Formation and early years (1986–1990) Manic Street Preachers formed in 1986 at
Oakdale Comprehensive School,
Blackwood,
South Wales, which all the band members attended. Their first line-up consisted of singer and guitarist
James Dean Bradfield, rhythm guitarist
Nicky Wire, bassist Miles "Flicker" Woodward, and drummer
Sean Moore. Bradfield and the slightly older Moore are cousins and shared bunk beds in the Bradfield family home after Moore's parents divorced. During the band's early years, Bradfield, alongside the classically trained Moore, primarily wrote the music while Wire focused on the lyrics. Some of their earliest performances were held at the
Blackwood Miners Welfare Institute in the town. The band's name came from Bradfield's busking when he was 16: Woodward left the band in early 1988, reportedly because he believed that the band were moving away from their punk roots. The band continued as a three-piece, with Wire switching from rhythm guitar to bass,
NME gave "Suicide Alley" an enthusiastic review, citing a press release by the band's friend
Richey James Edwards: "We are as far away from anything in the '80s as possible." With the help of Hall or Nothing management, the Manics signed to
indie label
Heavenly Records. The band's first single for the label, "
Motown Junk", released in January 1991, gave them their first chart appearance, reaching number 94 on the
UK Singles Chart. Their next single, "
You Love Us", opened with a sample of
Krzysztof Penderecki's "
Threnody to the Victims of Hiroshima", and closed with a sample of
Iggy Pop's "
Lust for Life". It was during this period that the band, particularly Wire and Edwards, began to adopt an androgynous/glam rock visual aesthetic. He was taken to hospital and received seventeen stitches. the Manics quickly became favourites of the British music press, which helped them build a dedicated following. In mid-1991, the band signed to
Columbia Records/
Sony Music UK with the songs regularly switching from a critical focus on global
capitalism to more personal tales of despair and the struggles of youth. Other tracks combine personal and political themes; "Nat West-Barclays-Midlands-Lloyds" was written as a critique of overseas banking credit policies, but also concerned Edwards' issues involving overdrafts and refused loans. The single "
Motorcycle Emptiness" criticises
consumerism as a "shallow dream" that makes human life overtly commercialised. "
Little Baby Nothing", a duet between Bradfield and former porn actress
Traci Lords, was described by Priya Elan of
NME as a "perfect snapshot of [female] innocence bodysnatched and twisted". In an interview with
Sylvia Patterson for the early April 1992 issue of
Smash Hits, Richey Edwards summed up their "two philosophies of life" as "there must be more to life than this" and "it's all fucking bollocks". In September 1992, the band released a cover of "
Theme from M.A.S.H. (Suicide Is Painless)" as a charity single in aid of
the National Spastics Society, now known as Scope. The single became the band's first Top 10 hit, peaking at number 7 in the UK. The group's second album, 1993's
Gold Against the Soul, had a more
grunge-influenced sound. It was released to mixed reviews but performed well, reaching number 8 in the UK. The album was produced by
Dave Eringa, who had already been an associate of the band for several years. In subsequent years, the band have named
Gold Against the Soul as their least favourite album, and have described the period surrounding the album as being the most unfocused of their career. Bradfield said: "All we wanted to do was go under the corporate wing. We thought we could ignore it but you do get affected." By early 1994, Edwards' mental and physical health difficulties, including anorexia, alcohol abuse, depression and self-harm, became worse. In April and May, the band played concerts in
Thailand and
Portugal and at a benefit concert for the
Anti-Nazi League at
Brockwell Park, London. Edwards was habitually cutting himself, and appeared onstage in Bangkok with self-inflicted wounds across his chest. Following their appearance at the
Glastonbury Festival in June (during which, Wire called Glastonbury a "shithole" and suggested to "build a few more fucking
bypasses" over it), Edwards was admitted into
The Priory, and the band played a few festivals as a three-piece to pay for his treatment. These appearances included
T in the Park in Scotland, the Alte Wartesaal in
Cologne, the
Parkpop Festival in
The Hague and the
Reading Festival. During the Reading show, Bradfield played Edwards' black
Gibson Les Paul Studio as a mark of respect (although Bradfield later commented that he regretted playing Edwards' guitar). The album also incorporates various elements from other musical genres, such as
hard rock,
British punk,
post-punk,
