Noel Gallagher performed Half The World away in touching tribute to Caroline Aherne

Noel Gallagher performed Half The World away in touching tribute to Caroline Aherne

Noel Gallagher performed Half The World away in touching tribute to Caroline Aherne

Noel Gallagher was half the world away from Manchester on Saturday night when he paid a stirring farewell to the late Caroline Aherne.

Just hours after news the writer and actress had passed away following her lengthy battle with cancer, the High Flying Birds frontman dedicated his song Half The World Away - that of course being the theme to The Royle Family - to his good friend while on tour in the US.

Earlier in the day, Gallagher had posted a photograph of Aherne on his Instagram account. Speaking to a sell-out 2,400 crowd packed inside Nashville's Ryman Auditorium, the Mancunian star said: "I want to dedicate the next song to a friend of mine who died this afternoon.

"Her name was Caroline and she was a very, very, very funny woman. She used this next song on a very, very, very brilliant sitcom in England called The RoyleFamily."

Pointing to the heavens, Gallagher then said: "So wherever you are."

Touching, poignant and bursting with warmth, it's totally befitting a woman whose comedy gave us all so much joy.

Marc Chacksfield
Content Director

As Content Director of Shortlist, Marc likes nothing more than to compile endless lists of an evening by candlelight. He started out life as a movie writer for numerous (now defunct) magazines and soon found himself online - editing a gaggle of gadget sites, including TechRadar, Digital Camera World and Tom's Guide UK. At Shortlist you'll find him mostly writing about movies and tech, so no change there then.