Oasis slagging doesn’t spare wives or children

You can say what you like about your brother — but when the wives and kids come into it, you’ve gone too far, says Sarah Caden

ROCK AND ROLL SPIRIT: Cindy Crawford, Rande Gerber, Noel Gallagher, George Clooney and Sara MacDonald at a celebrity event in London — the sort of do that drives Liam (inset below) to tweet about his brother’s “posh friends”

LAST week, Liam Gallagher compared his brother, Noel, and Noel’s wife, Sara MacDonald, to Fred and Rosemary West. He did not appear to be joking. But he definitely seemed to have crossed a line.

Of course, Liam has been on his tiptoes on that line for quite some time, venturing beyond just slagging off his older brother and having a pop off Noel’s daughter, Anais, too. Even Liam’s teenage son, Gene, has aimed arrows at Anais online — but of course online — clearly on message that anyone to do with Noel is fair game.

This time, however, Liam may have gone too far.

“Think it’s time to address the witch, you want me to drop dead, you have a screw loose and know [sic] the world knows,” he tweeted last week, with his sister-in-law cast as “the witch”.

“She’s the reason OASIS is no longer have to put it out there she’s DARK,” he continued, and followed up with the claim that when Oasis, the brothers’ band, were due to tour in the States, MacDonald robbed Noel’s passport, “f ***ed with [Noel’s] head for a week, he come crying at my door, she’s proper dark”.

The Fred and Rosemary West bit, which had to do with wishing people dead, was a response to posts made by MacDonald on an Instagram fan site about Liam.

MacDonald’s Instagram post was a reaction to Liam’s comments that he didn’t care if Noel, Sara and Noel’s “f **kin kid” Anais, were targeted by online trolls.

In reaction, MacDonald was reported to have posted: “His f ****** kid”? You mean your gorgeous niece, you deplorable w**ker… Please god [you] have dropped dead by the time my kids are on social media.”

So, in a nutshell, Liam wished ill on his brother and his brother’s wife and child. Liam’s brother’s wife hit back. And Liam hit back again. It’s not pretty.

It’s never been pretty between Noel and Liam — but really, this is just ugly.

Brothers fight. Siblings fight. The rough and tumble is a significant part of growing up and learning about yourself and how to deal with people and how to deal with conflict and resolution.

The resolution part, however, is as important as the conflict bit. Further, as siblings grow into adults, most learn that beating each other up is no longer an option. And they hope to learn that if you’re going to be a “deplorable w**ker”, you limit it to your sibling and leave out their families.

And maybe skip public comparisons with serial murderers and sex abusers.

Both Gallagher brothers are to blame in this, and both have slung many shots at each other. While Liam is more publicly foul-mouthed and no-holds-barred than Noel, he has always claimed to hear rumours of what is said about him in private.

Further, in a classic big-brother way, Noel seems to employ smug silence as a means of driving his younger brother completely nuts.

It’s the adult equivalent of holding a fist-flailing child at arm’s length. It’s the kind of thing that might drive Liam to his tweeting about Noel and his “posh friends” and high falutin notions. For the sake of dignity and peace, you have to wish they would stop now, given they won’t do it for their mother, whom they have said dearly wishes that they would make up. This latest spat, even as you spell it out, smacks of kids fighting — each screaming that it was the other who started it. When it comes to taking the animosity outside of the immediate brotherly relationship, though, it seems that Liam is definitely the leader. Liam is also the one who engages with social media, gives far too much rope to a man fuelled by a feud. Liam is, for certain, the one of the pair who has decided that extended family is fair game. Late last year, while announcing his solo tour online, a fan pointed out to Liam that Noel had compared him with an annoying ex-wife. “Cheeky c**t,” replied Liam, “I’m fitter than both his wife’s [sic]” . Liam has an odd combination of delusions of grandeur combined with a chip on his shoulder that sees him willing to hurt anyone in order to achieve his chief aim. If he has to slag off the two women Noel married, Meg Matthews and now Sara MacDonald, in order to hurt Noel, then so be it. And if he hurts Anais, daughter of Noel and Matthews, in the process, then he’ll do that, too. Which sets a great family example, with Liam’s son, Gene, now rowing into the scrap.

Last year, on Twitter, Gene called his cousin, Anais, a “posh rubbernecker” and described her as “Noel in a wig”.

Gene is Liam’s son with his second wife — and second ex-wife — Nicole Appleton. He also has an older son, Lennon, with first wife Patsy Kensit. Not to mention a teenage daughter, Molly, with singer Lisa Moorish, of whom he’s said: “I’ve never got around to meeting her.”

Liam also has a young daughter called Gemma in New York, the product of a relationship he had while still married to Appleton. “Not met the one in New York either,” he has said of Gemma.

You could read a nasty disregard for his children into this, or even a disregard for daughters while he seems close to his sons, but that would be unfair.

If all the spatting shows anything about Liam Gallagher, it is that he likes throwing words around for effect. Maybe it’s unfair to read them as his true feelings, but then again, maybe he should be more careful and consider how feelings can be hurt and relationships ruined irrevocably. Then again, maybe he just doesn’t care anymore.

It has, it seems, all gone too far.