Oasis recordings withdrawn from October auction amid legal proceedings

Oasis recordings have been withdrawn from Littleton Auctions’ 3 October sale in Evesham after legal proceedings began, the auction house said on 30 September. The collection, known as The Desk Tapes, had been expected to sell for between £1.2 million and £1.6 million. The rest of the auction is due to go ahead, leaving the recordings’ future subject to a dispute whose legal details have not been made public in the reports available so far.

Littleton managing director Ben Homer told The Independent that the tapes had been withdrawn ‘in light of legal proceedings’. He said the auction house was disappointed that it could no longer offer the archive as planned, but that the rest of its sale was unaffected. Homer said Littleton respected the legal process and would make no further comment on the proceedings at this stage.

What Owain Richards says about the dispute

Owain Richards, whose father Huw Richards made the recordings while working as an Oasis sound engineer, said the band had sued them to try to prevent the sale. ‘We have agreed to postpone the auction [of the tapes] to enable the legal dispute to be resolved either by litigation or otherwise in an orderly way,’ he told the BBC. His account describes why the sale was postponed; the reports do not provide the court papers needed to establish the precise legal claims.

The Independent also reported Owain Richards’ statement and said it had contacted Oasis representatives for comment. Its report included no response from them. Neither that report nor the BBC account identified a court, case number, filing text or the specific order being sought. The descriptions of a lawsuit and legal proceedings therefore do not establish what a court has decided, or whether any hearing has been scheduled.

What is in The Desk Tapes

The Independent reported that the archive had a guide price of £1.2 million to £1.6 million. That was the expected auction range for the collection before its withdrawal, rather than a sale result. With the tapes removed from the 3 October event, the reported valuation gives a measure of what had been due to come before bidders, but no transaction for the recordings has been reported.

What happens to the 3 October auction

Homer told The Independent that the other items in Littleton’s sale would proceed as planned. They include internal tour itineraries, original setlists, a band-played Epiphone guitar and an Oasis tour parka. The distinction matters for anyone following the event: the postponement concerns the recordings, while the auction house says the remaining memorabilia will still be offered.

The proposed sale had already drawn opposition from the band before the withdrawal. The Independent reported that, shortly after the auction was announced earlier in September, Littleton had confirmed Oasis did not support it. At that point, Homer said the auction house was handling the material with transparency and through a legal process. The subsequent withdrawal is the new development: the archive will not be offered at the scheduled auction while the dispute continues.

The BBC reported that the recordings had been brought to sale by Owain Richards. His statement says he and his father agreed to postpone the tapes’ auction so the dispute could be resolved through litigation or another route. It does not give a timetable for either outcome. The auction house’s statement likewise addresses the immediate sale, without setting a replacement date for the recordings.

What remains unclear about the legal case

The public accounts establish the practical result: The Desk Tapes are out of the 3 October auction. They do not set out the legal basis for Oasis’s challenge, identify the relief requested in a filing or establish the next procedural step. Until court documents or further statements become available, the parties’ descriptions should not be treated as a ruling on who may own, sell or use the recordings.