Manic Street Preachers will release their 14th album, The Ultra Vivid Lament, on September 2 via Columbia/Sony. The Welsh band made the album on home turf at the legendary Rockfield Studios, as well as their own Door to the River studios, with regular collaborator Dave Eringa, and the album features appearances from Mark Lanegan and Sunflower Bean's Julia Cumming.
The first single from the album is "Orwellian," a synthy, anthemic song the band say is about "the battle to claim meaning, the erasing of context within debate, the overriding sense of factional conflict driven by digital platforms leading to a perpetual state of culture war." They go on to say, "As with many songs on the record, it was written on the piano by James Dean Bradfield. Musically, it echoes ABBA, the majesty of Alan Rankine’s playing in the Associates and Talk Talk’s ‘It’s My Life’ with a Lindsey Buckingham guitar solo. It felt like the perfect sonic and lyrical introduction to ‘The Ultra Vivid Lament’.”
The band also have UK dates this summer and fall. All dates are listed, along with the stream of "Orwellian" and the album's cover art and tracklist, below.
Tracklist:
1. Still Snowing In Sapporo
2. Orwellian
3. The Secret He Had Missed ft. Julia Cumming
4. Quest For Ancient Colour
5. Don’t Let the Night Divide Us
6. Diapause
7. Complicated Illusions
8. Into The Waves of Love
9. Blank Diary Entry ft. Mark Lanegan
10. Happy Bored Alone
11. Afterending
Manic Street Preachers - 2021 Tour Dates
16th July CARDIFF, Arena (NHS workers show)
17th July CARDIFF, Arena (NHS public show)
30th July DERBYSHIRE, Y Not Festival
7th August LINLITHGOW, Party At The Palace
29th August ALCESTER, Camper Calling Music Festival
10th September HALIFAX, Live at Piece Hall
18th September JERSEY, Electric Park Festival
26th September NEWCASTLE, O2 City Hall
28th September EDINBURGH, Usher Hall
29th September DUNDEE, Caird Hall
1st October STOKE-ON-TRENT, Victoria Hall
2nd October MANCHESTER, O2 Apollo
4th October YORK, Barbican
5th October GLASGOW, Barrowland
7th October LEEDS, O2 Academy
8th October PORTSMOUTH, Guildhall
10th October BOURNEMOUTH, O2 Academy
11th October CAMBRIDGE, Corn Exchange
13th October BATH, Forum
14th October BRIGHTON, Dome
3rd December LONDON, The SSE Arena, Wembley*
*support TBC
