Was Oasis the biggest band in the world?

You missed the point.

Domination in a few smaller markets does not equal the world, that's the point.

Madonna is a worldwide pop icon.
Kylie Minogue is not.

Same applies for Oasis, not a worldwide biggest band in the world champion, ever.

Kylie is the perfect comparison.

 

Madonna possibly could receive 2.5 million ticket applications for a concert, as Oasis did. Kylie? Never. Ever. So Madonna is a better comparison to Oasis than Kylie.

 

No, because of America (and other very important markets such as Brazil).

Knebworth is not the world.
Knebworth has blinded some fans to extrapolate to the world.

Note, I maintain from the start, Oasis were by far the biggest band in the UK for an entire generation. Huge, massive for sure, of that there is no doubt.

But, and it's a big but, they were irrelevant in the biggest market because the Gallager's stuffed up their American push.

 

You missed the point again.

Kylie is to Madonna, what Oasis is to U2 (for example).

 

I maintain that for at the very least those two nights at Knebworth in 1996 there was no band on the planet that was bigger. For those two nights in August '96 Oasis were actually the biggest band. The next day? Nope. But those two nights? Definitely.

 

I spent a couple weeks in London in the summer of 1996 and I have never seen a band as EVERYWHERE as Oasis was at that time. Their faces were in every window and the songs were blasting out of every store, it seemed. I was a fan, so I had no complaints. I just wished I had timed it better, because Knebworth happened the day after I came home, not that scoring a ticket was likely.

But as I've typed at least twice in this thread, they still managed to play large venues in the US from 1995-2008. The "club act" claim is laughably inaccurate and easy to disprove with about four seconds of Googling.

Finally, they're not eligible for the HOF until this year, not that I think or care that they'll get the nod immediately.

 

Two nights as the biggest band in the world. It's a short amount of time to be sure. But it still counts. So the answer to the thread question is definitely yes.

It's lonely at the top. Unless you have 250,000 people there with you.

 

For you and the people there maybe it felt like that but as many have pointed out there was a whole big wide world outside of Knebworth and the Uk in August 1996 to whom they meant little or nothing to. So even those two nights they weren’t the biggest band in the world.

No it’s not

 

Between 1994-1997 which band was bigger?

 

I've stated the case for my opinion several times here already. Not going around the block with this again. You and I disagree on this. That's fine with me.

 

What's the Story went 4 times Platinum in the US, that is hardly little or nothing. How many bands albums released between '94-97 sold that many? 8 times Platinum in Canada, 8 times Platinum in Australia. 6 times Platinum in Denmark and Ireland.

All in all that album was certidified in 22 different countries. How exactly is that meaning 'little or nothing'? Name a band that did better that year in as many countries?

Definitly Maybe certified in 9 different regions. Be Here Now certified in 16 different countries, when released n01 in 18 different countries.

What band had a similar level of success in between 94-97?

There reign was short, but for a period they were the biggest band in the world.

 

The hatred towards Oasis never ceases to amaze me.

 

I can’t stand them

Much prefer the band in your avatar ! Although I don’t like their Beatles-esque stuff much.

 

I can’t remember if I’ve already posted but, as someone who was at university during the Oasis years, it felt like they were always threatening to become one of the biggest bands in the world but they never seemed to quite manage it, even though U2’s grasp on the pole position seemed shaky and REM’s commercial decline had begun (technically, the Rolling Stones must’ve been the biggest band, anyway, although it didn’t feel like it at the time). By 1997, they’d stalled and the momentum would never be regained.

 

I don’t hate them but I just don’t believe they were ever The Biggest Band in the World. Yes they were huge over here and I do concur that my statement that they meant “little or nothing elsewhere “ is an understatement. The spice girls probably had more of a global impact though (at the time).

 

The Police did peak in the early 80's, considering they broke up in the early 80's as one of, if not the biggest band in the world that would seem obvious. As far as having less cultural impact than Oasis, to me that is laughable. Record sales again, not even close. They also never released several crap albums. The Police while an active (and reunited) band were far bigger and simply more important than Oasis ever could hope or claim to be.

 

That's a good point about sales certification in x amount of countries as that directly relates to worldwide popularity.

 

These kind of statements prove that you (and many people in the forum) are completely unaware of the cultural impact of Oasis in the UK and Europe. And this is not your fault. It's just that living in the US, you probably haven't seen any of this.

As I stated earlier, even today, 25 years after their peak, people are still wearing the clothes, people are still wearing the haircuts and the magazines are still reporting on the Gallagher brothers EVERY SINGLE DAY. Jus like they do with everything that Macca does, for instance. THIS is cultural impact.

