Noel Gallagher has discussed his time in lockdown, saying that the “biggest benefit” of the period was all the new music he wrote.

Last week, Gallagher announced details of a Greatest Hits album from his High Flying Birds, with ‘Back The Way We Came: Vol 1 (2011-2021)’ celebrating a decade of the band and being revealed alongside a brand new song called ‘We’re On Our Way Now’.

In a new interview with BBC Radio 6 Music, Gallagher discussed the new album and how, despite “hating every single day of lockdown,” he enjoyed using the time to be more creative.

“I’ve hated every single day of lockdown and what it’s done to society and people and children, and all that, it’s been dreadful,” he said (per Contact Music). “But at the end of 2019 when I got back off the end of that tour from Mumbai, I’d given myself till 2023 off, anyway, before the pandemic.

“I went away on tour, I had two little sons. I got back and one of them has got a tache and the other one is wearing jewellery and they’re calling me ‘bruv’. I was saying to Sarah, ‘How long have I been away?’ And she goes, ‘Well, too long.’ So I was kind of like, ‘Right I need to be around for a bit,’ so I’d given myself a couple years out anyway.

“Then the pandemic came along and what that what that did for me creatively, was made me a finish off these songs that are on the Best Of, and have a look at everything that I had lying around, half songs that were finished and half-baked, new ideas, and I started to kick them into shape.”

He concluded that the “biggest benefit” of lockdown was his own music. “I’ve got more songs that I would ordinarily have now,” he said.

Gallagher also recently admitted h’’s hit a “purple patch” in his songwriting of late. Speaking on Matt Morgan’s podcast, he said: “I’ve been in the studio on a bit of a roll. Bit of a run, bit of a purple patch, some mega tunes, really fucking great.

“I’m doing the songs for a new album. I’ve been in the studio every day. If I didn’t have that, I don’t know where I’d be at now. If I wasn’t going in there every day. Actually, some fucking great stuff has come out of it.”