CD1: 1) Elvis Impersonator: Blackpool Pier; 2) A Design for Life; 3) Kevin Carter; 4) Enola/Alone; 5) Everything Must Go; 6) Small Black Flowers That Grow in the Sky; 7) The Girl Who Wanted to Be God; 8) Removables; 9) Australia; 10) Interiors (Song for Willem de Kooning); 11) Further Away; 12) No Surface All Feeling Bonus tracks: 13) Enola/Alone (Live); 14) Kevin Carter (Live); 15) Interiors (Song for Willem de Kooning) (Live); 16) Elvis Impersonator: Blackpool Pier (Live); 17) Everything Must Go (Live); 18) A Design for Life (Live); 19) A Design for Life (Stealth Sonic Orchestra Remix)
CD2: 1) Dixie; 2) No Surface All Feeling (Demo); 3) Further Away (Demo); 4) Small Black Flowers That Grow in the Sky (Demo); 5) No One Knows What It's Like to Be Me (Demo); 6) Australia (Acoustic Demo); 7) No Surface All Feeling (Acoustic Demo); 8) Interiors (Song for Willem de Kooning) (Acoustic Demo); 9) The Girl Who Wanted to Be God (Acoustic Demo); 10) A Design for Life (First Rehearsal); 11) Kevin Carter (First Rehearsal); 12) Mr. Carbohydrate; 13) Dead Trees and Traffic Islands; 14) Dead Passive; 15) Black Garden; 16) Hanging On; 17) No One Knows What It's Like to Be Me; 18) Horses Under Starlight; 19) Sepia; 20) First Republic; 21) Australia (Stephen Hague Production); 22) The Girl Who Wanted to Be God (Stephen Hague Production); 23) Glory, Glory
CD2: 1) Dixie; 2) No Surface All Feeling (Demo); 3) Further Away (Demo); 4) Small Black Flowers That Grow in the Sky (Demo); 5) No One Knows What It's Like to Be Me (Demo); 6) Australia (Acoustic Demo); 7) No Surface All Feeling (Acoustic Demo); 8) Interiors (Song for Willem de Kooning) (Acoustic Demo); 9) The Girl Who Wanted to Be God (Acoustic Demo); 10) A Design for Life (First Rehearsal); 11) Kevin Carter (First Rehearsal); 12) Mr. Carbohydrate; 13) Dead Trees and Traffic Islands; 14) Dead Passive; 15) Black Garden; 16) Hanging On; 17) No One Knows What It's Like to Be Me; 18) Horses Under Starlight; 19) Sepia; 20) First Republic; 21) Australia (Stephen Hague Production); 22) The Girl Who Wanted to Be God (Stephen Hague Production); 23) Glory, Glory
Good remastering, all the b-sides, loads of other nice bonus material, no tracklist edits...
Key tracks: Of the bonus material and across the various types of it, "Sepia", "A Design for Life (Stealth Sonic Orchestra Remix)", "Australia (Stephen Hague Production)"
(This review is for the 10th anniversary re-release, for the review of Everything Must Go itself please click here).
The Manic Street Preachers catalogue reissue series is a chaotic journey with twists and turns around every corner, the teasers for each new addition being met with concerned anticipation from fans. You never know what format they might go for, how they’ll treat the bonus material, and with the later releases how they’ll even treat the track list to the original album. And with all that in mind, the 10th anniversary reissue of Everything Must Go is the closest they’ve gotten to a perfect fan-pleasing deluxe re-release.
Most importantly, all nine of the original b-sides have been included, which is arguably the most important aspect of these re-releases given the Manics' strength as a b-sides band - only the three covers from the "Australia" single have been dropped. Some of the b-sides bear a similarity to the mother album's anthemic elegance, and the stadium ode to mundanity “Mr. Carbohydrate”, the melancholy and drop-dead gorgeous “Sepia”, and the flute-driven "Dead Trees and Traffic Islands" could have all slotted finely to the album, including from the quality perspective - with "Sepia" being one of the standout Manics b-sides. The brooding and moody "Black Garden" is like a reverse-transitional bridge to the dark mindscapes of The Holy Bible, nudging the idea that despite the gigantic transformation between the two albums they were still only two years apart. As per usual the b-sides offer a little bit of a ground for experiments and the band's first instrumental (and still among the best of its ilk), the suave "Horses Under Starlight" is a prime example, gliding along smoothly with its trumpet and ba-ba-bas; on the other end of the spectrum "First Republic" and "Dead Passive" are b-sides primarily because of how scathing their lyrics are, the former bringing down the government with some good ol' fashion riff-rocking and the latter making an elegant death march out of its litany of celebrity couples. The only real weaker b-sides are "Hanging On" and "No One Knows What It's Like to Be Me", which are rather uneventful and somewhat boringly straightforward three-minute rockers which sound like they took fifteen minutes to write, together. But, this reissue also contains the original demo for "No One Knows What It's Like to Be Me" and what seems like a weird inclusion at first turns out to be a brilliant one: the song actually sounds so much better in its original demo form, with a bit of a kick to it that got lost on the way to the final version.
