Oh, Mummy, What's A Manic Street Preacher?: Journal For Plague Lovers by Manic Street Preachers

There's a fine line between bravery and stupidity, and it's even finer between bravery and desperation. Had the announcement that the next Manics album would be utilising the leftover lyrics of Richey Edwards come after the flaccid Lifeblood album, that would have been my first reaction - 'Christ, they're really desperate now!'. Thankfully, we find this (still brave) plan being executed post the partial re-birth of the band after Send Away The Tigers found them finally landing on some artistic terra firma following three albums worth of creative meandering, and may just conclude that re-birthing process.

...Tigers was a refreshing blast from the Manics' past which doesn't hold a place some time down the line as a monolithic career high, but the feeling on release that it could be the platform for a resurgent MSP is thrust into sharper relief with the advent of Journal For Plague Lovers. The pre-Tigers MSP would never have had the balls to take on these lyrics and all the weight they must press onto the band. If they had taken the plunge, it is unlikely they would have been able to hold their (understandable) thrall for their lost friend in check - I would have expected a third rate facsimile of The Holy Bible at best, an album whose claustrophobic density would have been folly to try and replicate.

Instead, whilst the lyrics will of course demand the lion's share of attention (in fairness, you know it's Richey's lyrics as soon as you see the tracklisting with titles like Jackie Collins Existential Question Time and She Bathed Herself In A Bath Of Bleach), it has to be said the band have delivered an album more than worthy of those lyrics, matching the lyrical conviction with yet more musical confidence. Previously overdone arrangements are once again kept in check, and the result is a finely balanced mix of glammed, spiky post-punk and anthemic yet wiry, gnarled rock'n'roll - Everything Must Go without it's Spector sheen, Gold Against The Soul without it's wannabe FM-Rockisms.....and where there are echoes of The Holy Bible, they are just those, flashes, reflections, dashes, becoming connecting synapses rather than gaudy neon signposts. It's as if the lyrics have freed and inspired them in equal measure.

Opener Peeled Apples starts with a deep bass rumble, mountainous drums, and a riff bigger and bolder than anything they've ever done, and it's this boldness which characterises the record most consistently. It is a muscular beast, not without melody and grace, but resolutely on the front foot at all times. The sense of scale and size comes not from any of the usual indie rock production tricks, but from a constant propulsion born of incessant guitar noise, barrages of drums and torrents of bass.

Jackie Collins Existential Question Time brings a chiming guitar motif, and what initially sounds like a rather perfunctory lead guitar chug, but the figures underpinning it add extra layers to catch onto while you digest Richey's thesis on Catholic infidelity. She Bathed Herself In A Bath Of Bleach cuts a similarly simple figure intially before exploding outwards at breakneck speed. The best way to distinguish this from previous Manics work is to contrast the tunes here with The Masses Against The Classes, their first attempt to reconnect with their old identity. That simply tried to be loud and brash and ballsy and yet sounded plastic and forced, constantly reassuring itself 'This is SO Punk!' while conveniently avoiding the fact it was a none-trick pony laced in unconvincing faux-glam clothes. Journal For Plague Lovers continues with a feedback laced intro, more of those BIG drums and even when Marlon J.D. mixes a few more motorik beats it does so without clashing against the overall tone of the album . One hesitates to make the analogy, but once again they sound....for real.

There are subtler and more sedate moments, most notable on Facing Page: Top Left, a moment of calm which is perfectly placed to add a note of poise into proceedings. This Joke Sport Severed is initially a delicate acoustic ballad about how Jealousy sows rejection with a kiss, where Richey opines on how he endeavoured "To find a place where I became untethered", and grows into sumptuous and elegant strings as it closes.

As ever, the lyrics are never less than fascinating, riddled with references high and low brow, including Chomsky, Levi's, the Pistols, Stephen Hawking, Giant Haystacks, Ingres and Marlon Brando ; also the album is replete with Edwards' dense, often circuitous imagery and moral questioning-

Riderless horses, Noam Chomsky''s Camelot / Bruises on my hands from digging my nails out (Peeled Apples)

if a married man fucks a Catholic / And his wife dies without knowing / Does that make him unfaithful, people? (Jackie Collins Existential Question Time)

Oh, such love / Sweet stimulus / PG certificate and cuts unfocused Stitches and wounds / Doctored divinity So much love there''s blind affinity (Journal For Plague Lovers) It''s not "What's wrong?" / It's "What''s right?" Makes you feel like I'm talking a foreign language sometimes (All Is Vanity)

However there is also much of Edwards' dark humour to be found in Me And Stephen Hawking -

Overjoyed, me and Stephen Hawking, we laugh / We missed the sex revolution / When we failed the physical.

Virginia State Epileptic Colony draws clear allusions drawn with Edwards own periods of institutionalisation, which the band felt were one of the worst things ever to happen to their friend, but he treats with a more ambivalent tone -

They sit around tables rendered dumb / Coloured sticks of chalk are passed around Today the doctors allow the illusion of choice / Tomorrow the necks split, there is no voice.... Cleaning, cooking and flower-arranging / Dissolves a kind of liberation.

Listed closer William's Last Words will most obviously be looked at in the light of Richey's disapperance ; the most literal interpretations will be put upon lines such as

You're the best friends I ever had Goodnight, sleep tight Goodnight, God bless

and

Leave me, go Jesus / I love you, yeah I love you Just let me go / I even love the devil For yes he did me harm To keep me any longer 'Cos I''m really tired I''d love to go to sleep and wake up happy.

Maybe it's portent ; maybe it's the suicide note never left ; maybe it's the story of another individual not indicated in the reams Richey left behind. Clearly we'll never know. Should it matter which? Not in the slightest. Perhaps it's the band's (and specifically Nicky's, as he sings it) way of publically saying "It's ok mate, we understand. We love you too". It's a very beautiful song whatever way you choose to look at it. The album actually ends with the unlisted Bag Lady, the most Bible like track with it's scratchy guitar and portentious bass redolent of Archives Of Pain, and containing the stand out line Never let your self out, I did / It ruined me it is the track which most specifically takes you back into that moment.

The real triumph of the album as a whole is how it isn't mired in that moment despite using Richey's lyrics, but takes the very best of what he actually gave to the band verbally and what he provided as an inspiration. Famously of course he contributed not one note of written music and very little actual played music, but he continues to shape the Manics sound. In fact, bringing his influence directly back rather than having it always in the background might have actually helped finally answer the 'What's A Manic Street Preacher?' question.