ALBUM OF THE YEAR - SHORT-LIST .... ALBUM #8 - August 2020

It's late December, and I have no clue what is my August Album of the Month for 2020. This is not an ideal situation to be in. To be fair, this only really happened with August, for the rest of the months, I had a pretty clear idea, even if there was a couple of late changes. 

But August, I was stuck, I had nothing... I searched the internet for albums released in August, and a couple of possibilities finally stood out, after plenty of scrolling. I decided on my course of action : using my (very cheap - 4 months for 99p!) Tidal subscription to listen to them both and choose very quickly after a couple of plays ... (of course, one of my original rules was that I had bought the album - so out the window that rule went...)

The Killers was an option. I have most of their albums, but frankly, a bit like Coldplay, only really rate the first couple. They belong to a long list of bands (Placebo, Oasis, Snow Patrol, Starsailor...etc) that I have a number of albums of, but have never really loved  

There are bands I loved, that were my favourite band at a certain time (James, Blur, R.E.M.) that I not longer feel so connected to, which is one thing... but quite how I ended up with some many albums by bands I never loved, is quite another ...

Manic Street Preachers, are a bit like that too - I certainly wasn't keen at the beginning, but I guess when they have their most commercial period with Everything Must Go, I started to appreciate them and went back to pick up the early stuff too... I even got their solo albums , one by the singer, one by the bass player/lyric writer, that came out in 2006 (both of which are great incidentally, and probably better than most MSP albums). In fact, I think the only thing I am missing is their most recent album ... (little hint for you dear readers : 2001's 'Know Your Enemy' is their best album, not a lot of people aware of that ...) 

So, Even In Exile (written about the Chilean activist, singer and poet Victor Jara - of course...), James Dean Bradfield has a very distinctive voice, and the music styles are very varied on this one, I hardly felt desperate for another album from him, but this is pleasant enough and I will probably pick up a copy next year (CD when its cheap, or itunes has it for 5.99 euro...)

Couple of tracks as 'taster' : 

That all-important tracklisting :

I have seen Manic Street Preachers twice that I can recall : supporting Oasis at Knebworth in1996, and then in 1998 (six months after i moved to Italy). The second was nice as it was a much smaller venue than they were playing in UK at the time (and definitely less people than at Knebworth....)

So somehow, thats August ... got away with it, I think ... Sept will be easier (I know this, as I wrote it before August... not going to publish them together, or you'll think its christmas...)