Oasis back Coxon

NOEL GALLAGHER has taken his revenge on DAMON ALBARN for the Britpop battle of 1995 by publicly siding with estranged BLUR member GRAHAM COXON - and NME.COM can exclusively reveal that NOEL and GRAHAM have already met to discuss the former guitarist's future.

The Oasis songwriter has long harbored resentment against Damon Albarn, following Blur's victory in the bitter fight for Number One between 'Roll With It' and 'Country House' back in 1995. Now Noel has told NME.COM that he recently met up with Graham, who he believes simply "snapped" at Damon's attitude towards Blur.

In NME last week, Damon refused to deny that Graham was out of Blur. Since then, he has refused to discuss Graham, commenting only to NME: "I think there's more important things to consider at the moment – like imminent war." But last week, Noel was outspoken about the falling out between Damon and Graham.

He told NME.COM: "I bumped into him (Graham) the other day. But it's not for me to say, 'cos I've got a lot of time for Graham and it should come from him, not me. If it was the other c---, I'd tell you everything he said 'cos he's a knob. You've got to say this, in Damon Albarn's last couple of interviews he was saying that Blur should be grateful to have him in and it's good for them that he's in Gorillaz and stuff like that, well it's only gonna go one way, innit? You can't be saying things like that to your bandmates you've grown up with. Saying 'well, now that I've done all these things I'm doing you a favour being in this band'."

Liam added: "They should've split up a long time ago. Are they gonna get another guitarist?"

Noel showed his admiration for Graham, telling NME.COM: "They ain't gonna get another guitarist like him, he's a one-off. You've got to be strong to be a in a band, it takes a lot of tolerance. And I'm sure Graham Coxon's tolerance has just snapped. Because if your singer's saying stuff like he was... unbelievable. If I ever came into the rehearsal rooms and said to this lot, 'Look, it's in your interests I'm in this group', they'd just laugh at me. You'd get an amp on yer 'ead, a kick up the arse and 'see yer later'. Damon Albarn always wanted to be a solo artist anyway, he was always very quick to say 'It's all me, all this is me, Gorillaz is all me'."

For more on the situation with Blur, see this week's NME, out now.

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