Manics singles choices are often baffling, but got particularly bizarre after TIMTTMY.

Yeah, they've had many B-sides that are stronger than many singles.

Much stronger, if we're being honest.

I have no idea what criteria the band used when selecting singles. We've had glimpses of their methodology - for example, 'Indian Summer* sounds like Design For Life, in that case we'll put it on the album - and have it as a single!'

I have always wondered to what extent the band were free to choose singles (and the order of singles) and how many were chosen from them by the record company.

*I adore Indian Summer, by the way (my favourite track from SATT).

Nah, it got me really excited for the album because it was so different to anything they'd done. Still love the song.

I think Let Robeson Sing might be the one I'm totally baffled by.

I think LRS makes total sense as a single, regardless of whether you rate it as a song or not (personally I do, I know others will disagree) - "Can anyone make a difference anymore? / can anyone write a protest song?" as a lyric kind of carries a tad more weight when they put it out as a single, to me. However it went down with the public, if the answer is 'yeah, not if you hide it away as an album track mate' it would have removed some of the song's power, I think.

Though I would have personally loved Intravenous Agnostic as a single. Maybe not even instead of one of the others, KYE was a plentiful album, it could have taken another single IMHO.

I did find it underwhelming and unmemorable when it came out.. Maybe it was an anticipation thing, was a long gap between albums. Felt like ages at the time, but now 3 years feels like nowt, could blink that away.

Much more favourable to Love of Richard Nixon these days, meself. Wasn't on here at the time, curious to know what the reaction was like back then. Only knew a handful of Manics fans at the time, we were just glad they were back, don't remember banging on about how great the single was.

Fair point about the lyrics. I suppose musically it just feels like one of the 'tamest' songs on the album, which struck me as the image they were trying to avoid at that point. I'd say similar for Ocean Spray, actually. The album has lots of rawer moments and more unusual tracks, but it feels like only the first two singles followed up on that.

I think Let Robeson Sing is the worst single

I think Intravenous Agnostic was in the running for one of the singles, which would've balanced out the clean/dirty thing

Sometimes I like to go on eBay and look at the completed listings and see the going rate for stuff these days. Every now and again I'm shocked. Some sod paid over £50 for a a GT and TIMTTMY minidisc.

Got em meself mind. Never gonna listen to em, never had the means to. Someone's trying to sell a Holy Bible one for £55 and a Gold Against The Soul one for £80, what the fuck. Are minidiscs actually popular?

I kind of wish I'd bought all the official MiniDiscs now. But at the time I thought 'why bother? I have the superior quality CD and I can make a digital copy...'. and I would speculate that that is probably part of why MiniDisc failed to become as popular as it might have, as lovely a format as it was in many ways. Plus they cost the same or more than CDs, so they weren't even attractive as a budget option like cassettes were for ages.

I do have GT on MD.

Minidiscs were a great replacement for blank cassettes but Sony just told everyone to rebuy their albums and everyone just went *meh*. They were popular with journalists I think for a while to record interviews.

I'm just missing GATS & THB .. not got a working player anymore tho. I remember I used to spend a fortune on batteries

The MDs always for way more then I'm willing to pay. I was lucky enough to get KYE (I forget how much) and Truth. Truth I got last year or the year before for about £3 new on Amazon Marketplace! Still haven't opened it and probably never will.

Never bought any at the time, but got them all now, think it's worked out about £40 the lot, which could've been worse by the looks of it. Never actually hard a mini disc, and not sure I'd notice any quality difference anyway.

Suppose another of mini disc's problem was more or less coinciding with MP3s, as well as not being budget option or that significant an improvement from CDs. But the prices I'm seeing em go for does indicate that maybe people are holding em in a bit higher regard now than they did at the time so I wonder if there'll be any sort of comeback. Probably not on the scale of vinyl, that's gone from strength to strength.

Yeah, the rebuying the albums thing... while I was having a look on eBay the other day I found an auction where someone had pad $1100 for half a dozen Pink Floyd albums. Crazy money. That said, for a lot of bands and labels, old albums is where the money is more than new albums these days. Us collectors are spoilt for reissues.

I'd like to know what numbers we're talking with these things. Got hold of GT, EMG, TIMTTMY and KYE dead easy, but GATS and THB were more of a struggle. Wonder how much mini disc relied upon completists..

About time I got some use out of these. None of that hipster vinyl bollocks.

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