Is Oasis Overrated? A Statistical Analysis
Unpacking Oasis's cultural reputation—both the good and the bad.
Intro: Oasis is Everywhere
Over the past few months, an epidemic has swept through my friends and family: everyone I know is seeing Oasis in concert. After a fifteen-year hiatus, the most beloved Britpop band of the 1990s has reunited to considerable fanfare and $300 standing-room ticket prices. If you're unfamiliar with Oasis, you may recognize them as the band responsible for “Wonderwall.” And if you're unfamiliar with the song “Wonderwall,” then I don't know how that's possible.
Given the steep ticket prices and the band's polarizing reputation, any conversation about their reunion quickly devolves into a familiar debate: How many people actually like Oasis? My default response to this question is to label the band "overrated," a critique so common that Oasis die-hards rarely push back (because they're tired of defending the band).
After a handful of recent conversations in which I casually dismissed someone's favorite music as “overrated,” I started to question this impulse.
My behavior is oddly reminiscent of a high school bully.
If this band is readily considered “overrated,” perhaps I should figure out why.
So today we'll examine the case for and against Oasis, and explore why a musical act may be labeled “overrated” in the first place.
The Case For Oasis
Author's Note: If you're uninterested in the people who like Oasis, or any defense of the band’s cultural standing, feel free to skip ahead—the second section will give you plenty of ammo for future anti-Oasis arguments. If you'd like a nuanced take on the band's reputation, then read on.
Quantitatively speaking, there's no shortage of Oasis fandom—especially for those who came of age in the 1990s. On the strength of their first two albums alone, the band is one of the most commercially successful acts of the pre-Y2K era. The analytics site Chartmasters converts artist sales and streaming activity into a unified metric known as "Total Equivalent Album Sales," and by this measure, Oasis ranks among the 15 best-selling acts of the 1990s.
But how seriously can we take album sales in a decade that saw “Mambo No. 5,” “[The] Macarena,” and “MMMBop” top the charts? Maybe Oasis was another mega-selling ‘90s fad, alongside “Cotton Eye Joe,” MC Hammer, and purple ketchup.
The most common explanation for a polarizing cultural reputation stems from a disconnect between commercial success and critical acclaim—a pattern that holds for bands like Nickelback, Creed, Coldplay, and other “overrated” acts I've studied. But Oasis is a rare exception: both a best-selling artist and a critical darling. Two of the band’s records were selected for Rolling Stone's 2020 list of “The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time”—a notable achievement for a contemporary artist.
Given some truly absurd antics (which we'll explore later), you'd expect this band to be dismissed as a fleeting ‘90s relic. And yet, Oasis fandom has aged like fine wine.
Amid multiple breakups, short-lived reunions, and myriad PR fiascos, Oasis has not released a new album in seventeen years—an absence that has fueled a sense of scarcity, and with it, renewed demand for “Wonderwall” and some non-“Wonderwall” songs.
The band's “Oasis Live '25 Tour” is projected to generate $500 million in ticket and merchandise sales, placing the reunion among the highest-grossing tours of the 2020s.
For anyone keeping score, it appears that Oasis is appreciated by:
People Who Spend Money: These loyal consumers bought physical albums in the ‘90s and expensive concert tickets in the 2020s.
People Who Create or Evaluate Music: These critics and artists placed Oasis’s first two albums on a “best-of” list that also features Abbey Road, Rumours, and Thriller.
The obvious caveat here is that consumers and critics are two broad categories. There may be a silent majority of money-spending humans who’ve endured the band’s ubiquity for decades, and have some strong opinions about whether any of it was necessary. So who are these people, and where do claims of Oasis’s “overblown” cultural reputation come from?
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The Case Against Oasis
In 1966, John Lennon told a British newspaper that The Beatles were “more popular than Jesus,” a comment that triggered widespread outrage from people who preferred Jesus to A Hard Day’s Night. Nearly 30 years later, Oasis’s Noel Gallagher claimed his band was “bigger than The Beatles,” after releasing just two albums. By the transitive property, this also means Oasis would have been “bigger” than Jesus in the mid-‘90s.
This episode was an inflection point for the band’s reputation, and is a factoid remembered by even the most casual Oasis fan. Lennon followed his controversial remarks by releasing Abbey Road, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, Let It Be, and “Imagine.” Oasis, on the other hand, released five increasingly forgettable albums before calling it quits.
When we track the band’s critical acclaim as measured by Pitchfork rating and Metacritic composite score, we see a massive drop-off following Oasis’s first two records (which are, consequently, the albums featured in Rolling Stone's “Top 500” list).
