By Baz Francis
When Über Röck asked me to review the new Manic Street Preachers album, I felt hesitant at first due to my bias with them being my all-time favourite band alongside Queen, but in that I found a challenge to try and remain objective despite my obvious love for them anyway.
Thankfully for me, I’d already heard ‘The Ultra Vivid Lament’ and it is exactly the album the band should have made this time around. It’s commonly believed that the renaissance of The Manics was 2007’s ‘Send Away The Tigers’, and their most recent effort prior to this one, ‘Resistance Is Futile’, is I think my favourite from this second half of their career. Although part of me would have liked ‘The Ultra Vivid Lament’ to be a spiky Manics album, once the anthemic opening track ‘Still Snowing In Sapporo’ (with its chorus reminiscent of ‘South Yorkshire Mass Murderer’) led way to the album further exploring that musical theme, plus with the record’s release date being in September, I soon became so pleased that once again the band were making one of their sweet, melancholic and autumnal collections.
As has been the case with many Manic Street Preachers lead-off singles, ‘Orwellian’ and ‘The Secret He Had Missed’ failed to grab me at first, but the latter grew on me with time, and the recent declaration from James Dean Bradfield of the ABBA influence this time around was certainly no lie or bad thing. I do however prefer the piano-led ‘Quest For Ancient Colour’ for that particular sound here, and ‘Don’t Let The Night Divide Us’ is sweeping pop delivered deftly once more.
The less pop moments feel like they are reserved for the second half of the album, but that was certainly a strength to ‘This Is My Truth Tell Me Yours’, and ‘The Ultra Vivid Lament’ follows that fine example, but unlike their 1998 chart-topper, this time around we are signed off with the gorgeously uplifting ‘Afterending’. This winter lover can now pick out his favourite faux-fur coat knowing that the latest Manic Street Preachers album will also help keep him warm on the inside over these coming Autumn months.
- ‘The Ultra Vivid Lament’ is out now. You can get your copy HERE.
- Manic Street Preachers headline the Electric Park Festival in Jersey tomorrow (Saturday 18 September). They then play two back-to-back shows at Cardiff’s Motorpoint Arena on Sunday and Monday, before heading out on tour:
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