Perhaps the Manics will be hoping for the “Frankie’ effect?

After the Beeb banned “Relax” (presumably on the basis of the line “when you wanna come-huh”) the record from the little known Liverpool punk-funk outfit hurtled to No1.

As to the motivation of Tesco et al – well it seems that those obsessed with low price chicken need to be protected from a child who might remind the bovine shoppers of Baby P – I for one agree we must avoid upsetting those in search of tranquil, indeed solipsistic shopping experiences.

It’s a good album, I didn’t really pay much attention to the cover art to be honest.

It’s Cerrie Burnell all over again. Madness.

I quite like Jackie Collins Existential Question Time, though it’s not up there with the lyrics to Motorcycle Emptiness or Faster.

Ahhh, the Manics. Soundtrack to my teenage alienation.

My parents’ copy of Sgt Pepper came in a brown paper bag because of the cannabis plant on the cover but my own collection includes a graphic depiction of childbirth (Chumbawamba) and self-immolating Buddhists (Rage Against the Machine).

HMV strategically placed the price sticker over the title of Big Black’s Songs About Fucking.

Pulp’s This is Hardcore got into trouble too.

Roxy’s “Country Life” had to be covered with green cellophane – back then the visual pun on ‘bush’ was simply to shocking for the average record buyer.
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Hcz8f-55iCY/SKj6OFhT3UI/AAAAAAAAA9E/nvL1gK_JgVs/s400/Roxy_MusicCountry_Life-front.jpg

“are unlikely to sell by the bucketload”

Bollocks, the publicity of using Richey’s lyrics, combined with a 15th anniversary of his disappearance and an obvious “censorship” publicity stunt will ensure massive sales. The supermarkets simply can’t afford to drive the 30 something’s trying to relive their youth into real record shops.

Now censorship….well you could be a heavy metal band in the middle east that gets put in Jail occasionally during the periodic round ups. Or be a country music band that gets death threats for opposing the Iraq war. Or just have artwork like Scalplock’s spread the germs album that numerous pressing plants refused to take.

Or be a Muslim women who writes lyrics glorifying suicide bombing.

Planeshift, I doubt it’s a foregone conclusion, even though it has had generally very good reviews. The Holy Bible was critically acclaimed but sold poorly, although according to Nicky Wire it still shifts about 15,000 copies a year. I’m not sure it’s a publicity stunt either; supermarkets don’t generally help out in such things, although I could be proved wrong.

With such a large percentage of sales being for MP3 how much does cover art matter any more?

I’m with you on the other album covers and the stupidity of the supermarket’s argument here, especially because the cover is being advertised heavily in the mainstream press etc.

however i can’t help feeling there’s something a bit ultimately lame going on the part of the manics. dark lyrics by richey, check, jenny saville painting, check – it’s just like oasis finally realising that the reason for this success is not the bloated ‘what’s the story’ but the first album, so the manics are just doing a ‘holy bible 2′ for their fans of a certain age. There’s nothing shocking about them using a saville painting, no matter how good it is – it’s been done before and has the whiff of so much of their recent output, of ageing men who used to be ‘dangerous’ trying to do exactly what they did in the past. I’ve disliked more or less everything they’ve done since Richey disappeared and an awful lot of it has felt like a band who’ve lost their main point of interest, going through the motions for the cash.

Put simply, this is the same as johnny rotten swearing on I’m a celebrity. entertaining and possibly even ‘important’, for the fans who’ve been there from the beginning, but for most it’s not even an issue. This has the ring of a slightly classier version of the ‘reunion to play classic albums’ phenomenon, for me – enjoyable enough if you’re a fan, but ultimately a bit pointless and a bit embarrassing.

It doesn’t have to have supermarket complicity to be a publicity stunt, either.

A propos of nothing much in particular except a certain Welsh chippiness, I’d like to point out – having just heard the song in question on 6Music – that Bradfield is singing ^Mammy^ what’s a Sex Pistol…

Jenny Saville is a marvellous artist. I can’t understand why this image should be considered worthy of censorship when, as sceptic points out, woman-hating pornographic imagery is freely displayed in supermarkets and newsagents all over the country. Very depressing.

a fairly appropriate piece of spam!

Organic Cheeseboard, what are you talking about?

Your accusing James, Nicky and Sean of using thier long lost best friend’s lyrics, written in the weeks and months before he went missing (possibly commiting suicide) to shift more copies.

That they are so hungry for money they would sell out all they believe in, despite putting one quarter of all royalties away for Richie in case he returns. Unless you didn’t notice Send away the Tigers was very successful in itself anyway…

That’s an outrageous slur, inflicted on musicians you just don’t like for no reason other than laziness and an irrational cynicism.

organic cheeseboard, I take your point, but the Oasis comparison doesn’t really wash. The Manics haven’t been doing the same thing over and over again, although they have perhaps claimed to have been going back into the Holy Bible spirit of things, such as on Know Your Enemy, which failed due to the fact that Nicky Wire simply can’t channel Edwards and should stop trying. To go from all out commercialism on the last album to going back to Edwards’ lyrics once they finally thought that enough time had passed was reasonably brave. I was cynical too, thinking that if the lyrics were so good why hadn’t they used them already, having used some of the other stuff he’d left behind on Everything Must Go, but the album simply blows that out of the water. The tragedy is that the same person who produced amazingly poetic verses (4st 7lb from THB is one example) couldn’t live within his own skin enough to carry on doing so.

“I was cynical too, thinking that if the lyrics were so good why hadn’t they used them already…”

They weren’t too fond of them at first…

…the lyrics Richey left behind were too dark – one line about cutting the feet of a ballerina seemed indicative of their depressing nature, and of the 50 or so songs-worth of lyrics, none were used – “They were pretty heavy going,” Sean added. “There wasn’t a lot to pick out to be honest. They were mostly very fragmented and rambling.

(Taken from Martin Clarke’s Sweet Venom…(Yeah, yeah, okay, I bought the book of the band…(have a military jacket with “Generation Terrorist” scrawled across the back in lipstick, n’ all…)).)

I suppose after The Holy Bible they wanted a shift in tone. Now that they’ve gotten so sedate, they’re in need of a hefty slice of despair…

*Goes to fetch album, eyeliner and copy of The Situationist International Anthology…*

Interesting. I got the deluxe edition of it today (naturally) and if anything I think they’ve missed some of the best bits out, as it reproduces his lyric sheets in full, some of the verses of which aren’t used at all. Facing Page: Top Left especially seems to give just as much of a view into his mindset as Yes did