Wow, what an album. I have been a Manics fan for a long, long time and this is among their finest work to date. I would love for this album to get some attention in the states because it could be huge here if people would just hear it. Manics fans need to be calling/writing radio stations demanding to hear them on American radio. They said their goal was to reach mass audiences with this album and if this album can't do it, then I don't know what can.

Amazing, I wish I could give it more than 5 stars. A great album to introduce people to the Manics with, very accessible without compromising their music or style.

LOVE IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I happened to hear a song from the Manic Street Preachers on a radio show and have since bought every album they've done since and including The Holy Bible. Their albums vary a lot in style . Some people may not like certain albums but I appreciate their excellent musical abilities and arrangements. Sean Moore is in my opinion the best drummer perhaps ever. Nicky Wire is a great bassist / guitarist and James Dean Bradfield is an excellent singer / guitarist. Wire writes the lyrics and Bradfield and Moore write the music to go with it. I like the fact that the drums have such a prominent role in their music. The music is very refined , they spend a lot of time on each songs arrangement. It is hard for me to believe they aren't more popular in other counties including the US. They don't seem to try to write top 40 music although I understand they have had many hits in the UK. I'm glad I happened across them. They are the best band in the world in my opinion. Perhaps the best ever. Because of the complexity of their music it is hard to tell how good a song is from hearing only 20 or 30 seconds of it. I almost didn't buy Postcards From A Young Man because I didn't like the sound of these excerpts. I'm glad I took a chance on it. This is a great album. Although I'm not prepared to say it is their best because they've done a number of excellent albums. I hope this is helpful.

If the Manics' last release, the impressive Journal For Plague Lovers, was an attempt to return to the anarchic sounds of their classic 1994 The Holy Bible, then Postcards From A Young Man is their attempt to recreate the awesomeness of their 1996 release Everything Must Go. The use of gospel choirs and orchestration is certainly evocative of Everything Must Go, and the songs are suitably catchy. The highlight is Some Kind of Nothingness, where James Dean Bradfield and Nicky Wire's trading of vocals works remarkably well. This is a strong collection of songs, and a worthy follow-up to Plague Lovers.

It as all....the best solos, more mature from james dean bradfield, beautifull songs(The future has been here 4ever), it has loads of feeling, great arrangements, perfect they can do a tour only playing this songs...there in an amazing form...clearly the best rock band from england...

Alas, my beloved Manic Street Preachers, fast becoming the most staid, placid band in rock. They never repudiated their

as revolutionary firebrands. Instead, they romanticized their history, made it safe and quaint by putting it into the past tense. They praised themselves for their own resilience in the face of hardship long after all hardship had passed ("

," "

," "

," "

"), they commemorated long-dead activists ("Let Robeson Sing," "Emily") and forever circled around the traumatic disappearance of Richey Edwards ("

," "Cardiff Afterlife," "Your Love Alone Is Not Enough," and all of

).

Postcards From A Young Man goes one step further: it replaces these vivid memories (which were sometimes inspiring) with a vague and general dissatisfaction. Those "Postcards" aren't the authentic mementoes of youth shown in the liner notes, they're glossy impulse buys on a gift shop counter. "Some Kind Of Loneliness," the best song on the album, uses the line, "still and lonely like an old school photograph." It's a beautiful-sounding song, but man, does anybody anywhere actually feel that way about their school pictures? Since when do the Manics? I remember when they sounded very unhappy to be young. I know, everything looks different in retrospect, but I thought Wire had had enough run-ins with small-town prejudice and insensitivity (remember, he used to have quite the fashion style back in the day) to knock off the rose-coloured glasses.

Nicky can still be quite articulate, underneath the deceptive smoothness of the music. "Golden Platitudes" eulogizes "the liberal left destroyed" and observes, "why colonize the moon when every different kind of desperation exists in every single home?" (Actually, back when people aspired to colonize the moon, there was also less desperation.) But all he can do about it is helplessly moan, "where did the feeling go / where did it all go wrong?" Light, non-descript grief, unhappy but convenient. And you can't even call him out on it, he already titled the song "Golden Platitudes."

But he does that. It's even almost impressive, the way he balances on the edge between vacuous, uh, "platitudes" and potentially meaningful commentary. He writes a song called "All We Make Is Entertainment," with the chorus, "All we make is entertainment / it's so damn easy and inescapable / we're so post-modern, we're so post-everything." Just what we needed, broad social criticism that implicitly contains its own excuse not to go deeper. But wait -- there's also the genuinely perceptive line, "a sad indictment of what we're good at," suggesting a little more than just glib irony, but, sadly, a little less than any interesting conclusion.

The music is back to the same reliable guitars/strings combo as Send Away The Tigers, but less distinctive. The songs focus on catchy, uplifting choruses -- for example, "Some Kind Of Nothingness" gets all of its mileage out of the crooning, sentimental refrain. (The song's even got

in full late-career Sinatra mode!) I can think of about two songs where the music makes any impression apart from the voices -- the sixties-style guitar line opening "It's Not War, Just The End Of Love" (very Byrds), and the laid-back good-time riff in "All We Make Is Entertainment." That's fine, but what always set the Manics apart was their sheer musical ability, their timeless, unforgettable riffs and rhythms (most recently in "Peeled Apples"). Without that, might as well listen to

or something.

Look, the biggest problem with this album is that there just is not a lot to say about it. If you liked Send Away The Tigers, this isn't bad (at least it's better than Lifeblood!), but even Send Away The Tigers sounded livelier -- ironically, the John Lennon cover made it cut deeper. These days, Nicky just does not have a lot to say. He knows it, too, so his answer is to write numerous songs about how he doesn't know what to say. The latest

album is also heavy on nostalgia (and cameos by Bunnymen), but it has solid guitarwork and some actual descriptive detail in the lyrics. My suggestion: next time, just tell a few stories from your childhood or something. It would carry more conviction.