The Manics are done with their first decade, and what a decade it has been. If you're unfamiliar with them, go read a biography somewhere - it'll seem like high drama, like some kind of play, what with all the colourful characters, high-flying ideals, eruptions of passion, disappearances, blood and so on. If you're already one of the faithful, you're doubtless incensed that they released this in the first place. After all, the Manics aren't supposed to release retrospectives - that's for the Rolling Stones to keep doing! But if you look closely at Forever Delayed in its handsome package, you'll see that it's not so bad, though it's not too great either. But why leave it at that? Let's examine it, shall we?

1. Track selection

There is a positive correlation between Manics singles and Manics amazing songs, but it's not an exhaustive one. Nonetheless, most of what's on here - "Kevin Carter," "Motorcycle Emptiness," "A Design for Life," "La Tristesse Durera," "If You Tolerate This...," "The Everlasting," "Everything Must Go," "Faster," "From Despair to Where," and the inimitably superb "Little Baby Nothing" - is stellar. I can't resist the temptation to gripe, though. First, the band's earlier days are deliberately underrepresented. This means that there are only three songs off Generation Terrorists, one of which - "You Love Us" - would have been better off replaced by "Slash'n'Burn" or "Stay Beautiful," and two off Gold Against the Soul. Thus, great stuff like "Life Becoming a Landslide," "Gold Against the Soul," "Born to End," and "Repeat" is nowhere to be seen.

Worse, though, is the inclusion of only ONE song from The Holy Bible, one of the Manics' best albums. Yes, that is an album shrouded in its own dark atmosphere that doesn't fit in with many of the other songs here, but it's an incredibly important album. This isn't a case of me complaining because they sidestepped a personal favourite of mine, you must understand - that album is the key album of the band, the culmination of their earlier days, and the reason the Manics ever came to write such songs as "A Design for Life." Richey James may appear on the album cover, but he's reduced to merely a face here - one would never suspect that he was the ideological core of the band for the first half of their career.

There's plenty of great songs from the later albums, but there's too many of them - thus, there are the weaker singles like "You Stole the Sun From My Heart" and "Australia." Know Your Enemy is well represented by "So Why So Sad," though. However, many of these songs are only present as single edits - so, instead of getting the gorgeous six-minute album version of "The Everlasting" (one of the Manics' best songs), we get one with a gutted chorus and without the little acoustic intro. It sounds botched, hasty, and - dare I say it? - it's really, really disappointing. With so many songs to put on a CD with only 80 minutes, this may have been necessary, but it's still unsatisfying, especially since some of the other songs could have been safely left off.

2. The new songs

Usually, songs recorded exclusively for compilations are crass, exploitative affairs that serve only as bait for fans. "There By The Grace Of God" and "Door To The River," however, are both very, very good. They're really two of Bradfield's best vocal performances, and his blissful voice singing "baby, I lost my way following our star" in the latter is something indescribable.

3. The non-album tracks

The Manics' cover of "Suicide is Painless" is one fine song. However, it never appeared on an album, meaning fans had to import the single for a ridiculous amount of money. Now, however, that problem has been rectified, and both that song and "The Masses Against the Classes," another fine non-album single, are available here.

However, they also included their early nihilistic single "Motown Junk," which dates back to pre-Generation-Terrorists days. It's placed right at the end, unfortunately, and its muddy production and Bradfield's yelps make for a poor close to Forever Delayed. And since the compilation focuses on the later days and not the early ones, it deprives the listener of the context necessary to understand that song and why the Manics recorded it. It seems bewildering and out of place. It should have been left off in favour of "Yes," "Nobody Loved You," "She Is Suffering," "Removables" or any of the other great Manics songs ignored by the compilation.