The cultural impact of The Police in the UK and in England and in Europe was minimal compared to Oasis.

 

Don't think I've ever seen another band that polarizes people as much as Oasis. They've been gone for a decade yet their accomplishments still upset so many haters who simply can't admit that there was a time when a band they despise was the biggest band in the world. No, it wouldn't be that way if Oasis weren't truly a force to be reckoned with.

Face it. Despite the facts these people will never accept our point of view. And we will never accept theirs. So there's no reason whatsoever in continuing such a conversation. D'you know what I mean?

I'm done here. Carry on if you must.

 

I think we are quite aware of it. As I've already stated, Oasis was the biggest act since The Beatles in the UK from around early 1996 to autumn 1997. I would tend to agree that Oasis's influence (I'm not sure if "culturally" is the right word to describe bad haircuts and fake Manchester accents) in the UK was bigger than, say, The Police's ever was. (Not that The Police have anything to apologize for in Britain, as they were the UK's biggest group from 1980-1983).

The key point you seem to be missing, however, is the "world" part of this thread. That is, the UK is not the world. The USA is also not the world... but as record-markets go, it's a far bigger and more important part of it than the UK is.

It's really hard to think of any pop/rock group that was not HUGE in the USA and that can accurately be called "the biggest band/act in the world". The closest thing to this is probably ABBA, which likely was the biggest act in the world around 1976 to 1978 (if not longer), but was never really HUGE Stateside (just 'big'). However, ABBA has a much better claim than Oasis does to having been the world's biggest group:

ABBA <--> Oasis:
No. of UK #1 LPs
9 <--> 8
No. of UK #1 singles
9 <--> 8
No. of Australian #1 LPs
4 <--> 2
No. of Australian #1 singles
6 <--> 1
No. of Canadian #1 LPs
0 <--> 2
No. of Canadian #1 singles
1 <--> 2
No. of German #1 LPs
7 <--> 0
No. of German #1 singles
9 <--> 0

Those are just some random chart stats for #1, and I don't have accurate info for Japan (but as I live here I would guess the two are about equal, with a slight edge to ABBA for most 'classic' songs sung at karaoke).

Anyway, I think ABBA were much bigger in Europe than Oasis ever was, and ABBA was actually the biggest group of all-time in Australia around 1976-77 (like, bigger than The Beatles in 1964). I also think ABBA had a bit more sustained global mega-sales for a longer period -- certainly in singles -- than Oasis did, although Oasis did have the bigger non-compilation LP (Morning Glory). More to the point, though, while neither act could sustain those kind of sales for original studio albums, ABBA's world sales curve was much more consistent than Oasis's, which was really only at world-beating level in 1996 and 1997. ABBA was routinely topping European charts from 1975 to 1981 with albums, and in singles it's not even close as ABBA trumps Oasis easily.

Why am I pointing this out? Because I think ABBA and Oasis are two good examples (similar life-spans and numbers of releases) of artists that could be called "the biggest band in the world" despite never having been the biggest act (or co-biggest act) in the USA, in fact not even close. But I think ABBA has a much stronger claim to that than Oasis does (and ABBA had a #1 single in the USA, which Oasis never did... and 20 years later, ABBA's Gold: Greatest Hits sold 6 x Platinum in the USA, bigger than any Oasis album has ever been there).

So, while I think it IS possible to become the world's biggest act without being huge in the USA, I also think it's extremely rare and probably only ABBA has ever achieved it with any room to spare. Oasis maybe was the world's biggest contemporary band for about 12 months around mid-1996 to mid-1997 (Be Here Now ended that party), but even though they were very briefly the world's biggest contemporary act, legacy artists like McCartney or Elton John or Madonna would probably have beaten them easily in ticket sales and live appeal, even at their peak in 1996-97.

Basically, if you weren't an enormous act in the USA (and Oasis was not), you'd have to have been handily the world's biggest group everywhere else, with room to spare, to be crowned "world's biggest act". Anyway, how BIG they were in the UK alone is simply not relevant to a worldwide discussion.

 

Being the biggest band in the UK isn't the same as the biggest in the world.

Citing ticket sales for 2 concerts doesn't establish anything other than that they were huge in the UK...

 

One thing I will say.

The Masterplan is a bloody good song.

 

Well, it's settled then (because this is the period in question)!

 

I'm not a "hater", I like them. And I have no doubt they were the biggest band in the UK. The debate is "biggest band in the world". Hate has nothing to do with it. Let's keep emotion out of it and talk facts.

 

So, this has taken 71 pages to draw a consensus?