"Little by Little" is a song by English rock band Oasis, first released as the sixth track on their fifth studio album, Heathen Chemistry. In September 2002, it was released with "She Is Love" as the only double A-side single by the band, peaking at number two on the UK Singles Chart and number nine on the Irish Singles Chart. "Little by Little" by itself reached number two on the Canadian Singles Chart and number five in Italy. Noel Gallagher provides lead vocals on both tracks, which he also wrote.

The promo video to the song featured a guest role by Robert Carlyle. The cover art for the single is an homage to Robert Indiana's Love artwork series.

Background

Liam Gallagher was originally meant to record lead vocals for "Little by Little", but according to Noel, he could not manage it. "It's a shame 'cos that would have made it extra, extra special. When it came to him (recording the vocals) you could see he was going, 'I'm not going to fucking get it.' And we were all willing him to get it. I went in and did a version and you could see he was sat at the desk going, 'Fucking bastard. He's got it.' But he doesn't want to do anything that's shit."

Music video

There are two versions of the music video, one being Noel Gallagher sitting on a doorstep singing and playing guitar as people (including Gem Archer) throw money to him. A small man (played by Robert Carlyle) mimes to Gallagher. It then shows Carlyle's character at a bus stop with Alan White and then grows to normal size and trips over but is helped up by Liam Gallagher. Carlyle's character is then last seen growing to giant size, walking into a forest and then into farmland. The alternate version shows the band playing in a concert at Finsbury Park in 2002.

Live performances

The first performance on the song was on 23 May, 2002, at Zepp Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan, and it quickly became a favourite for the band to play in concert. While it appeared irregularly following the Heathen Chemistry Tour before being dropped completely in 2005, it has been performed many times by Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds, and is notable for being the only song from an album made by Oasis in the 2000s to be on their Live '25 setlist, all the others being from either the first three albums made in the 1990s (Definitely Maybe, (What's the Story) Morning Glory? and Be Here Now), or the 1998 compilation The Masterplan.

Track listings

  • UK 7-inch single and European CD single
  1. "Little by Little"
  2. "She Is Love"
  • UK 12-inch and CD single, Australian CD single
  1. "Little by Little"
  2. "She Is Love"
  3. "My Generation"
  • UK and European DVD single
  1. "Little by Little"
  2. "Little by Little" (demo)
  3. 10 Minutes of Noise and Confusion Pt. 3 (Finsbury Park, London, July 2002)
  • European CD single—Special Tour Edition
  1. "Little by Little"
  2. "My Generation"
  3. "Columbia" (live)
  4. "Little by Little" (live video) (Finsbury Park, London, July 2002)

Personnel

Oasis

  • Noel Gallagher – lead vocals and acoustic guitar
  • Gem Archer – electric guitar
  • Andy Bell – bass
  • Alan White – drums and tambourine

Additional musicians

  • Paul Stacey – organ

Charts

Weekly charts

{|class="wikitable sortable plainrowheaders" style="text-align:center"

|+Weekly chart performance for "Little by Little"

!scope="col"|Chart (2002)

!scope="col"|Peak<br/>position

|-

!scope="row"|Canada (Nielsen SoundScan)

|2

|-

|-

|-

|-

|-

|-

|-

|}

{|class="wikitable sortable plainrowheaders" style="text-align:center"

|+Weekly chart performance for "Little by Little" / "She Is Love"

!scope="col"|Chart (2002)

!scope="col"|Peak<br/>position

|-

|-

!scope="row"|Europe (Eurochart Hot 100)

|11

|-

|-

|-

|}

Year-end charts

{|class="wikitable sortable plainrowheaders" style="text-align:center"

|+Year-end chart performance for "Little by Little"

!scope="col"|Chart (2002)

!scope="col"|Position

|-

!scope="row"|Canada (Nielsen SoundScan)

|47

|-

!scope="row"|UK Singles (OCC)

|81

|-

!scope="row"|UK Airplay (Music Week)

|59

|}

Certifications

Release history

{|class="wikitable plainrowheaders"

|+Release dates and formats for "Little by Little"

!scope="col"|Region

!scope="col"|Date

!scope="col"|Format(s)

!scope="col"|Label(s)

!scope="col"|

|-

!scope="row"|Japan

|19 September 2002

|rowspan="2"|CD

|Epic

|align="center"|

|-

!scope="row"|Denmark

|rowspan="2"|23 September 2002

|Helter Skelter

|align="center"|

|-

!scope="row"|United Kingdom

|

|Big Brother

|align="center"|

|-

!scope="row"|Australia

|14 October 2002

|CD

|Helter Skelter

|align="center"|

|}

References