new wave,
industrial,
art rock and
gothic rock. Lyrically the album deals with subjects including prostitution, American
consumerism, British
imperialism,
freedom of speech,
the Holocaust,
serial killers, the
death penalty,
political revolution, childhood,
fascism and suicide. According to
Q: "the tone of the album is by turns bleak, angry and resigned". There was also an element of autobiographic subjects, like in the song "
4st 7lb" where the lyrics clearly tackle Richey's own experience with anorexia. The song was named after 4
stones 7
pounds, or , because it is the weight below which death is purported to be medically unavoidable. The title of
The Holy Bible was chosen by Edwards to reflect an idea, according to Bradfield, that "everything on there has to be perfection". Interviewed at the end of 1994, Edwards said: "The way religions choose to speak their truth to the public has always been to beat them down [...] I think that if a Holy Bible is true, it should be about the way the world is and that's what I think my lyrics are about. [The album] doesn't pretend things don't exist". Although its initial sales were poor,
The Holy Bible eventually sold over 600,000 copies worldwide. The band changed their visual aesthetic during this period, away from androgynous glam and towards an army/military look. A now infamous appearance on
Top of the Pops in June 1994, where the band performed "
Faster", the first single from
The Holy Bible, featured Bradfield wearing a "terrorist-style"
balaclava. The band were told by the
BBC that the performance had received the most complaints in the BBC's history to that point. With Edwards out of hospital, the band spent late 1994 on a headline tour of the UK and Ireland and two tours in mainland Europe with
Suede and
Therapy?. In December, three nights at the
London Astoria ended with the band smashing up their equipment and the venue's lighting rig, causing £26,000 worth of damage.
Disappearance of Richey Edwards (1995) Edwards disappeared on 1 February 1995, on the day when he and Bradfield were due to fly to the US on a promotional tour. In the two weeks before his disappearance, Edwards withdrew £200 a day from his bank account, which totalled £2,800 by the day of the scheduled flight. He checked out of the Embassy Hotel in
Bayswater Road, London, at seven in the morning, and then drove to his apartment in
Cardiff, Wales. In the two weeks that followed he was apparently spotted in the
Newport passport office, and the
Newport bus station. On 7 February, a taxi driver from Newport supposedly picked up Edwards from the King's Hotel in Newport, and drove him around the valleys, including Blackwood (Edwards' home as a child). The passenger got off at the
Severn View service station near
Aust and paid the £68 fare in cash. On 14 February, Edwards'
Vauxhall Cavalier received a parking ticket at the Severn View service station and on 17 February, the vehicle was reported as abandoned. Police discovered the battery to be flat, with evidence that the car had been lived in. Due to the
service station's proximity to the
Severn Bridge (which has been a prominent suicide location in the past) it was widely believed that he took his own life by jumping from the bridge. Manic Street Preachers were put on hold for six months and disbanding the group was seriously considered, but with the blessing of Edwards' family, the other members continued. The band continue to set up a microphone for Edwards at every live performance. The band's first release following Edwards' disappearance was a cover of "
Raindrops Keep Fallin' on My Head" for the various artists charity album
The Help Album, issued in September 1995 in aid of
War Child.
Everything Must Go to Lifeblood (1996–2006) The first album without Edwards,
Everything Must Go, was released on 20 May 1996. The band had chosen to work with new producer
Mike Hedges, mainly for his work on
Siouxsie and the Banshees' single "
Swimming Horses" that Bradfield rated highly.
Everything Must Go debuted on the UK Albums Chart at number 2. So far the album has gone
Triple Platinum in the UK and is their most successful album to date, spending 103 weeks in the Top 100 with the album still in the top five a year after its release. Bradfield later recalled that the lyric had been a fusion of two sets of lyrics - "Design for Life" and "Pure Motive" - sent to him from Wales by Wire, while he was living in
Shepherd's Bush. The band later stated that writing the song "rescued" them from the despair they felt in the aftermath of Edwards' disappearance, with Wire describing the song as "a bolt of light from a severely dark place". "A Design for Life" was followed by three more hit singles from the album, "
Everything Must Go", "
Kevin Carter" (one of the five songs with a writing credit to Edwards) and "
Australia".
