the lyrics editing...

[GoldAgainstTheSoul]

Originally Posted by Bought In

Yes that's true, but I think it has been overdone here. The real lyrics are just as long as the lyrics on the holy bible so I'm guessing they weren't edited as much. On JPFL, alot of the verses are just repeated which is just silly because they were was alot of source material to work from. It's annoying as this was supposed to be a tribute to Richey but somewhere in the process they forgot about that and worried too much about how they might affect the music, which is not necessarily a bad thing but THB is a perfect compromise between lyrics and music, I just feel that the musical considerations were given too much weight.

I havent gotten my lyric booklet yet so I'll hold off judgement but I feel as if I'm going to agree with you on this. How some of the intricate lyrics ended up used in the fairly simple 2 1/2min verse/chorus/verse layout in the end almost seems like Richey-lite when taking in to consideration these words were written following lyrical novellas like Yes, IfWhiteAmerica... & 4st 7lb.

The last thing I ever expected was to hear a song with lyrics written by Richey were the verse repeats itself. But I guess they were moving in that direction anyway with Judge YrSelf...

That said, I still LOVE the album.

[227lears]

I think the album is the best stuff since Everything Must Go, but i must agree the edititing on the lyrics is absolute fucking shit. It reeks of laziness to me, when you read the edit in conjunction with reading the lyrics to something like PCP it makes me wonder if the Wire has totally lost the plot, either that, or he is was insane with jealousy and didn't want us to hear the full Richey opus, then realised when it was too late that they published the full lyrics instead of the edited pish that James has been forced to bellow out.
I'm fucking hugely dissapointed. I had it down previously as a great album, after viewing what might have been it's now down to a good from me...fucking cop-out.

[4Manics]

Bla bla bla it's all Nicky's fault, i personally think that the second verse on JCEQT is utter shit and im bloody glad it was edited out, yes there are some bits that i would rather were not edited out but theres a limit on how much you can cram in and some things just do not work with regards to the melodies and sounds already in progress if the album did not get edited and it was all the lyrics put to sub standard music i would hate that where as what they have got here is great. I think people need to face up to the fact that they cannot make another THB and this was never going to be THB2 and if they tried doing that it would have sounded awful and desperate.

[Pedro8]

I was originally annoyed about JCEQT, but then again how could James sing lingerie to the tune he wrote and not sound stupid? I haven't got the deluxe edition yet, but feel happy that they have done amazing credit to some great words. It is such an incredible album, well worth the wait. Remember that it is about the music being creative. Perhaps if they had kept all the same words it would have ruined the quality of the music, especially the vocals too. We should be thankful that they have been willing to share the other lyrics in the deluxe edition, so risking fans' wrath. We can at least enjoy seeing the original work in progress and enjoy them (dare I say it) poems.

[River Boy]

I think Richey wouldn't have wanted THB 2, but something with a different feel. So I'm happy as I think that's what they've done - though it has echoes of THB it has more of a vulnerable and sensitive side.

[darkanddivine]

Originally Posted by 4Manics

Bla bla bla it's all Nicky's fault, i personally think that the second verse on JCEQT is utter shit and im bloody glad it was edited out, yes there are some bits that i would rather were not edited out but theres a limit on how much you can cram in and some things just do not work with regards to the melodies and sounds already in progress if the album did not get edited and it was all the lyrics put to sub standard music i would hate that where as what they have got here is great. I think people need to face up to the fact that they cannot make another THB and this was never going to be THB2 and if they tried doing that it would have sounded awful and desperate.

Spot on. The second verse for Jackies is pretty poor and the editing has been done to make the lyrics as powerful as possible.

[begging_to_be_cool]

I seem to remember James saying in an interview once that the original chorus of Motorcycle Emptiness, as handed to him by Richey, began with something along the lines of "Underneath economic clouds of alienated loneliness", so this kind of editing process has always gone on.

Some good lines have been cut, sure, but they had to turn those words into songs. At least the lines aren't lost, thanks to the band publishing them for us to read.

It's a great album.

[Takk]

There are some lost lyrical great bits in there, and I think it's great we can read the real lyrics, but I think it's a bit unfair to be too critical. We really have no idea what the original PCP read like for example.

That said, it's not like these lyrics were too complicated, and some of them could have been kept in....but this isn't a Richey Edwards solo album, it's a manics album, so I think the others have every right to decide what lyric went in or not.

[Bach Psychosis]

Quite so!

It's pretty arrogant and obnoxious for people here to be deciding what the band do and don't have the right to do with their own work. But then, I imagine that the band don't expect anything different from their fans.

It was incredibly ballsy of them to publish the full lyrics, knowing as they must have that they were going to get this kind of high-handed presumptuous shit from their own fans.

[mute solitude]

i read throgh the lyrics before i heard the song, i felt they missed a lot of good lines on MASH, but isnt surprised WLW have been cut. id rather see the full original lyrics then the edited song along ones. my only wondering is what the hell something like YES or FASTER was like

[countdown to retirement]

not exactly lyrics, but from reading the booklet with the original lyrics in, i get the impression that the album containing these songs was intended to be 'opulence'? not just the bugs bunny cover, but the fact that the 'contents' page is also titled that too? not that it matters too much, but i'm curious as to why they didn't choose that since it seems quite obvious (although admittedly i am completely assuming) and to be fair, better than the current jfpl title.

[mrsmanics]

I agree to a degree that the lyrics, having read the full version, have been given something of a "new Manics" makeover (THB era Manics, you get the feeling they might have edited a bit less), but they've used the words and made an incredible album from them, which is all a fan can really ask and all Richey probably wanted when he left them the lyrics. Editing those lyrics must have been quite a difficult process, what with choosing which lines to use, trying to decipher the meaning in the songs without having Richey on hand to ask and trying to fit the words to the music.

The only song that I really query is William's Last Words, because when you read the original words, it comes across as a character piece, but with obvious links to the way Richey was feeling at the time ("I wish I could go to sleep and wake up happy" etc). The way it has been edited sounds far more like a goodbye note, which just seems slightly odd; the band must have known that fans and members of the press would leap on those lyrics and read into them. I can understand why they cut the "don't be surprised if I come back" line, given that people would have a field day with it, with the benefit of hindsight, but I just wonder why it was simplified so much.

I love the full lyrics to it and I still think that Richey may well have been writing some sort of goodbye note, from the guise of a character, but it's much more open to interpretation in it's full form than it is on the completed track.

[nocultureicons]

I'm surprised they didn't open the record with Bag Lady... imagine how the press would have interpreted "I am not dead / I demand I know my rights" as the first thing they heard.

[Bought In]

Originally Posted by nocultureicons

I'm surprised they didn't open the record with Bag Lady... imagine how the press would have interpreted "I am not dead / I demand I know my rights" as the first thing they heard.

and end it with 'don't be surprised if I come back'

[Kieslowski]

I initially questioned the editing of the lyrics, particularly MASH where they're not even using the suggested verses. But then I said something to myself which I would repeat to anyone giving the band a hard time over the lyric editing:

"They didn't have to include the original lyrics, and they didn't even need to make the album in the first place - stop being such a cock."

As for people laying the blame completely at Nicky's feet - don't you know anything about how JDB used to be presented with much more lines of lyrics than he eventually put into the song, even from the very early days?