Manic Street Preachers in 1994. L-R: Sean Moore (drums), Nicky Wire (bass), James Dean Bradfield (guitar/vocals), Richey Edwards (guitar)
"Rock and roll is our epiphany,"
sing the Manic Street Preachers on their 1992 song "Little Baby Nothing,"
"culture, alienation, boredom and despair."
That couplet could be the band's manifesto - although it occurs to me that I should probably include the next line, which is "ooh ooh ooh." The combination of those five elements, rock and roll, culture, alienation, boredom and despair, is present on every single Manics album to this day (there has occasionally been a bit more boredom than one might wish, but only occasionally). In particular, I would single out alienation as a key concept that runs through the band's career: from the flat-out punk of their early days, through the glam sound of their early 90s work, the twisted post-punk of their 1994 masterpiece The Holy Bible and the mainstream rock of their later work, alienation both in a Marxist and a conventional sense has been a constant.
The Manics first started making waves at the end of the 80s/start of the 90s with catchy, politicized punk songs and eye-catching media statements which frequently involved venomous attacks on other bands and musicians. One of their first singles was called "Motown Junk" and contained the line "I laughed when Lennon got shot"; they were operating upon the maxim that all publicity was good publicity. In modern parlance, they were trolling.
The politics was an an integral element of the band's art at this point. The Manics all came from the same community: Blackwood, a Welsh coal mining town whose economy was devastated by Thatcher's deliberate destruction of the industry. Everything the band wrote was informed by a socialist perspective, and they presented themselves as more of a left-wing Situationist art group than as a conventional rock band. The music, in the early days, was almost an afterthought - the intention was to provoke controversy and debate.
The band was divided into two discrete elements: guitarist/lead vocalist James Dean Bradfield and his cousin and the band's drummer Sean Moore, who between them wrote the music, and bassist Nicky Wire and Richey Edwards, ostensibly the band's rhythm guitarist (although he could barely hold down a chord and the band frequently unplugged him when they played live), who together managed the band's conceptual side, writing the lyrics and developing with the band's look (which varied from punk to glam to some kind of weird terrorist chic), as well as thinking up publicity stunts and to an extent determining the musical direction of each album.
Having got themselves a media profile that was frankly disproportionate to both the quality and popularity of their music with their publicity stunts, the Manic Street Preachers announced that their debut album would be the "greatest rock album ever" and sell 16 million copies around the world "from Bangkok to Senegal," after which, mission accomplished, the band would split up. It was around this time that Edwards got into an argument with the music journalist and broadcaster Steve Lamacq about the band's authenticity and decided to prove his point by carving "4 Real" into his arm with a razor blade - in hindsight, this was a bit of a red flag.
When it arrived, the Manics' debut album, Generation Terrorists of course did not sell anything like 16 million copies - initial sales were around 250,000, enough for it to reach No. 13 in the UK charts (sales figures for Senegal and Bangkok are unknown). The band did not split up, and their career began to follow a more conventional trajectory: the sophomore album attempted to refine the debut's sound, and they began to have hits and do more normal interviews in which nobody ended up in hospital.
However, Edwards' mental health deteriorated. In 1994, he wrote most of the lyrics and determined the musical direction of the band's harrowing masterpiece, The Holy Bible, before checking into The Priory with mental health issues including anorexia, alcoholism and depression. In early 1995, he disappeared and has never been seen again. In 2008, he was declared dead in absentia, but the case has never been definitively resolved.
In 1996, the Manics came back as a three-piece with their most important song, the working class anthem "A Design for Life." Their popularity exploded, but they were a different band, still excellent, but more conventional, more mainstream (although on the other hand, I can't think of another mainstream rock band who had Fidel Castro attend one of their concerts). After their late-90s apogee, they sort of blew it with a couple of albums people other than me didn't like very much, before settling into a comfortable middle-age release pattern, continuing to enjoy modest commercial success without attracting much attention. Although their young selves would probably hate the idea of this version of the band, they still write very good songs. The world of music is better for their continued existence.