Everything Must Go was shortlisted for the 1996
Mercury Prize award for best album, and won the band two awards at the
1997 Brit Awards, for Best British Band and Best British Album. and frequently voted in polls in the category of best albums of all time by many publications. The success of
Everything Must Go at the Brit Awards ensured that sales of their previous albums -
Generation Terrorists,
Gold Against the Soul and
The Holy Bible - enjoyed a late surge (
Generation Terrorists sold an extra 110,000 copies). selling 136,000 copies in the first week and spending a total of 74 weeks in the chart. The cover photograph was taken on
Black Rock Sands near
Porthmadog, Wales. The album also peaked at number 1 in Sweden and Ireland. The album spawned the band's first number 1 single, "
If You Tolerate This Your Children Will Be Next". The song's theme is taken from the
Spanish Civil War, and the idealism of
Welsh volunteers who joined the
left-wing International Brigades fighting for the
Spanish Republic against
Francisco Franco's military rebels. The song takes its name from a
Republican poster of the time, displaying a photograph of a young child killed by the
Nationalists under a sky of bombers with the stark warning "If you tolerate this, your children will be next" written at the bottom. The song is in the
Guinness World Records as the number 1 single with the longest title without brackets. The album also included three more hit singles, "
The Everlasting", "
You Stole the Sun from My Heart" and "
Tsunami". As with the 1997 Brit Awards, the Manics won both Best British Band and Album at the
1999 Brit Awards. After headlining
Glastonbury Festival,
T in the Park and
V Festival, the band played the
Leaving the 20th Century concert at the
Millennium Stadium in Cardiff on 31 December 1999, the first concert to be held there, with 57,000 people attending and the final song being broadcast around the world by satellite as part of
2000 Today. The concert was released on
VHS and
DVD as
Leaving the 20th Century. In 2000, they released the limited edition single "
The Masses Against the Classes". Despite receiving little promotion, the single sold 76,000 copies in its first week and reached number 1 in the
UK singles chart on 16 January 2000, beating "U Know What's Up" by
Donell Jones to the top. The single was deleted on the day of release, but the song nevertheless spent nine weeks in the UK chart. The band also pays tribute to singer and civil rights activist
Paul Robeson in the song "
Let Robeson Sing", which was issued as the album's fourth and final single. One non-political song on the album is "
Ocean Spray", the album's third single, which was written entirely by Bradfield about his mother's battle with cancer. The first two singles from the album, "
So Why So Sad" and "
Found That Soul", were both released on the same day. The Manics headlined the 2001
Reading and Leeds Festival. A greatest hits album,
Forever Delayed, was released in 2002, featuring two new songs, "Door to the River" and the single "
There by the Grace of God". A 2-CD 'Special Edition' was also issued, featuring a bonus CD of remixes.
Forever Delayed debuted and peaked on the UK chart at number 4. A DVD collection of the band's promo videos and a photo book, both also titled
Forever Delayed, were released at the same time.
Lipstick Traces (A Secret History of Manic Street Preachers), a compilation album of
B-sides, rarities, and cover versions was released in 2003, which includes the previously unreleased "Judge Yr'self", the last song the band recorded with Edwards. The album received a far more positive reception from fans than the
Forever Delayed greatest hits album, which was heavily criticised for focusing the band's more commercial side. The only recurring criticism of
Lipstick Traces was the exclusion of the fan favourite "Patrick Bateman", a B-side of "
La Tristesse Durera (Scream to a Sigh)", the second single from 1993's
Gold Against the Soul. The band explained that it was excluded mainly because it was almost seven minutes long and simply would not fit on the album.
Tony Visconti helped the band produce three songs on the album, which was followed by a UK arena tour in December 2004. "
The Love of Richard Nixon" and "
Empty Souls" were the two singles released from the album, both reaching number 2 in the UK. A 10th Anniversary Edition of
The Holy Bible was released on 6 December 2004, which included a digitally remastered version of the original album, a rare US mix (which the band themselves have admitted to preferring to the original UK mix) In September, the band contributed the new track "
Leviathan" to the War Child charity album
Help!: A Day in the Life. The band received the prize for the Q Merit Award at the 2006
Q Awards. A 10th Anniversary Edition of
Everything Must Go was released on 6 November 2006. It included the original album, demos, B-sides, remixes, rehearsals and alternate takes of the album's songs, spread out over two CDs. An additional DVD, featuring promo videos, live performances, TV appearances, a 45-minute documentary on the making of the album, and two new films by
Patrick Jones, completed the three-disc set. The second single, "
Autumnsong", and a third, "
