0163. Manic Street Preachers
Everything Must Go
The first album without the near mythic Richie James Edwards (he went and offed himself) and it's a whole new ballgame: instead of the claustrophobic angst they'd got known by, they went more accessible. Bigger arrangements, more in tune with the mainstream audience and so on - things that are bound to alienate the core audience.
But that wouldn't necessarily have been a bad thing if they'd combined it with also changing singer, cause I've never liked James Dean Bradfield's vocal styles - he's got too much of a harmless whine.
The end-result is too unintimidating for my taste, even though their hearts seem to be in the right place.
