Oasis Halt Auction of £1.6m Archive of Unreleased Recordings

Oasis has reportedly taken legal action to stop a major archive of previously unheard recordings from being sold at auction, just days before the collection was due to go under the hammer.

The recordings, valued at between £1.2 million and £1.6 million, had been scheduled for sale through Littleton Auctions in Worcestershire on Saturday 3 October. However, the collection has now been withdrawn following a legal challenge involving rights to the material.

The wider Oasis memorabilia auction is still scheduled to take place, with other items from the collection remaining available for sale.

What is in the unreleased Oasis archive?

Known as The Desk Tapes, the archive was assembled by former Oasis sound engineer Huw Richards, who worked with the band between 1994 and 2001.

It is understood to contain recordings from 63 live performances, together with rehearsal sessions and private conversations involving members of the band. The material spans one of the most important periods in Oasis history, beginning around the release of Definitely Maybe and continuing through the years in which the group became one of the biggest bands in the world.

The collection attracted considerable attention when plans for its sale emerged in September because much of the material has never been officially released.

For Oasis fans and collectors, that potentially made the archive one of the most significant privately held collections of recordings from the band's peak years.

Oasis intervenes before 3 October auction

The recordings had been due to form the centrepiece of Littleton Auctions' Icons and Artifacts music sale in Evesham on 3 October.

According to reports, Oasis has now challenged the proposed sale on intellectual-property grounds, resulting in the recordings being withdrawn while the dispute is resolved.

That distinction is important. Possession of the physical tapes does not necessarily give their owner the right to commercially release or exploit the performances contained on them, and the disagreement now appears to centre on the respective rights attached to the archive.

No indication has yet been given as to whether the recordings could eventually return to auction or whether an agreement might be reached over their future.

Other Oasis memorabilia remains in the auction

Although the unreleased recordings have been removed, the wider Littleton sale is still scheduled to go ahead on Saturday.

The catalogue includes other material connected with Huw Richards' time working with Oasis, including touring documents, set sheets and memorabilia from the band's career.

That means the legal intervention appears, for now, to concern the recorded archive rather than preventing the entire collection from being sold.

Renewed interest in unreleased Oasis material

The dispute arrives at a particularly active moment in the band's history.

Following the Live ’25 reunion, Oasis are now preparing for their Live ’27 tour, with all 42 announced shows selling out at the end of September.

The band's return has inevitably renewed interest in its archive, including recordings, footage and other material that has remained unheard or unseen for decades.

The fate of The Desk Tapes is now uncertain, but the attempt to sell them has provided a rare glimpse at just how much undocumented material from Oasis' defining years may still exist outside the band's official archive.