We believe in each other, we need one another…

And so, it ends.

An unkind word, a flippant, witty reply, a smashed guitar, and it’s all over.

Well, there’s a whole lot more to it than that, but that’s the compressed version of 16 years of a career in music.

You have to stop flogging a dead horse eventually, and although it has prompted some hagiographic nonsense among some critics, the common sense view is, and should be, a collective sigh of relief that Oasis are, finally, no more.

I remember coming back from backpacking in the Far East, and the one thing I did between getting off the plane and collapsing into bed for the next 48 hours was hit a record shop to buy Definitely Maybe. They meant that much. In 1994.

At that time, they lifted you up from the mundane; it was an antidote to 14 years of Tory rule in the UK, hedonistic escapism for people who didn’t fancy clubbing, driving, tuneful, guitar music that was just so right for the time that it sparked something inside a nation.

Then came Morning Glory. A hype orgy preceded it’s release, it sold in its millions, it was a validation of the initial rush. And the songs were pretty good, too.

Here they are at the height of their powers. Oddly, everything after these two gigs in London’s Earls Court arena, which I was privileged to be at, was downhill.

The ongoing obsession and blind faith that many had with Oasis came from that initial blaze of glory. But you knew deep down, after Be Here Now appeared, a bloated, cocaine-fuelled, tossed-off mess of a record, there was never going to be another Columbia, another Don’t Look Back In Anger, another Acquiesce. There as a stagger, not a swagger.

The loyalty remained, and as long as they slipped a good single onto an otherwise terrible album, there was hope they might rise again, that Noel might regain his muse, and that Oasis might send you on the rocket-trip euphoria of the intro to Cigarettes And Alcohol once again. They didn’t.

Hauling their emperor’s new grooves around the world each year has made them hugely rich, certainly, and given another generation the opportunity to experience an Oasis show. But having been at Slane earlier this year, and having left after an hour, I had the impression that they really could not go on doing this any more, to themselves, their recorded legacy (the first two records), or their fans.

The V Festival no-show was the beginning of the end, Rock En Seine the final straw. Hope remains that Noel will come back stronger, with better tunes, and the determination that he left at the door when the initial rush of success bought everything he ever wanted. Having nothing left to prove led to a decade of plodding. Having nothing to hold him back might just give him the space to grow as a songwriter and performer.

Oasis might not have been the Beatles, but Noel may yet grow into something more than a Paul McCartney wannabe.