There are two obvious takeaways from this ordeal:
Do not compare yourself to a sacred figure, be it cultural or religious.
If you are going to compare yourself to an artistic or spiritual icon, you must subsequently release five all-time albums, or risk becoming a cultural punchline.
Noel Gallagher has since walked back the comparison, attributing his comments to “an alarming amount of drugs,” including cocaine, ecstasy, and alcohol. Which brings us, inevitably, to The Brothers Gallagher—and the long, chaotic trail of PR disasters they've left in their wake. The long-running feud between Oasis’s lead guitarist and singer—and their regrettable behavior, both together and apart—is the other trivia factoid people remember about the band.
Here is a short excerpt of the Gallaghers’ feuds and misadventures:
In 1996, Oasis was set to perform on MTV Unplugged, but just before the performance, Liam Gallagher pulled out, claiming a sore throat—only to sit in the balcony with a cigarette and heckle Noel during the show.
In 2000, the brothers were involved in a violent sibling brawl that left Liam with a missing front tooth and Noel with a busted foot.
In 2009, following an argument over unprofessional behavior, Liam reportedly swung a guitar at Noel “like an axe,” narrowly missing his brother and destroying a dressing room in the process.
Months later, Noel claimed Liam had cancelled a performance due to a hangover. In response, Liam sued him for libel. The lawsuit was eventually dropped.
This well-documented history of familial discord led a research firm to poll the British public on their favorite Gallagher brother ahead of Oasis’s reunion tour. The results of the survey are not particularly memorable; what’s interesting is that this question was asked in the first place (and neglected all non-Gallagher band members).
Reactions to the Gallaghers’ antics vary widely. For some, it humanizes Oasis—imbuing the band with a messy, relatable cult of personality. For others, it's proof that the group is undeserving of its outsized cultural footprint.
If you care to look, there’s no shortage of bad behavior associated with this band. These cultural grievances are amplified by those demographically removed from Oasis’s core fanbase—listeners who did not experience “Wonderwall's” ascent firsthand.
Oasis was ubiquitous for a three-year run in the 1990s. During this period, a comparison to The Beatles was silly but not so outlandish. And then the band collapsed so thoroughly that its story can be firmly divided into two chapters.
Those who first consumed (What's the Story) Morning Glory? in their teens and twenties will know a time when this group was the biggest band in the world, without irony or caveats—which is why Oasis is uniquely popular among Gen X.
The band’s lopsided career success and shenanigans bifurcate their legacy, same as any artist who produced good music and later undermined their achievements with non-musical publicity—like when Ozzy Osbourne bit a bat's head off while on stage. A 1970s teen will know Ozzy as the brooding lead singer of Black Sabbath, whereas I know Ozzy as a bat-biter and reality TV star.
If you were to locate a time and place for unabashed Oasis fandom, the time would be the mid-1990s, and the place would be the United Kingdom and Ireland. The band is popular worldwide while also being disproportionately consumed in Northern Europe, as evidenced by Google search traffic.
In assembling this data, I have put a lot of effort into stating the obvious: Oasis's following is largely Anglo-centric and Gen X. The people buying $300 general admission tickets to “Live '25” probably fall into one or both of these groups.
If it were just British Gen Xers evangelizing this band, that would be mildly annoying but not overwhelming. And here is where things get complicated (and well beyond the band’s control): Oasis’s music doesn't just spread by word of mouth; it also proliferates through amateur guitar playing.
The first time I heard “Wonderwall” was in third grade during an elementary school talent show. The next time I heard “Wonderwall” was the following year, also during an elementary school talent show. All told, I probably heard several amateur renditions of Oasis’s work before gaining the ability to download their songs on iTunes and give them a proper listen.
While what I'm describing is oddly specific, it's also not very unique. To this day, the guitar chords to “Wonderwall” and “Don't Look Back in Anger” are among the most-searched online.
My hot take: if the band petitioned to remove these chords from the internet, I think it would meaningfully improve their reputation.
Legions of amateur guitarists have unintentionally reshaped “Wonderwall's” legacy:
The song’s ubiquity among entry-level musicians gives the impression that Oasis lacks skill.
Over time, “Wonderwall” has become a meme, flattening the band into a punchline.
“Wonderwall” is easy to play on guitar while also carrying the illusion of depth and being broadly accessible to casual music fans. It's a basic song for those seeking artistic credibility, much like “Seven Nation Army” or “Creep.”
