Photograph by Ian D. Hall.

Originally published by L.S. Media. October 10th 2010.

The Manic Street Preachers are a band that everybody should experience live at least once in their lifetime, understated, dramatic, proud and as real as you can get. There can no doubt that James Dean Bradfield, Nicky Wire and Sean Moore are to be considered as three of the best live musicians of the last decade.

Even when faced with the difficulty of trying to top the partisan and maniacal crowd of Liverpool from the previous night, the band simply rose to the challenge and delivered a set full of angst, deliberately written, well placed lyrics and thoughtfully delicate music to a Blackburn crowd that lapped up the chance to see the band play live for the first time in eons.

The guys from Blackwood opened the night with the storming You Love Us and Your Love Alone is not Enough to great applause, however it was when the stirring, opening moments of Motorcycle Emptiness that brought the capacity crowd headlong into the beautiful noise that the band are renown for creating.

The first song from the new Album Postcards from a Young Man, (It’s Not War) Just the End of Love received an early airing within the set, as did the title track before some of the more well known radio friendly songs by the Welsh Trio got the attention the crowd craved. Everything Must Go, the haunting Tsunami and the surprise hit If You Tolerate This Your Children Will Be Next being greeted like old friends and having James Bradfield remarking that the crowd were “bloody loud tonight”.

James was left alone on stage for a couple of acoustic songs which he performed superbly and deftly, indeed You Stole the Sun from My Heart became fresh and with a different meaning to it as James strummed his guitar with almost delicate precision.

The band finished a set, one that was at times moving and at others bouncy, with the classic Design for Life. The crowd slowly dissipated from the hall with the thoughts of a top notch gig running through their memory and hoping that it won’t be too long before the band make it back to that part of Lancashire.

Ian D. Hall