Indian Summer", were released in August. "Indian Summer" peaked at number 22, making it the first Manics single not to chart in the Top 20 since 1994's "
She Is Suffering". The album sleeve features a quotation from
Wyndham Lewis: "When a man is young, he is usually a revolutionary of some kind. So here I am, speaking of my revolution". A Christmas single, "The Ghost of Christmas", was released as a free download on the band's official website throughout December 2007 and January 2008. In February 2008, the band were presented with the God-Like Geniuses Award at the
NME Awards ceremony. The ninth Manics studio album,
Journal for Plague Lovers, was released on 18 May 2009 and features lyrics left behind by Edwards. Wire commented in an interview that "there was a sense of responsibility to do his words justice." The album was released to positive critical reviews and reached number 3 on the UK Album Chart. However, the cover of the album generated some controversy, with the top four UK
supermarkets stocking the CD in a plain slipcase, as the cover was deemed "inappropriate". Several tracks refer to Edwards' time in a couple of hospitals in 1994. Bradfield commented that
Journal for Plague Lovers was an attempt to finally secure the legacy of Edwards and the result was that, during the recording process, it was as close to feeling his presence since his disappearance: "There was a sense of responsibility to do his words justice. That was part of the whole thing of letting enough time lapse. Once we actually got into the studio, it almost felt as if we were a full band; it [was] as close to him being in the room again as possible." The band's tenth studio album, 2010's
Postcards from a Young Man, was recorded with producer
Dave Eringa and was mixed in America by
Chris Lord-Alge. The album cover art uses a black and white photograph of British actor
Tim Roth. The first single from the album, "
(It's Not War) Just the End of Love", was released on 13 September 2010. The album was supported by the Manics' most extensive tour of the UK to date, starting in Glasgow on 29 September 2010.
British Sea Power were the support act for the band on the tour. Two further singles were released from the album—"
Some Kind of Nothingness", featuring
Ian McCulloch of
Echo & the Bunnymen, and the title track "
Postcards from a Young Man". "Some Kind of Nothingness" peaked at number 44 in the UK, making it the first-ever Manics single to not make the Top 40 since they signed to Sony in 1991. The compilation album
National Treasures – The Complete Singles was released on 31 October 2011, preceded by the release of the single "
This Is the Day", a cover of the song by
the The. The album was chosen by
NME magazine as the best reissue of 2011, beating
Nirvana's deluxe and super deluxe edition of
Nevermind to the top spot. On 17 December 2011, the group performed 'A Night of National Treasures' at
O2 Arena in London to celebrate the band's 25 years to date, and enter into a period of hiatus where the eleventh studio album was written. The band performed all 38 singles, with around 20,000 people in attendance, as well as guest performers including
Nina Persson from
the Cardigans on "Your Love Alone Is Not Enough" and
Gruff Rhys from
Super Furry Animals on "Let Robeson Sing". In April and May 2012, the band embarked on a European greatest hits tour. A documentary about their album
Generation Terrorists was screened on Saturday 20 October 2012 at Chapter Arts Centre as part of the Festival, with all profits donated to Young Promoters Network. The film was made available in the 20th Anniversary Edition of
Generation Terrorists, issued in November.
Rewind the Film and Futurology (2013–2016) In May 2013, the band announced an Australasian tour for June and July, that would see them play their first-ever show in New Zealand. This tour coincided with the British and Irish Lions rugby tour to Australia and the Melbourne concert on the eve of the 2nd Test featured Lions' centre Jamie Roberts as a guest guitarist on "You Love Us". In May 2013 the Manics released information about their most recent recording sessions, saying that they had enough material for two albums; the first would be almost exclusively without electric guitars. The name of the first album and title track was revealed to be
Rewind the Film on 8 July. In a statement, the band announced, "(If) this record has a relation in the Manics back catalogue, it's probably the sedate coming of age that was
This Is My Truth Tell Me Yours." The band also stated via
Twitter, "MSP were in the great Hansa Studios in January with Alex Silva (who recorded
The Holy Bible with us). Berlin was inspirational... Sean been playing a
french horn in the studio today—sounding wonderful." The lead single of the album, "
Show Me the Wonder", was released on 9 September 2013 to a positive critical reception. The album itself was released on 16 September 2013 and reached number 4 on the
UK Albums Chart. The second single from the album, "
Anthem for a Lost Cause", was released on 25 November 2013. The other album,
Futurology, the band's twelfth studio album, was released on 7 July 2014 and it received immediate critical acclaim. The lead single from the album, "
Walk Me to the Bridge", was released as a digital download on the day of the announcement, on 28 April. The album sold about 20,000 copies in its first week and reached number 2 in the UK. The title track, "
