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Gold Against the Soul
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Gold Against the Soul
Gold Against the Soul is the second studio album by Welsh alternative rock band Manic Street Preachers, released on 21 June 1993 by Columbia Records. The follow-up to the band's 1992 debut album Generation Terrorists, the record reached No. 8 on the UK Albums Chart.
Gold Against the Soul takes to an extreme the hard rock sound of its predecessor and saw the band experiment with styles including funk and grunge. The album's lyrical themes owed little to the political and social commentaries of its predecessor, and instead explored more personal themes of depression, melancholy and nostalgia.
The band stated that the choice to work with Dave Eringa again was important for this album: "We finished work in November and then just went straight into a demo studio and we came out about four weeks later with the album all finished. We were all happy with all the songs, we knew what they wanted to sound like, so we didn't want to use a mainstream producer because they've got their own sound and vision of what a record should be like. So we just phoned Dave up and said 'Look, come down, let's see how this works out', and everyone loved what we were doing, so we decided to stay with him."
When asked to look back on the album, the band themselves have described Gold Against the Soul as their least favourite album and the period surrounding the album as being the most unfocused of their career. The band's vocalist and guitarist James Dean Bradfield has said "All we wanted to do was go under the corporate wing. We thought we could ignore it but you do get affected."
Simon Price of The Telegraph opined that the lyrics on Gold Against the Soul "switched from the political [of Generation Terrorists] to the personal". The lyrical content is considerably less political than their previous album Generation Terrorists, and the album is more reflective of the despair and melancholy of their later work.
"La Tristesse Durera" (literally "the sadness will go on") is the title of a biography of Vincent van Gogh, although the song is not about him but about a war veteran.
The album presents a different sound from their debut album, not only in terms of lyrics but in sound. The band privileged long guitar riffs and the drums feel more present and loud in the final mix of the album. This sound would be abandoned in their next album. According to AllMusic, the album takes "the hard rock inclinations of Generation Terrorists to an extreme." Meanwhile, Dave de Sylvia at Sputnikmusic characterized it as a glam rock album, similar to that of Bon Jovi, with Simon Price likening the record to "a blend of Bon Jovi and Nirvana". Cam Lindsay of Exclaim! proclaimed it to be a "sullen glam rock" album. Writing Leyendas Urbanas del Rock in 2019, José Luis Martín proclaimed that Gold Against the Soul saw the Manics "abandon glam punk and dangerously approach grunge". Tom Doyle of Q called the sound of the album "epic pop-rock", while Gigwise described it as "hair metal".
The album displayed a variety of styles; "Roses in the Hospital" tapped into a "stadium funk-rock" style, while "From Despair to Where" incorporated a quiet-loud dynamic; "follow[ing] the grunge template" in the words of Rob Jovanocic.
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Gold Against the Soul
Gold Against the Soul is the second studio album by Welsh alternative rock band Manic Street Preachers, released on 21 June 1993 by Columbia Records. The follow-up to the band's 1992 debut album Generation Terrorists, the record reached No. 8 on the UK Albums Chart.
Gold Against the Soul takes to an extreme the hard rock sound of its predecessor and saw the band experiment with styles including funk and grunge. The album's lyrical themes owed little to the political and social commentaries of its predecessor, and instead explored more personal themes of depression, melancholy and nostalgia.
The band stated that the choice to work with Dave Eringa again was important for this album: "We finished work in November and then just went straight into a demo studio and we came out about four weeks later with the album all finished. We were all happy with all the songs, we knew what they wanted to sound like, so we didn't want to use a mainstream producer because they've got their own sound and vision of what a record should be like. So we just phoned Dave up and said 'Look, come down, let's see how this works out', and everyone loved what we were doing, so we decided to stay with him."
When asked to look back on the album, the band themselves have described Gold Against the Soul as their least favourite album and the period surrounding the album as being the most unfocused of their career. The band's vocalist and guitarist James Dean Bradfield has said "All we wanted to do was go under the corporate wing. We thought we could ignore it but you do get affected."
Simon Price of The Telegraph opined that the lyrics on Gold Against the Soul "switched from the political [of Generation Terrorists] to the personal". The lyrical content is considerably less political than their previous album Generation Terrorists, and the album is more reflective of the despair and melancholy of their later work.
"La Tristesse Durera" (literally "the sadness will go on") is the title of a biography of Vincent van Gogh, although the song is not about him but about a war veteran.
The album presents a different sound from their debut album, not only in terms of lyrics but in sound. The band privileged long guitar riffs and the drums feel more present and loud in the final mix of the album. This sound would be abandoned in their next album. According to AllMusic, the album takes "the hard rock inclinations of Generation Terrorists to an extreme." Meanwhile, Dave de Sylvia at Sputnikmusic characterized it as a glam rock album, similar to that of Bon Jovi, with Simon Price likening the record to "a blend of Bon Jovi and Nirvana". Cam Lindsay of Exclaim! proclaimed it to be a "sullen glam rock" album. Writing Leyendas Urbanas del Rock in 2019, José Luis Martín proclaimed that Gold Against the Soul saw the Manics "abandon glam punk and dangerously approach grunge". Tom Doyle of Q called the sound of the album "epic pop-rock", while Gigwise described it as "hair metal".
The album displayed a variety of styles; "Roses in the Hospital" tapped into a "stadium funk-rock" style, while "From Despair to Where" incorporated a quiet-loud dynamic; "follow[ing] the grunge template" in the words of Rob Jovanocic.