/ VICES /
W hen a 22-year-old Liam
Gallagher sang “ all I need is cigarettes and alcohol ” in Oasis ’ s 1994 single of the same name , he was articulating an outlook on life common among people of this age – living for the day . After all , talking to someone who is barely out of their teens about the importance of making regular contributions to fund their retirement is likely to elicit a look of contempt before they return to a more pressing concern – making the most of their youth .
However , time has a habit of catching up with you much faster than you expect and the feeling of immortality you may have had in your early 20s can give way to a feeling of despair when you wake up one day and realise you are now closer to retirement age than to your teenage years , with the gap widening all the time .
You can at least cross off one item from your list of worries if you have been sensible with your finances and put a small amount away each month for a rainy day .
Unfortunately , this is not a situation Liam Gallagher finds himself in . While Oasis have been one of the most successful UK rock bands of the past 20 years , selling more than 70 million records , it is Gallagher ’ s brother Noel as the songwriter who receives the lion ’ s share of the royalties . And while in 2011 , website Celebrity Net Worth
Assuming he smoked 20 a day , Liam Gallagher would have spent £ 43,422.15 on cigarettes since 1994
estimated the younger of the two brothers had made £ 50m over the course of his career , when he divorced Nicole Appleton last year , the judge in the case estimated he had just £ 11m to be split with his ex-wife .
Of course , rock stars have a hedonistic reputation to maintain and Gallagher admits his cost of living has taken its toll , particularly when touring . As he put it in a 2013 interview with NME : “ I don ’ t go on the road to come back with a big pot of money . I go on the road to have a good time , do great gigs and enjoy being in a band . And that means staying in good hotels and flying business class .”
“ I don ’ t want a f ***** g Mini picking me up at the airport , I want a nice f ***** g car picking me up , and if I come back and I ’ ve made no money on that tour because it ’ s all been spent , then I ’ m happy with that .”
CUTTING BACK If Gallagher did want to cut back on his cost of living , a good place to start would be two of the vices that made him successful in the first place : cigarettes and alcohol . Take cigarettes to start with . Data from the Tobacco Manufacturers ’ Association shows that the average price of a pack of cigarettes has almost quadrupled in the 22 years since Oasis released the single Cigarettes and Alcohol , from £ 2.52 in 1994 to £ 9.60 today . Assuming Gallagher smoked 20 a day , he would have spent £ 43,422.15 on cigarettes from the start of 1994 up until the present day .
In terms of alcohol , data from the Office for National Statistics shows the average price of a pint of lager has increased from £ 1.58 in 1994 to £ 3.47 in 2016 , an increase of 120 per cent . Assuming Gallagher drank an average of five pints every day from 1994 – admittedly this is more than three times the recommended amount for adult males , but rock stars aren ’ t exactly famed for moderation – he would have spent £ 103,312.5 on beer .
WHERE BETTER TO INVEST ? Added together , the amount Gallagher would have saved from abstaining from these two vices over the past 22 years stands at £ 146,734.65 . However , sitting on a large amount of money over such a lengthy period of time is never a good idea when you can put it to work in markets , and what
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