Oasis released “Wonderwall” as a single on October 30, 1995, after it had appeared on (What’s the Story) Morning Glory? earlier that month. The song had already been performed backstage at Glastonbury four months before the single arrived. Its familiar lead vocal, though, came down to a decision made during the band’s sessions at Rockfield Studios in Monmouth, where Noel Gallagher and Owen Morris shared production duties.
Morris told Sound on Sound that Noel offered Liam the choice of singing “Wonderwall” or “Don’t Look Back in Anger.” Liam picked “Wonderwall,” and most of the recording was completed that Wednesday. Noel layered three acoustic guitar parts, while Paul “Bonehead” Arthurs played the Mellotron’s cello sound. Morris guided Arthurs through the part, including its harmony notes. Liam recorded four takes, from which Morris assembled the lead vocal. The arrangement wasn’t quite finished: Noel added the closing piano weeks later, and Morris put in keyboard strings during mixing.
That cello sound gave director Nigel Dick something he could put on screen. In an interview with Oasis Recording Information, he explained that it inspired the cello player and musical saw players in the video. Noel’s brief called for black and white with touches of colour; the label also warned Dick against asking the band to act. He drew on The Beatles’ films and put a table football game on set to help catch the musicians in less guarded moments. A showgirl offered a specific nod to Help!, while Dick’s own childhood record player inspired the turntable seen in the clip. Some effects were made with materials that could fit in a stationery drawer: green paper stuck onto Noel’s guitar allowed its colour to be isolated during post-production, and torn black card held in front of the lens darkened the picture’s edges. Switching the camera on and off during takes briefly overexposed the film, producing the flashes used in the edit.
The single also gave listeners “The Masterplan” as a B-side, alongside “Round Are Way” and “The Swamp Song.” Both “The Masterplan” and “The Swamp Song” later appeared on Oasis’ 1998 B-sides compilation, with “The Masterplan” supplying its title and closing track.
“Wonderwall” entered the UK singles chart at No. 2 in November 1995. It stayed in the Top 10 for its first five chart weeks, then returned there over Christmas and into the following year. That first uninterrupted chart run lasted 30 weeks, carrying it into June 1996.
The song reached another milestone in October 2020, when it became the first track from the 1990s to pass one billion Spotify streams. The band’s publicity announcement tied that achievement to the 25th-anniversary reissue of (What’s the Story) Morning Glory?, which had returned the album to No. 3 in the UK.
