Awesome / Manic Street Preachers

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• All of The Holy Bible qualifies as awesome, when it's not depressing or terrifying.
• "A Design For Life", "Kevin Carter", "Enola/Alone", "Australia" and the title track from Everything Must Go.
• The last four or so minutes to "Condemned To Rock And Roll". It's pretty much the band in overdrive.
• The rare B-Side "Patrick Bateman" deserves a mention. The lyrics and the solo at the end are phenomenal.
• The fact that the band managed to carry on after Richey disappeared is awesome in and of itself.
• Ushering in the new Millennium by playing to 57,000 people on New Years Eve, 1999, as part of their "Leaving The 20th Century" concert.
• They had the first number one single of the new Millennium with "Masses Against The Classes".
  • The single was deleted on the day of its release, and yet it still managed to make the number one spot!
• They were also the first Western band to play live in Cuba. They even met Fidel Castro!
• Their twelfth album Futurology got the number two spot in the charts. Their twelfth album. Seems they're still relevant, almost 30 years on.
  • Their follow-up, Resistance Is Futile managed to achieve the same spot.
• Journal for Plague Lovers ends with the sombre "William's Last Words", which as the title implies seems to be a musical suicide note, or perhaps the last thoughts of a dying man. It ends the album on a sombre note...at least, until we reach the bonus hidden track, "Bag Lady", which is awesome. It's a bass-driven post-punk song reminiscent of Magazine or Gang of Four that opens with the affirmative line "I am not dead." The song's lyrics are no less depressing, discussing the impermanence of beauty and ultimately one's own existence, but to hear the line "I am not dead" immediately after a song about a person that is dying is powerful.
• Nicky Wire has a degree in politics from Swansea University (the same one Richey attended).
  • And he won't let anyone forget it!

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