***
As you may have guessed, I am an unapologetic fan of this band, the kind who enjoys even random b-sides and finds it difficult to view any of their work objectively. In my teens, I bored the snot out of all my school friends by talking about them ceaselessly for about a year. I like all their albums and personally don't think they've made a bad one - most music fans would disagree with me about that. Above all, I met my wife at a Manics gig in 2013, and so owe the band an eternal debt for making me literally the happiest person in the world.
Despite all this, I've attempted to approach their discography objectively while putting together this ranking, aimed at anybody with a passing interest in listening to their work. Incidentally, I've tried to avoid the word "anthemic" as much as possible, because it's a lazy cliché employed by all journalists when writing about this band.
Now, let's proceed to the ranking!
13. LIFEBLOOD (2004)
(It was rock, but it sure as hell was not new or revolutionary - thank you, NME, for that completely inaccurate marketing slogan.)
...there was a sense that the tide was turning against the Manics. I reckon their confidence took a serious knock; they seemed rattled in the subsequent half-decade. The result was a convoluted series of sessions with various producers that led to this keyboard-dominated oddity. I rather like it - it has a nostalgic beauty - but I wouldn't recommend starting here. The third single from the album was cancelled, and the band went on hiatus after the tour (I saw them play Leeds University Union in this period - they were actually really good that night).
12. GOLD AGAINST THE SOUL (1993)
This is a real curate's egg. After their hugely ambitious debut album, the goal here seemed to be to refine the glam metal-dominated sound of Generation Terrorists into something more accessible, retaining that album's political edge but displaying it through a personal lens.
After their 2006 hiatus (during which both Bradfield and Wire released excellent solo albums), the Manics resorted to a cliché that is found somewhere in the discography of any band of long standing: they recorded a "back-to-basics" rock album. Send Away the Tigers harks back to various hallmarks of their classic work: "Indian Summer" directly recalls 1996's "A Design for Life," while the glam-rock and punk moves of several other songs evoke their early years. The best track (also the band's last real hit), "Your Love Alone Is Not Enough," a duet with Nina Persson from The Cardigans, is possibly the Manics' catchiest song of all time, and the album as a whole is a tad insubstantial but great fun.
Results were mixed. The best songs are amongst the finest work ever produced by the band - in particular, "From Despair to Where," "La Tristesse Durera" and "Roses in the Hospital" are timeless anthems of alienation. However, the less said about stuff like "Drug Drug Druggy," "Nostalgic Pushead" and "Symphony of Tourette's," the better. The other songs land somewhere between, but are ultimately inessential.
11. KNOW YOUR ENEMY (2001)
This album would be at the bottom of many fans' lists, but I like its bravery and eclecticism. After releasing their most polished, commercially successful album, Manic Street Preachers decided to spend their cultural capital on this raw, overstuffed collection of genre experiments - their second-longest album after the debut.
The Manics are often compared to The Clash, whom they have frequently cited as influences - I'd say this is their most "Clash-esque" album, with a more spontaneous recording process, highly political lyrics, and an unpolished, punky feel. It's overlong and several tracks are sub-standard, but it also has a number of great deep cuts such as "The Convalescent" and "My Guernica," and the singles are ace too.
10. RESISTANCE IS FUTILE (2018)
In their most recent album, the Manics paid tribute to their heroes and wrestled with the issue of obsolescence. They also went full-on FM rock: glossy 80s Van Halen synths, harmonized guitars, big choruses (well, big choruses are pretty much a given) and a very shiny production job courtesy of their new studio, Door to the River.
The album is perhaps a little overproduced, but it's full of great, immediate songs, such as the Yves Klein tribute "International Blue" and the lament for lost innocence "Distant Colours." As with many recent Manics albums, the highlight is a duet. This one is with Catherine Davies AKA The Anchoress, "Dylan and Caitlin," a moving song* about the final years of Dylan Thomas, with Bradfield and Davies singing the titular roles.