4. The extras

Oh yeah, there's a bonus disc here. It's got remixes of the band by such folks as the Chemical Brothers. Does that sound interesting? Well, it really doesn't, and it's really not that great an idea. What they could have done was fill the second disc with rare songs and B-sides - thus, the non-album tracks could have been moved there. They would thus have had more space on the first disc for more great album tracks (particularly from The Holy Bible and from the earlier days), and could also have pleased fans with the second. They could have charged more for it, but who would argue?

5. The packaging

The disc comes, in classic Manics style, with a quote for every song, in lieu of lyrics - this is actually good, as it often says more about the songs and the band than the lyrics could, if you'd believe that. The best quote is the one by John Cassavetes, which summarizes what makes the Manics so wonderful perfectly. But there is a lack of photographs, of information. The faces on the cover are just faces - there's nothing to learn about the men behind the music. I already know the Manics' backstory, but I'd never have gleaned any of it from this disc, especially since it all but completely ignores the band's most compelling and confrontational material. Would it have killed them to splurge on a few more pages of liner notes?

But overall, it's a good release, and there's enough great music on here to interest a complete newcomer. The Manics are, admittedly, an incredibly difficult band to properly anthologize, since there's just such a huge scope of things to cover. It still could have been better, though.

Manic Street Preachers are definitely one of the best rock bands in the 90s. They have made many unforgettable songs like "Motorcycle Emptiness", "A Design For Life", "If You Tolerate This Then Your Childeren Will Be This" and so. Their era can divided to two parts: Richey James era and post-James era. James was excelent songs lycrics writer, who had also resbonsible Manic's albums art. You can find three tracks for Generation Terrorist in this compition,which was their debut album. "Motorcycle Emptiness" is a pure classic song with hooking guitar melody and great chorus. "You Love Us" is not favourite track.In my opinion, it would be drop out for this best of because for exemple "Stay Beautiful" is three times better song than "You Love Us". "Little Baby Nothing" is really beautiful song about prostitute's life and its melody makes you feel sympathy for prostitute. Woman vocals suit perfect to this song's chorus. Gold Against Soul albums Manic's has chosen "La Trisses ( A Scream to Sign)" and "Door to River" " La Trisses is irritating song and stupid choice for best of. "Gold Agaist Soul" and "Roses in the Hosbital" would be hundred times better choices. "Door to River" is a fine song and like to listen it.

The Holy Bible was Manic's third album and it had said to be their best. But I can find only one song for Holy Bible and it is not best pick. Faster is a rather good song and it gives you some like image about The Holy Bible. Yes, Ifwhiteamericatoldthethetruthit'sonedayworldwouldfallapart, Walking Abortion and She Is Suffering are songs that you should be find in this compition but you can't hear any of them because Manic's wanted to drop all them out. These songs don't suit well in the middle of the Everything Must Go and This is My Truth , Tell Me Yours albums songs because The Holy Bible's songs are so rare, aggressive and uncommercial. I would give this compition five stars if I had find more The Holy Bible songs and some bad tracks had dropped out. "A Design For A Life", "Everything Must Go" and "Australia" are terrific songs for Everything Must Go Album. This Is My Truth, Tell Me Yours album has chosen four tracks: "Tsunami" is Japanese infuenced song with a great melody, "You Stole The Sun From My Heart" is a strong song with fine lyrics, "Everlasting" is a major ballad with shaking guitar melody and "If You Tolerate This Then Your Children Will Be Next" belongs to my Manic favourites because it so impressing and awesome masterpiece.

"You Found that Soul" is only pick for Know Your Enemy album and it is good .... There is also some songs that you can't find studio albums for exemple "Masses Against Classes" and a new song "There By The Grace of God" are best of them. Finally, I can recommand this compition in spite of the some false picks.

Detracting from this compilation because of what it 'fails' to contain based on one person's snobbiness concerning a favourite album is flat-out wrong. I said the same thing about the KISS box set, and I'll say it again here; "Forever Delayed" is a collection of chart hits, not a comprehensive anthology.

Of course those of us with a true affection for the band will already own the original albums, but there are any number of prospective buyers who haven't a clue as to what to buy first; this is a better collection of tunes than most.

