"I'm Outta Time" is a song by English rock

Rock music

Rock music is a genre of popular music that developed during and after the 1960s, particularly in the United Kingdom and the United States. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, itself heavily influenced by rhythm and blues and country music...

 band Oasis

Oasis (band)

Oasis were an English rock band formed in Manchester in 1991. Originally known as The Rain, the group was formed by Liam Gallagher , Paul "Bonehead" Arthurs , Paul "Guigsy" McGuigan and Tony McCarroll , who were soon joined by Liam's older brother Noel Gallagher...

, featured on their seventh studio album, Dig Out Your Soul

Dig Out Your Soul

Dig Out Your Soul is the seventh and final studio album by English rock band Oasis. It was released in October 2008. The first single, "The Shock of the Lightning", was released on 29 September 2008. In promotion of the album, the band embarked on a world tour, debuting in Seattle, Washington at...

. The second single from the album, succeeding "The Shock of the Lightning

The Shock of the Lightning

"The Shock of the Lightning" is a song by English rock band Oasis and is the fourth track from the band's seventh studio album, Dig Out Your Soul. The song was released as the first single from the album on 29 September 2008...

", "I'm Outta Time" was written by lead vocalist Liam Gallagher

Liam Gallagher

William John Paul "Liam" Gallagher is an English musician and singer-songwriter, the former frontman of the English rock band Oasis and currently of the band Beady Eye. Gallagher's erratic behaviour, distinctive singing style, and abrasive attitude have been the subject of commentary in the press...

 and released on 1 December 2008.

Composition

The song bears similarity, in style, to John Lennon

John Lennon

John Winston Lennon, MBE was an English musician and singer-songwriter who rose to worldwide fame as one of the founding members of The Beatles, one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music...

's work in the early 1970s. The piano which features on the track partly emulates that of Lennon's "Jealous Guy

Jealous Guy

"Jealous Guy" is a song written and performed by John Lennon which first appeared on his 1971 album Imagine. It is one of the most commonly covered Lennon songs, with at least ninety-two recorded cover versions, the most notable being Roxy Music's version, which reached number one in several...

", with the three octave jumps in C major. The song also has a backing piano part similar in content to that of The Beatles' "A Day in the Life

A Day in the Life

"A Day in the Life" is a song by The Beatles, the final track on the group's 1967 album Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. Credited to Lennon–McCartney, the song comprises distinct segments written independently by John Lennon and Paul McCartney, with orchestral additions...

", which also contains a three octave jump in C major. Liam jokingly claims that it took him nine years to write the song. However, in a different interview Liam Gallagher claimed that he wrote the song "While sitting on the end of my bed".

The song features a short speech sample from John Lennon taken from one of his last interviews in 1980. The speech sample says: "As Churchill

Winston Churchill

Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill, was a predominantly Conservative British politician and statesman known for his leadership of the United Kingdom during the Second World War. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest wartime leaders of the century and served as Prime Minister twice...

 said, it's every Englishman's inalienable right to live where the hell he likes. What's it going to do, vanish? Is it not going to be there when I get back?".

Reception

The song has been noted as one of the highlights of the album by fans, as well as the band themselves, with guitarist Noel Gallagher

Noel Gallagher

Noel Thomas David Gallagher is an English musician and singer-songwriter, formerly the lead guitarist, backing vocalist and principal songwriter of the English rock band Oasis. He is currently fronting his solo project, Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds.Raised in Burnage, Manchester with his...

 labelling it "deceptively brilliant". It has also been praised by music critics, with NME

NME

The New Musical Express is a popular music publication in the United Kingdom, published weekly since March 1952. It started as a music newspaper, and gradually moved toward a magazine format during the 1980s, changing from newsprint in 1998. It was the first British paper to include a singles...

calling it a return to form, and comparing it to the music of Oasis-admired rock band The Beatles

The Beatles

The Beatles were an English rock band, active throughout the 1960s and one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music. Formed in Liverpool, by 1962 the group consisted of John Lennon , Paul McCartney , George Harrison and Ringo Starr...

.

It charted at #12 in the UK Singles Chart - the first Oasis single to miss the top ten since 1994, but the reason for his would be the dying of indie music becoming a lot less popular since 2006's 'Don't Believe The Truth', ending the band's streak of 22 consecutive top tens. It spent only two weeks in the UK top 75, the least ever by any Oasis single. Although only peaking at number 48 in France, the song spent a total of 28 weeks in the French Singles Chart, the most ever by any Oasis single.

Music video

The music video for "I'm Outta Time" was released in November 2008. Filmed in black and white, it shows Liam Gallagher, the only band member to appear in the clip, on a "surreal journey through a moon-lit English landscape". At the end of the video, Liam is filmed in a close-up profile shot lying down. This bears resemblance to the back cover artwork for John Lennon's album "Imagine". It also resembles the cover of Lennon's 1973 album Mind Games

Mind Games

Mind Games is John Lennon's fourth post-Beatles album, and was recorded and released in 1973. Like his previous album, the politically topical and somewhat abrasive Some Time in New York City, Mind Games was poorly received by music critics...

.

Other versions

The song was covered by singer Lily Allen

Lily Allen

Lily Rose Beatrice Cooper , better known as Lily Allen, is an English recording artist and fashion designer. She is the daughter of actor and musician Keith Allen and film producer Alison Owen. In her teenage years, her musical tastes evolved from glam rock to alternative...

 on BBC's Live Lounge

Live Lounge

The Live Lounge is a segment on the British radio station BBC Radio 1. Originally hosted by Jo Whiley on her mid-morning radio show and now hosted by Fearne Cotton, it exhibits well-known artists usually performing one song of their own and one by another artist, in an acoustic format...

 on 2 December 2009.

Track listing

Charts

Chart (2008)	Peak position
European Hot 100 Singles	25
French Singles Chart Syndicat National de l'Edition Phonographique The Syndicat national de l'édition phonographique is the inter-professional organization which protects the interests of the French record industry...	48
Germany Singles Chart Media Control Charts The official music charts in Germany are gathered and published by the company Media Control GfK International on behalf of Bundesverband Musikindustrie...	62
Italian Singles Chart Federation of the Italian Music Industry The Federation of the Italian Music Industry is an umbrella organization that keeps track of virtually all aspects of the music recording industry in Italy....	41
Polish Singles Chart	29
UK Indie Chart UK Indie Chart The UK Independent Chart or Indie Chart is a chart of the best-selling independent record releases in the UK.- History :In the wake of punk, small record labels began to spring up, as an outlet for artists that were unwilling to sign contracts with major record companies, or were not considered...	1
UK Singles Chart UK Singles Chart The UK Singles Chart is compiled by The Official Charts Company on behalf of the British record-industry. The full chart contains the top selling 200 singles in the United Kingdom based upon combined record sales and download numbers, though some media outlets only list the Top 40 or the Top 75 ...	12
U.S. Billboard Hot 100 Singles Sales Hot 100 Singles Sales The Hot Singles Sales chart is a chart released weekly by Billboard magazine in the United States. It measures sales of commercial singles and is one of three component charts, along with the Hot 100 Airplay and the Hot Digital Songs, that determine the chart positions of singles on the...	9