*It bears a passing resemblance to Elton John and Kiki Dee's "Don't Go Breaking My Heart," but I'll let them off.
9. FUTUROLOGY (2014)
Early 80s post punk and sophisti-pop influences combined with the band's classicist pop-rock songwriting on the Manics' twelfth album, resulting in an infectious album of art-rock full of guest spots and left turns. The album's overt artsiness resulted in it being one of the most critically acclaimed Manics albums.
Unfortunately, Futurology loses momentum in the last two or three songs, which leaves it lower in my ranking than it otherwise might be - its failure to stick the landing always leaves me feeling vaguely let down. However, the first three quarters of the album contains some absolutely storming tunes.
8. SEND AWAY THE TIGERS (2007)
7. JOURNAL FOR PLAGUE LOVERS (2009)
Based on a folder full of lyrics and poetry that Richey Edwards gave to the other band members shortly before his disappearance, Journal for Plague Lovers is an oddity in the late Manics catalogue. In their catalogue as a whole, in fact - they don't have another album remotely like this. Unlike the word salads Richey lyrics tended to result in back in the 90s, here Bradfield, Moore, and Wire prune Edwards' screeds into haikus of despair, and pair them with cold, minimalist art-punk. It's not an unequivocal artistic success, but it is an intriguing and unsettling listen.
6. POSTCARDS FROM A YOUNG MAN (2010)
While Postcards from a Young Man was being recorded, Nicky Wire announced that the sound of the record would be "heavy metal Motown," probably causing James Dean Bradfield to curse the impossibility of actually creating such a thing. In the event, the sound was basically Manics + strings + choir, which is fine by me.
This was the first Manic Street Preachers album not to contain a UK Top 20 single (except Journal for Plague Lovers, but that didn't have singles), and they haven't had one since. Nevertheless, a lot of the songs feel like hits. The album's welcoming, summery tone belies the fact that the album is steeped in melancholy and fear for the future; not only is it musically very beautiful at times, it also functions as an incisive and prescient analysis of the United Kingdom at the start of the 2010s.
5. REWIND THE FILM (2013)
In 2013 and 2014, the Manics released two albums they had recorded concurrently. According to the hype, the idea was that Rewind the Film was a gentle and rather nostalgic acoustic album, and that Futurology was an arty and experimental effort that would take the Manics sound into the modern era.
The thing is, I think the acoustic album is actually more experimental and takes more risks than the "arty" one. There isn't really a traditional Manics song on here, and it's full of quirky experiments like "4 Lonely Roads," on which Cate Le Bon sings lead vocals, and "(I Miss the) Tokyo Skyline," which revolves around subtle, looping electronics. Best of all is the magnificently melancholic title track, but it's a late-career triumph from start to finish and their best album of the 21st Century.
(I might be biased - I met my lovely wife on the tour for this album, so it truly changed my life.)
4. GENERATION TERRORISTS (1992)
From a certain perspective, the Manics's debut album is just college agit-prop sloganeering bolted onto shittily produced pseudo-hair metal. To which I say:
a) There are several songs that are considerably more than that. In particular, "Motorcycle
Emptiness" is a classic anthem of alienation with one of the greatest lead guitar parts of all time,
and "Little Baby Nothing" is the Manics' first and greatest duet, a beautiful and scathing anti-
patriarchy ballad.
b) College agit-prop sloganeering bolted onto shittily produced pseudo-hair metal is awesome.
So yes, Generation Terrorists is much longer than it needs to be at 18 tracks and 73 minutes, yes, the programmed drums sound bloody horrible, yes, there's absolutely no need to get The Bomb Squad to produce a remix of one of the album's least interesting tracks, yes, it does kind of sound like Mötley Crüe got infiltrated by Communists...
...what was my point again? Ah, yes...
...but it's fun. You can chant along, play air guitar, headbang, and some of the sloganeering makes you think. Plus those two songs I mentioned before are so good I decided to embed both of them.