In my opinion, this is the proverbial “straw that broke the camel's back” when it comes to the band’s reputation. “Wonderwall's” omnipresence on the radio and at college open mics amplifies every other complaint about Oasis. What’s so special about this band anyway? Why do they dominate dorm room sing-alongs and elementary school talent shows across the world? And why did they compare themselves to The Beatles?
Final Thoughts: How Much Context is Too Much Context?
My dad loves to endlessly recycle the same pop culture factoids, which is a classic (and charming!) “dad” trait. A rock song will play on Sirius XM, and he will begin dispensing trivia about that track, as if triggered by Pavlovian programming.
“Everyone in Fleetwood Mac dated and then broke up!”
“Mick Jagger sings backup vocals on 'You're So Vain'!”
“If you play Abbey Road backwards, it kinda sounds like they're saying 'Paul is dead'—but also not really!”
During adolescence, I thought these were the single coolest facts I'd ever heard. As a prickly teenager, I feigned frustration over these involuntary history lessons. As a thirty-something, I've come to understand that this is how culture is passed down across generations, or at least this was my dad’s approach.
Cultural consumption, especially music, is heavily dependent on context—people will frequently remember how and when they first heard a song. I will forever associate Carly Simon’s “You’re So Vain” and Bruce Springsteen’s Born to Run with my dad’s loving info dumps. In some cases, the context may supersede the art itself, like Usher’s “My Boo,” which was the soundtrack to my first slow dance. To me, this song will always be about having braces, being at a Bar Mitzvah, and using Axe deodorant spray.
Which brings me to Oasis: an artist weighed down by context. For many Millennials and Baby Boomers, the band represents another generation’s music—a group with two good albums, one massively overplayed song, endless bad PR by way of cartoonish behavior, and a small army of amateur guitarists butchering their biggest hits. These details shape how the band and its music endure in popular imagination, much like Ozzy Osbourne’s bat-crimes or the messy web of breakups that preceded Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours. I will never know Fleetwood Mac’s “Go Your Own Way” without the knowledge of Stevie Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham’s failed relationship, just as I will never know Oasis’s “Champagne Supernova” without the band’s extensive cultural baggage and a mental image of Liam Gallagher attacking his brother with a guitar.
To understand Oasis’s reputation, you have to separate the lore from the art. There's Oasis, the myth: a band known for saying and doing ridiculous things, zealously adored by Gen Xers and Brits, and responsible for an overplayed anthem favored by amateur musicians. And then there’s the music itself—pretty good, especially the first two albums. Your view of the band—and whether they deserve a $500 million reunion tour—hinges on how you weigh their music against sibling duels, “Wonderwall’s” inescapability, hubris fueled by “alarming” drug use, and a remarkably ill-timed Beatles comparison.
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Oasis are one of the last great rock bands -- they are among the so-called grunge bands in the US and the Brit Pop bands in the UK -- before rock as we knew it from the 50s/60s onwards saw its demise. It's why grown men are crying at the Oasis concerts. Oasis are a reminder of what those of us who grew up with the iconic rock bands have lost and what we are still in mourning for, and why we still reverentially listen to rock music from the 60s to 90s.
There are many factors in the demise of rock -- the Telecommunications Act of 1996 in the US that destroyed local radio, massive changes in the record industry, the rise of streaming, etc. -- that ushered in the 'alt' era and the difficulty for rock bands to get visibility, airtime, and contracts.
That's why I would contend that you cannot compare across musical genres because it's comparing apples with oranges. Rock bands, even successful ones like Oasis, were facing very different circumstances from the favored pop and rap/hip hop genres from the mid-90s onwards. The record companies will claim there was a fall in demand for rock that explained their decrease in investment, but I would contend there was a fall in supply because of their decisions and actions. There was no shortage of kids still trying to make it in rock (and still isn't), and the investment is now overseas where rock is thriving.
So we have to give the Oasis guys credit for managing to keep themselves in the public eye for three decades, which they have done brilliantly. The big names in music are entertainers par excellence, and Noel and Liam are certainly two of the best.
I have enjoyed these articles you’ve put out in this vein of statistical analysis, but I think there is something being missed in this activity.
You cannot separate the lore from the music. There is a presupposition here that goes unnamed, that music, as an object, has intrinsic value outside the material-discursive relations that constitute the lore through which you are measuring Oasis’s music. But Oasis’s music is not separable from the material-discursive contexts that give it form!
Tabloid antics, amateur guitar covers, nostalgia for the ’90s - these do not obscure music-in-itself (an impossibility); they are part of the phenomenon we call “Oasis.” To suggest, as you do at the end, that we must separate the lore from the art is to miss the point: the lore is not accidental to the art, it is constitutive of it.