how can it endure?

the music from beginning to end is unequivocally a conversation and shared meditation between the two of them - one songwriter/occasional singer and one singer/occasional songwriter - that paints a poignant picture of Liam being the youthful idealistic ‘anything is possible if we’re together’ romantic and Noel being the tortured pragmatist; Liam overwhelmed with longing for an intentional, fully-realized romantic partnership, spending most of his adult life imploring Noel to give himself over to loving him in the way that Noel was inclined to, and Noel responding mournfully that the the risk is too great, the world isn’t designed for something like that to be possible. Liam seemed ready to jump at the drop of hat, and i think a big part of the rebuffing from Noel was recognition of that impulsive instinct in Liam and fear of the outcome. Liam's music said, repeatedly, “let’s just do it, don't be scared” and Noel’s response was no, it’s not practical, that's not how the world works, this is both self-preservation and preservation of the person i love, this is in both of our best interests

still, Noel's music has always expressed just as devastating of a longing to share a life in that way, to "escape" or shun his moral responsibilities, but the impression we’re left with when also taking into account how things turned out is that from the beginning Noel felt a deep sense of shame and paternal duty and thus kept Liam at arm’s length (at least in the sense that he didn't allow a full commitment to come to fruition), Liam acted out in increasingly desperate ways, Noel was often left hurt, and so went the constant cycles of overwhelming love, frustration, longing, jealousy, giving in, backing off, despair, resentfulness, and coping. decades spent at a depth of pain that couldn't be aired out with a single other soul in pursuit of relief due to the taboo nature of it must have felt biblical and inescapable. they couldn’t practically extricate themselves from it, because their romantic affection existed hand-in-hand with their brotherhood. in this case, moving on from a lover would mean losing a brother and savior. it would also mean losing their livelihood. ultimately, the chaotically-reached resolution was absolute estrangement and they both appear to have suffered greatly for it.

of course i would expect accusations of absurdity in response to these thoughts, but when it gets down to it all i can say to people who characterize interpretations like this as being absurd - listen to the music and read all the lyrics from start to finish. take note of the songs that have most explicitly demonstrated that their longing for each other is romantic and/or sexual in nature - e.g. My Sister Lover, Guess God Thinks I’m Abel, It’s A Crime, If We Shadows, Songbird, Let There Be Love - and the themes and motifs they present, and look at how they have been woven endlessly throughout all the music they made (together and separately) for over 30 years. those recurrent themes - criminal shame, the intangible/unattainable nature of safety, fear of the outside world and judgement, a need to escape, dreams of finding refuges, communicating the contents of the heart through song, idolizing or regarding your lover religiously, stewing in the pain of their absence, hopelessness, appeals for pragmatism met with appeals to the supremacy of love and the courage to love boldly, mourning the death of a romantic and familial relationship, and more - are what make it incredibly easy to pick up the narrative of their story across their work and understand what unique circumstances, emotions, beliefs, and behaviors made it so that they were never able to find their footing with each other despite how deeply they loved each other.

and that’s without even considering the historical events that lined up with the timeline of their music - such as, for example, footage of Noel doing an interview looking truly miserable and sick with jealousy prior to an enormous show, during which he immediately drives the conversation into a discussion about how he had to find out about Liam’s engagement to his girlfriend through the papers, sardonically calling him the man of the hour; and then later in the day, experiencing what can only be described as a complete collapse of emotions and judgement that led to him walking up to his brother (who was sitting on stage in front of 40,000 people and their cameras) and pulling a wide-eyed Liam into a fully-reciprocated, open-mouth-and-tongue kiss (that, mind you, only exists now in photos, despite the epic size and scale of the event). soap opera levels of angst, and we can only estimate what uncontrollable emotions and thoughts were informing his actions in that moment - was he demonstrating ownership by engaging his brother in that way in front of a crowd of 40,000, flaunting how malleable Liam was for him? was he overcome with despair at the thought of an imminent goodbye? was he trying to appear bold cool and unaffected? or all of that? 

for Liam’s part, it will never stop fascinating me to observe how he seemed so confident in his feelings and what he wanted from the very beginning. it’s clear that his love for Noel was paramount and he would have done or said anything to have Noel choose him, outside perception not even being a consideration. i don’t think there was ever a point that Liam would have cared if the public found out. outside of his music he has always been just as transparent and without shame in expressing these intense emotions and desires, and has been literally begging Noel his whole life to let himself love him the way he naturally would if no one was watching. 

it’s incredible to see that Liam has persisted in maintaining that same mindset, genuine vulnerability, bloody gushing heart on his sleeve existence. and that he’s just as blindly romantic for the same person at 52 years old as he was at the beginning of his life when he experienced all those emotions for the first time and immediately placed them above everything else in the world. his behavior and words throughout their estrangement has been distinctly and unabashedly lovesick in nature, obsessive and romantic, something that Noel had remarked on outright in interviews during their separation. Liam never shied away from revealing exactly how much he was suffering and why.

Paddy + Augustin 👀

https://telltaletv.com/2022/11/creator-and-cast-members-discuss-sas-rogue-heroes-interview/