3. THIS IS MY TRUTH TELL ME YOURS (1998)
There is a certain vintage of Manics fan who will be furious that I have placed this album, their commercial apex, ahead of Generation Terrorists in my ranking. The widescreen FM rock of This Is My Truth Tell Me Yours was viewed by some as a betrayal of the band's punk roots. The first album where the lyrics were entirely written by Nicky Wire, it often explores grief and depression rather than being confrontationally political - another strike against the album in the eyes of some "true fans."
However, the songs on this album, whatever their lyrical theme, are brilliantly written and beautifully produced and arranged, and the album's much-maligned second half is a procession of the most underrated material in the band's career. Also, there is some sharp political writing on songs like "Ready for Drowning" and the band's first UK Number 1, "If You Tolerate This Your Children Will Be Next." Taking an anti-fascist protest song to the top of the UK charts is one of the Manics' finest achievements; unfortunately, the song seems to become more relevant with each passing year.
2. EVERYTHING MUST GO (1996)
After the disappearance of Richey Edwards - never solved, never resolved - there was a question mark over the continued existence of the Manic Street Preachers. However, one day in late 1995, James Dean Bradfield fused two sets of Nicky Wire lyrics into a song so glorious that it alone justified the band's prolongation. "A Design for Life," a brilliant and timeless song of working class self-elevation and systemic repression, is one of those songs with a life of its own. It became ubiquitous in the UK, and soared to the top of the...
...actually, it was denied the number one spot by "Return of the Mack" by Mark Morrison. Oh well, at least it beat Gina G's "Ooh Aah... Just a Little Bit."
In a way, Richey Edwards was still part of the band on this album. Several lyrics are his, including the haunting "Small Black Flowers That Grow in the Sky," one of his finest works, and "Kevin Carter," a song about the true story of a war photographer who, unable to handle the trauma inflicted upon him by his work, took his own life (one of Edwards' last known interactions was to object to Bradfield's decision to give the verses a bossa nova rhythm, but the final version is undeniable).
Everything Must Go as a whole is affecting, rousing and basically without flaw, containing some of the band's most direct and immediate, as well as their most emotionally resonant, material. It was directly responsible for a new level of exposure and acclaim, and for the Manics' continuation to this day. New listeners, start here: this album contains the essence of the Manic Street Preachers.
1. THE HOLY BIBLE (1994)
The Holy Bible stands apart from the rest of the Manic Street Preachers discography. Musically, the album's convoluted post-punk is unlike anything else they produced, seeming to come from a darker dimension. Lyrically, Richey Edwards takes the lead - the lyrics of first two albums were written collaboratively with Wire, here it's at least 70% Edwards - and explores the full extent of his torment. The album expresses, in harrowing manner, both self-disgust and disgust with the world. In modern geek parlance, it's the "darkest timeline" version of the Manics.
Subject matter: prostitution, imperialism, fascism, self-harm, anorexia, depression, genocide, suicide. This is not a cheery listen. It's actually one of the Manics albums I listen to least frequently, because quite frankly it's a bit of a bummer. Edwards was seriously mentally ill at this point, and his pain permeates every note of The Holy Bible.
The darkness surrounding the group at this point seems to elevate their work onto another plane. James' guitar playing, singing and the melodies themselves are inhuman, focusing on chromatic or minor-key progressions and modes in contrast to the more conventional writing found elsewhere in the band's catalogue. Wire's basslines follow suit, and Moore's drum sound, having previously sounded stadium rock-esque, is stripped down to a bone-dry thud. It's a sound more reminiscent of Joy Division, PiL, or Wire than the band's earlier glam-punk or later mainstream rock stylings. They were never able to recapture the mood of this album (probably a good thing in terms of their mental health).
There are some people who only have time for The Holy Bible, and can't be bothered with the rest of the Manics discography. While I certainly don't agree with that, I do understand it. This is something else.
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