The version with the remixes is interesting, and better overall value, but in the final analysis, completely unessential. Watch for a 'live' album next, and I can only hope it's as well-produced and performed as the Cardiff 2000 concert DVD.

What can i say? The Manics rule. This album is well worth buying. It's a fantastic selection of all the best singles ffrom the former Best band brit award Manics. Taken from the albums Generation Terrrorists, Gold Against The Soul, The Holy Bible, Everything Must Go, This Is My Truth, Tell Me Yours and most recently, Know Your Enemy.

It includes songs from their earlier period which got them famous like, "You love us" from their earlier albums which Richie featured on, to the all time classics that we all love today, like, "Design for life" and the number one hit "If you tolerate this (your children will be next)". All of the songs on the album have great meaning, whether it be political or purely inspirational. Great selection of songs except it's a shame some of their other greats like "Slash and burn" aren't included in the album. A must have for any alternative/rock fan. The Manics continue to do Wales proud with their amazing political, lyrical and musical talent. Buy it or miss out!!!!

Sure, there are a lot of great songs on this CD - MSP are extremely talented, one of the best British groups of the 90's. The casual fan just getting into MSP will love what they hear. Who could not love classics such as A Design For Life, If You Tolerate This, or Motorcycle Emptiness?

But it's too incomplete. There's just too many songs left out that are essential listening to getting the full picture of the band. It's OK to emphasize the commercial aspects of the band to hook in new fans, but there's no reason not to have more from Gold Against The Soul and Know Your Enemy, both very underappreciated CDs with plenty of very good songs. Also, it's kind of annoying to have single edits - usually it subtracts from the songs (as in the shortened The Everlasting, for example, not having the great acoustic intro)

But more importantly it is CRIMINAL that there is only one song from The Holy Bible. I disagree that it can't fit with the rest of the catalog - precisely the reason it is a masterpiece is the ability to combine dark, nihilistic lyrics with great hooks. In my mind, Richey disappearing is the defining event in the history of MSP - you have to have at least five or so songs from The Holy Bible to truly appreciate the despair that Richey was going through and how it defined the band's sound. Novice fans who only have Forever Delayed are missing this important piece.

To be honest, this really needs to be a 2-CD set. There are about 30 or so equally worthy and essential songs in the MSP catalog, so to have to cut out any 10-12 to fit it all in and include a few songs is a lose-lose task. No matter what get booted, it's not going to be the right call. Doing it my way, you can put in all the essential songs (in their proper original lengths), and have the obligatory new songs and non album songs.

I would suggest that they break it into a "Richey days" CD and a "post-Richey days" CD. As much as possible, songs should be chronologically arranged. My "wish list" would be:

Richey Days

Slash And Burn, Motorcycle Emptiness, You Love Us, Love's Sweet Exile, Little Baby Nothing, Stay Beautiful, From Despair To Where, La Tristesse Durera, Roses In The Hospital, Life Becoming a Landslide, Yes, Ifonlywhiteamerica..., She Is Suffering, Archives Of Pain, Revol, 4st 7lb, Faster, and This Is Yesterday

Post Richey Days

A Design For Life, Kevin Carter, Everything Must Go, Removables, Australia, The Everlasting, If You Tolerate This, You Stole The Sun From My Heart, Ready For Drowning, Tsunami, Found That Soul, Ocean Spray, So Why So Sad, Miss Europa Disco Dancer, The Convalescent, Suicide Is Painless, The Door To The River, and There By The Grace Of God (the last two are the new songs)

Notice I dropped The Masses Aginast The Classes and Motown Junk, two songs which I feel are OK, but not essential listening. So overall, a generous collection - two CDs with 18 songs apiece.

I'm sure this would never happen, as you still want people to buy all the albums. And I'm sure some reviewers will debate my song list. But to be a true MSP fan, all of these songs need to be at your disposal. But until that point, Forever Delayed does its job reasonably well.