"Last shot at mass appeal" (or however it was phrased) = we'll try and connect to a lot of peeps again, get some hits out there and not just fizzle out of spotlight instantly after the release of the album. If it doesn't work, we'll shrug over it and are satisfied to continue with a series of low-key releases, possibly like Plague Lovers.

It's pretty clear what he means, if it was a "this is possibly OUR VERY LAST ALBUM EVER", it'd be bigger news and a proper statement rather than a tiny little quip in a small web news clip. They're not exactly a band who's going to stop for a while, anyway. They're all workaholics and close friends who love playing music with eachother. Nicky's pretty much the only member who isn't against doing more solo releases, what would the other two do all day if the band quit?

Stop being silly doomsaying sausages.

The photograph of Tim Roth is a 1994 shot by Glen Luchford, who is a long-time collaborator with artist Jenny Saville. It's part of his book 'Monograph' but I believe it was originally a photo shoot for I-D magazine.

Tim Roth kept a 'Polaroid diary' in the early 90s, hence the camera.

am i the only one getting a conceptual 'polaroids from the dead' vibe from the title and the initial artwork?

Continuing the trend of pronounceable acronyms!

It's all getting a bit emotional on here.
Afterall it's all guesswork.

I mean, for all we know, there could be another 3 albums to come after this, that's my positive thoughts anyway.
I just couldn't imagine them not making music anymore.

Surely the by Nicky's "last shot" comment he was referring to the fact that Manics will never do a tour of this size again?

Anybody in the smoke got NME yet?

The cover mentions "In the studio with the Manics", hopin' for some song titles!

I do hope they've learnt their lesson from SATT about how you only actually need two or three songs designed to get airplay on daytime Radio 2 and Absolute. That's all the masses will be interested in. For the rest of the album you can, you know, write a proper album or something...

Thanks for the tip - will drop by my newsstand later but usually we in Boston don't get it until a week later than you guys. :(

I really like the album title. 'It's Not War, Just The End Of Love' would still be a good title for a track though.

I'm looking forward to it hugely. Any mention of EMG is a good thing to me.

I like a lot of SATT. But they did know what they were doing in terms of the sound. They played it safe, and it sold well and they received more airplay with the singles off it than probably all they're singles the singles from Know Your Enemy and Lifeblood combined. But that's hardly a suprise i guess.

I look forward to listening to it. But i can't help feeling with Journals only coming out a year ago. Another record so soon sugests to me, it's a case of let's try and make some money, as we didn't make anything with Journals. And let's face it, they can write tracks like the ones on EMG and SATT in their sleep. Hence, it coming out so soon after the last release.
In saying all that, I think I'm probably being a little MEH here. It's a new manics album, and i should be happy. I love my pop music. Good pop music anyway. I just don't want to have to deal with any souless hits like YLAINE. That really tested me as a fan of the band.
And aswell, i shouldn't moan so much about all this. Afterall, they gave us Journals last year.

But saying that, back in the great age of the 60's albums came out 10-12 months after each other in some cases! The Jam released the first few albums within months of each other so why is there so much emphasis that an album can only come out 2-3 years after the next one.

Just because it has been made faster than anticipated doesn't mean it'll be poor. For all we know they may have had these lying around since SATT. Don't forget JFPL was more of a 'concept' album. They knew what tehy wanted to do with it. I am excited for PFAYB. It is giving me a sense of hope. It will be ok :)

Is it me or has the promo work for the last few albums contained something along the lines of 'sounds like a mix of "*** and EMG". Send away the tigers was a mix of GT and EMG so now we're getting two parts EMG and one part GT.

I can't say I'm incredibly excited about SATT II yet. Why doesn't Nicky just come straight and say they're making this album just to make some money? Be honest about recycling the same albums again and again.

One line in a review of SATT has always stuck with me 'They've made this album before and they'll probably make it again'.

The songs might be good but I'm not sure if I will be listening to the album by Christmas. Here's to hoping that I'm incredibly wrong about this.

my mate said there was written in the news about it on the main site that the album will be released on the 20th of September but now it's already deleted. WTF?! IT'S SO SOON.

also how do you think can we except new songs in Europe in the summer? :D