Futurology", was the second and final single released from the album on 22 September, with the video debuted on
YouTube on 10 August. The video was directed by the
British Academy of Film and Television Arts winner
Kieran Evans, who worked with the band on videos from
Rewind the Film. The band promoted the album with a tour around the UK and Europe from March to May 2014, they also made appearances in festivals like
T in the Park in Scotland and
Glastonbury Festival in the summer. In December 2014, the band toured
The Holy Bible, playing it in full for the very first time, to coincide with its 20th anniversary reissue. After the tour in the UK, the Manics took
The Holy Bible tour to North America, in April 2015, they played in Washington DC, Toronto, New York, Boston, San Francisco, Los Angeles and Chicago. They also played in the
Cardiff Castle on 5 June 2015 with 10,000 fans attending the gig, it was broadcast nationwide by BBC Two Wales. At the 2015
NME Awards, the album won "Reissue of the Year". In November 2015, Manic Street Preachers announced that they were going to celebrate the 20th anniversary of
Everything Must Go, with their biggest headline show since 1999, in the
Liberty Stadium, in
Swansea on 28 May 2016, featuring special guests including
Super Furry Animals. The album was performed in full, with Nicky Wire teasing "B-sides, rarities and curios, greatest hits and a few brand-new songs". Before the final show in Swansea the band played:
Liverpool,
Echo Arena (13 May),
Birmingham,
Genting Arena (14 May),
London,
Royal Albert Hall (16–17 May),
Leeds,
First Direct Arena (20 May) and
Glasgow, the
SSE Hydro (21 May). In early 2016, the band announced the European tour of
Everything Must Go, they played across Europe, in Finland, Denmark, the Netherlands and Germany.
Wales national team song and Resistance Is Futile (2016–2019) The band announced in March 2016 that they would be releasing a theme song for the Wales national team ahead of the
UEFA Euro 2016 tournament in the summer, entitled "
Together Stronger (C'mon Wales)". It was released on 20 May. Featuring a video with the band and the Welsh team, the Manics tweeted: "It's with great pride we can announce the Manics are providing the official Wales Euro 2016 song – 'Together Stronger (C'mon Wales)'". All profits from the song went to the Princes Gate Trust and Tenovus Cancer Care. On 8 July the band was at the
Cardiff City Stadium to give a home welcome to the Wales football national team after they were knocked out of the
UEFA Euro 2016 by Portugal in the semi-finals, the band played a few songs in the stadium including the official theme song "Together Stronger (C'mon Wales)". On the next night, 9 July, the Manics headlined a night at the Cornwall's
Eden Project, and later the band managed to secure a new recording studio near
Newport, Wales. The city's council ensured that only the band can use the studio, there would be an increase on-site parking and a series of soundproofing measures to ensure nearby properties aren't disturbed by noise. To end the summer, the Manics went on to headline another two festivals, Wasa Open Air in Finland in mid-August and in late August the
Victorious Festival in Portsmouth. The band also received a nomination in the 25th British Academy Cymru Awards for the best live outside broadcast after their 2015 gig in the Cardiff Castle, celebrating the 20th anniversary of
The Holy Bible. ,
Leeds in May 2018 In February 2017, the band revealed a teaser trailer for a documentary entitled
Escape from History. The documentary aired on
Sky Arts on 15 April. The band also stated that they would release an album later in that year. The band released a 10th Anniversary Edition of
Send Away the Tigers on 12 May 2017, with the Manics saying it was "a very important album" in their career. The special edition featured a remastered album as well as
B-sides and rarities spread over two discs, plus a DVD which features the band's 2007 Glastonbury performance, rehearsal footage, an album track-by-track, and promo videos. On 17 November 2017, the band announced that their thirteenth studio album,
Resistance Is Futile, would be released on 13 April 2018. After much delay, the band wrote in a statement: "The main themes of
Resistance Is Futile are memory and loss; forgotten history; confused reality and art as a hiding place and inspiration [...] It's obsessively melodic—in many ways referencing both the naive energy of
Generation Terrorists and the orchestral sweep of
Everything Must Go. After delay and difficulties getting started, the record has come together really quickly over the last few months through a surge of creativity and some old school hard work." It is the first album to be recorded at the "Door to the River" studio. The Manics launched their first single from
Resistance Is Futile, "
International Blue", as a download on 8 December 2017. The second single "
Distant Colours" was released, also as a download, on 16 February 2018. About the first single the band said that there was certain naive energy and widescreen melancholia on the song that is reflected through the whole album, comparing it to "
