Album 15

[Abstract Unknown Girl]

In the first few seconds on first listen, I thought it was another Orwellian (which I don't really like tbh), but I think it does get more interesting than that once the song kicks in. It's still a little more in the vein of TUVL than I was hoping for, but let's be honest, they have never been good at picking the best songs as their lead singles Or singles that necessarily represent the sound of the rest of the album, so I'm still interested to hear the full album and put this into context.

Originally Posted by counterlanguage

I hope the rest of the stuff's a bit more imaginative. Listen to Futurology, Even In Exile or Intimism - it's possible for them to push themselves.

I think this is something I do find a bit frustrating, because they clearly can still be more experimental. I must confess I haven't listened to Intimism a whole lot, but at least it was something different. And I love Even In Exile more than RIF or TUVL. You could tell it was James' passion project and it really came through with that album, even down to the podcast series he made to go with it.

I feel like they prefer to play it creatively safer with the Manics in recent years (bearing in mind Rewind the Film/Futurology are over a decade old now), which is a shame when they are capable of something more ambitious.