The other demos offer interesting little insights to the process with melody and lyric changes, and the acoustic solo versions prove that Bradfield's melodies stand up strongly even when the guitar walls are stripped away. The live versions are a good mix of hits and deep cuts (I particularly appreciate how much the generally underappreciated “Interiors” gets wheeled out across the two discs), and the Stealth Sonic Orchestra remix of "A Design for Life" is one of the band's best remixes and iconic in its own little way by way of its appearance in various segues and interludes along the years, so it's great to have it here. It's a shame the Stealth Sonic Orchestra remix for "Everything Must Go" hasn't been included and it probably would have been better to have than the rehearsal versions of "A Design for Life" and "Kevin Carter", which are neat to hear once but too shoddily recorded to warrant for repeated listens. The two Stephen Hague mixes are the best part of the alternative takes and are genuinely fascinating: the band started the album sessions with Hague but soon realised it wasn’t just working, and you can hear why through the versions of “Australia” and “The Girl Who Wanted to Be God” but as fan fodder they are incredible. His take on “Australia” is incredible for all the wrong reasons, as the song is driven through a happy-go-lucky Britpop filter with handclaps and tinny horn sections - but it’s so interesting.
From a general perspective, the remastering is generally really well done. Everything Must Go didn’t necessarily need a touch-up job, but to my ears the original sounds a little flat at places (mostly in the drums); this reissue doesn’t tweak the mix as such, but it does give it a little extra boost that adds to the anthemic volume of the songs. As per usual for Manics re-releases the liner notes are more visually oriented so rather than track-by-track breakdowns or interviews (beyond a guest essay on the album serving as the introduction), the focus is more on showcasing various artwork and photography from the period. The DVD features a talking heads documentary with the band on the album, the music videos and various peripheral performance material - all which make for a decent evening’s viewing. It all comes together into one particularly strong reissue, with little to actually criticise. The only real complaints are that the three covers would have been nice to have been included for the sake of representing the complete the era (and unlike the covers of "Velocity Girl" and "I Can't Take My Eyes Off You", the original 1996 version of "Take the Skinheads Bowling" never made it to Lipstick Traces), and the intro to "Black Garden" has been chopped off and given its own track ("Glory, Glory") which makes no sense.
The thing is, those two points have already been addressed on the later 20th anniversary reissue, which arguably is the better version - it lacks the demos and other unreleased alternative versions, but it's more complete in terms of all the official non-album releases and gathers every single b-side (remix, cover, live or original) that appeared during the era. So, the main issue for this one becomes the simple fact that the band decided to outdo it when cashing out on this album again and thus this version has basically outlived its usefulness. But I can’t say I’m too bitter about it - this is still a fantastic reissue of a great album, and the bonus material is enough to kick the original's rating up a notch.
The other demos offer interesting little insights to the process with melody and lyric changes, and the acoustic solo versions prove that Bradfield's melodies stand up strongly even when the guitar walls are stripped away. The live versions are a good mix of hits and deep cuts (I particularly appreciate how much the generally underappreciated “Interiors” gets wheeled out across the two discs), and the Stealth Sonic Orchestra remix of "A Design for Life" is one of the band's best remixes and iconic in its own little way by way of its appearance in various segues and interludes along the years, so it's great to have it here. It's a shame the Stealth Sonic Orchestra remix for "Everything Must Go" hasn't been included and it probably would have been better to have than the rehearsal versions of "A Design for Life" and "Kevin Carter", which are neat to hear once but too shoddily recorded to warrant for repeated listens. The two Stephen Hague mixes are the best part of the alternative takes and are genuinely fascinating: the band started the album sessions with Hague but soon realised it wasn’t just working, and you can hear why through the versions of “Australia” and “The Girl Who Wanted to Be God” but as fan fodder they are incredible. His take on “Australia” is incredible for all the wrong reasons, as the song is driven through a happy-go-lucky Britpop filter with handclaps and tinny horn sections - but it’s so interesting.
From a general perspective, the remastering is generally really well done. Everything Must Go didn’t necessarily need a touch-up job, but to my ears the original sounds a little flat at places (mostly in the drums); this reissue doesn’t tweak the mix as such, but it does give it a little extra boost that adds to the anthemic volume of the songs. As per usual for Manics re-releases the liner notes are more visually oriented so rather than track-by-track breakdowns or interviews (beyond a guest essay on the album serving as the introduction), the focus is more on showcasing various artwork and photography from the period. The DVD features a talking heads documentary with the band on the album, the music videos and various peripheral performance material - all which make for a decent evening’s viewing. It all comes together into one particularly strong reissue, with little to actually criticise. The only real complaints are that the three covers would have been nice to have been included for the sake of representing the complete the era (and unlike the covers of "Velocity Girl" and "I Can't Take My Eyes Off You", the original 1996 version of "Take the Skinheads Bowling" never made it to Lipstick Traces), and the intro to "Black Garden" has been chopped off and given its own track ("Glory, Glory") which makes no sense.
The thing is, those two points have already been addressed on the later 20th anniversary reissue, which arguably is the better version - it lacks the demos and other unreleased alternative versions, but it's more complete in terms of all the official non-album releases and gathers every single b-side (remix, cover, live or original) that appeared during the era. So, the main issue for this one becomes the simple fact that the band decided to outdo it when cashing out on this album again and thus this version has basically outlived its usefulness. But I can’t say I’m too bitter about it - this is still a fantastic reissue of a great album, and the bonus material is enough to kick the original's rating up a notch.
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