Motorcycle Emptiness". Furthermore, the album focused on "(...)things that make your life feel a little bit better. Rather than my internalised misery, I tried to put a sense of optimism into the lyrics by writing about things that we find really inspiring." Said Wire, taking inspiration from
David Bowie and seen as almost an escape and a wave of optimism, just like the previous album was described. On the other hand, "Distant Colours" was written by James Dean Bradfield, rather than Nicky Wire, and inspired by disenchantment and Nye Bevan's old Labour. He said: "Musically, the verse is downcast and melancholic and the chorus is an explosion of disillusionment and tears." The third single "
Dylan & Caitlin" was released as a download on 9 March 2018. The fourth single "
Liverpool Revisited" is about a magical day in the city, Nicky added that: "It was on the Everything Must Go (anniversary) tour and I got up really early at sunrise to walk around Liverpool, polaroid camera in hand on a balmy day. It sounds clichéd I know, but Liverpool in the sun does take on a hypnotic quality, with the Mersey and the stone." The band also revealed that they were to support
Guns N' Roses during their summer tour. The fifth and final single, "
Hold Me Like a Heaven", was released as a download on 4 May 2018. Wire said that the song was inspired musically by David Bowie's "
Ashes to Ashes", something that the band wanted to write about, and Nicky thinks that this the closest that the band is going to get, sharing also that lyrics were informed by the work of
Philip Larkin. The album sold around 24,000 copies in the first week, entering the
UK Albums Chart at number 2, despite being number 1 during the week. It was the highest new entry on the chart, and on physical sales the album peaked at number 1, both on
CD and
vinyl. In January 2018, Manic Street Preachers signed a publishing contract with
Warner/Chappell Music, leaving their longtime home
Sony/ATV Music Publishing. The band announced a 20th Anniversary Edition of
This Is My Truth Tell Me Yours in October 2018. It was made available on digital, CD, and vinyl, with the CD edition featuring bonus demos, live rehearsal recordings, remixes, and B-sides. The album was launched on 7 December 2018 and to promote it, the band went on tour in Spring and Summer 2019, performing the album in full alongside other content.
The Ultra Vivid Lament and Critical Thinking (2020–present) In March 2020, the Manics announced a deluxe reissue of
Gold Against the Soul for release on 12 June 2020. Bonus content included previously unreleased demos, B-sides from the era, remixes, and a live recording, while the CD was released alongside a book of unseen photographs from the era with handwritten annotations and lyrics from the band. The next day, the unnamed follow-up album to
Resistance Is Futile was confirmed to
NME alongside Bradfield's second solo album. The group's album, including a track called "Orwellian", was described as "expansive" and is due for release in Summer 2021. On 14 May 2021, the Manics announced the title of their fourteenth studio album as
The Ultra Vivid Lament. The first single from the album, "
Orwellian", was released on the same day. "
The Secret He Had Missed", the second single from the album, was released on 16 July 2021.
The Ultra Vivid Lament was released on 10 September 2021 and received generally positive reviews from critics: on
Metacritic, the album has a
weighted average score of 78 out of 100 based on 12 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews". The album sold 27,000 copies in the first week, granting the band their second UK number 1 album, as they narrowly beat
Steps to the top spot. In May and June 2022, Manic Street Preachers opened for
the Killers in some of their UK tour dates. In September 2022, the Manics announced a co-headlining tour of United States and Canada with
Suede for November 2022, which would be the first time the two bands would share the stage since they toured Europe together in 1994. On 24 June 2023, the band played the
Glastonbury Festival. Speaking to the Other Stage crowd, Wire said: "The first time we played was 1994 and it was the four of us, we had the one and only Richard Edwards with us, oh yes, we had a f**king blast. Everything that could go wrong did go wrong, it was f**king fun you know." All four band members were honoured with a
mural in their hometown of Blackwood in April 2024, designed by street artist Paul Shepherd. On 29 August 2024, Manics released "
Decline and Fall", the lead single for their fifteenth studio album,
Critical Thinking, which was announced in October that year.
Critical Thinking was initially announced to be released on 7 February 2025, but was postponed due to production delays. On 31 January 2025, preceding the release of
Critical Thinking, an extended play was released, titled
Brushstrokes of Reunion, comprising the songs "Brushstrokes of Reunion", "People Ruin Paintings", "Hiding in Plain Sight" and "Decline and Fall" from
Critical Thinking. The album was released on 14 February 2025 and reached number 2 on the Official UK album chart. The release coincides with the 30th anniversary of Richey Edwards' disappearance. In a February 2025 interview with
NME, Wire and Bradfield stated they were considering making their sixteenth album
European themed. == Collaborations and covers ==