one – albums were of declining quality, the band rifts and arguments became tedious rather than entertaining, and the ten-years-too-late split of last year only left a sour taste in the mouth.

Former lead singer Liam Gallagher has been content to continue in a mediocre vein with his new group (the frankly dull Beady Eye), so expectations for the first post-Oasis material from his brother Noel weren’t exactly sky high. Well – whaddaya know, Gallagher Snr. has only gone and reinvented himself with ‘What A Life’ – a New-Order-like, piano-and-bass-laden dance-off that’s the best thing he’s done in over a decade. It’s been streamed online a few days before the official release date, and you can check it out above.

The less cynical among us have always known that Gallagher is capable of some genuinely brilliant stuff when left to his own devices, like this largely-unknown tune from 1998 …

…. so now he’s free of the burdens of Liam and ‘lad-rock’, we’re really looking forward to what he does next.