Britpop Titans Re-Emerge

When most people (and I mean the casual listening public) think of the Britpop of the 1990s, two bands probably come to mind—Oasis and Blur.  Oasis was the juggernaut that exploded with “Live Forever” off of Definitely Maybe in 1994, practically taking over the charts after Kurt Cobain’s death in April.  Blur was a few years older and somewhat late on the U.S. scene (compared to Oasis), but their single “Song 2” has been a mainstay on rock radio for years.  People probably forget that Great Britain was fertile ground for music in the 1990s.

One of the bands to emerge from the Britpop scene was the Manic Street Preachers.  Hailing from Wales, James Dean Bradfield (lead vocalist, guitarist), Nicky Wire (rhythm guitarist and lyricist, later chief lyricist and bassist), Sean Moore (drummer), and Miles Woodward (original bassist) started the band as a punk band before Bradfield, Wire, and Moore migrated more towards glam punk and hard rock (Woodward would step down during this transition).  Richey Edwards joined the band on rhythm guitars a little over a year after Woodward quit, changing the dynamics of the band.  Edwards’ writings tended to be either political or introspective, and his personality was often characterized as enigmatic yet eloquent.  He was the mastermind behind their most powerful record, The Holy Bible, which was critically acclaimed but commercially a flop.  Despite the commercial failure, the band maintained a strong fan base, though Edwards became more and more despondent.  Edwards disappeared mysteriously in 1995, but before his disappearance he left a journal of his lyrics and writings with the band while in the process of recording.  This journal became the core of the album I’m listening to today, Journal for Plague Lovers (2009).

# 187 – Manic Street Preachers, Journal for Plague Lovers (Metascore = 85)

Journal for Plague Lovers came out shortly after authorities deemed Edwards had died in 2008, nearly 13 years after his disappearance.  The band, having never really believed he had died, set aside his share of royalties from their sales in case he should return.  The band even seriously considered disbanding after the decision, but Edwards’ family encouraged them to continue.  Journal for Plague Lovers is sort of their ode to their fallen band mate.  They had recorded only a few songs from this material on a previous album, Everything Must Go, but otherwise they set the material aside for the right time.

The time waited seems to have allowed the band to digest what they found.  They held Edwards’ input into the songwriting process so deeply that they only wanted to do the best they could.  Each band member contributes to writing the music to the lyrics, which is a relatively new aspect of the band.  Bradfield wrote most of the music on previous Preachers’ records, but here Wise and Moore provide more to the music than they had previously.  Sonically this sounds similar to other more recent Preachers’ albums; I felt familiar with it having heard Send Away the Tigers previously.  “Journal for Plague Lovers” actually sounds like a Rush song to me, but other than that, the Preachers’ stamp is here.

Lyrically the listener can get a feel for the mood Edwards was in at the time of his death.  Some of his lyrics and writings were created while institutionalized for depression and alcoholism.  There are strong political tones throughout the record, but there are as many songs of heart break and loneliness.  Edwards references Noam Chomsky’s book Rethinking Camelot in album opener “Peeled Apples” and writes about endless suffering and no governments doing anything to remediate it.  In “Jackie Collins Existential Question Time” Edwards seems to be questioning his own thoughts of what love and life are when writers like Jackie Collins write these overtly selfless lust books where the characters are never really in love so much as in lust over other people than the ones they should be devoted to.  Love, or the lack thereof, was a muse of Edwards to his end.

I acknowledge I should listen to more of the Preachers’ music than I have, because listening to this it’s hard to tell whether the record is better than some of their others.  As an outsider looking in, though, I do appreciate this album and what the surviving band members did with Edwards’ material.  Many of the songs here barely exceed 3 minutes in length, but their efficiency and catchiness are apparent throughout.  I think an 85 Metascore is good for this record.  It’s not the best record I have heard so far, but it’s certainly a good record.