Motown Junk
"Motown Junk" | ||||
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Single by Manic Street Preachers | ||||
B-side |
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Released | 21 January 1991 (1991-01-21) | |||
Recorded | Late 1990 | |||
Genre |
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Length | 4:00 | |||
Label | Heavenly | |||
Songwriter(s) | James Dean Bradfield, Nicky Wire, Sean Moore, Richey Edwards | |||
Producer(s) | Robin Wynn Evans | |||
Manic Street Preachers singles chronology | ||||
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"Motown Junk" is the second single by Welsh alternative rock band Manic Street Preachers, released on 21 January 1991 by Heavenly.
Release
"Motown Junk" was released on 21 January 1991 by record label Heavenly, the band's first release on this label. It peaked at number 94 on the UK Singles Chart.[3] Despite its relatively poor charting, the single gained the band much attention from the press.[4]
In 2008, the band added a "Johnny Boy Anniversary Mix" free embedded version to their official website, which featured spoken dialogue by Richey Edwards.[5]
In 2011, Heavenly re-released "Motown Junk" to sell at the Manic Street Preachers gig on 21 May 2011 and at the Berwick Independent Marker.[6]
The track has long been a live favourite throughout their career.[5]
Content
The title track shows the band during their pinnacle of iconoclastic attitude,[7] such as in the lyric, "I laughed when Lennon got shot". The "Motown" in the title refers to famed 1960s and 1970s label Motown Records. The song also displayed their diverse cultural scope with a Public Enemy-sampling intro and an outro sample of The Skids.[5]
Mark Corcoran of NARC adjudged the song to pertain to the punk metal style.[1]
Both B-sides featured on the single, "Sorrow 16" and "We Her Majesty's Prisoners", were on the later singles "Slash 'n' Burn" and "You Love Us", respectively, both from the band's debut album Generation Terrorists (1992). The single was the band's first from their then record label Heavenly Records.[6]
The single's cover features a watch recovered from the Hiroshima bomb site depicting the exact moment of detonation.[8]
The outro of the song samples the outro of the single 'Charles' by the Skids with James Dean Bradfield often citing Stuart Adamson as one of his influences.
Legacy
In 2011, NME ranked the song number three on their list of the 10 greatest Manic Street Preachers songs,[9] and in 2022, The Guardian ranked the song number 12 on their list of the 30 greatest Manic Street Preachers songs.[10] NME included the song at no. 244 in their list of 500 Greatest Songs of All Time, with the description: "They were still stencilling their own t-shirts and playing to half-full pub back rooms, but this icon-skewering single showed that the Manics meant business."[11]
In subsequent live performances of the song, Bradfield generally skips the lyric "I laughed when Lennon got shot," or replaces his name with a different word, such as in their Millennium concert Leaving the 20th Century, in which Lennon is replaced by the word "Misty". In a 2008 interview with The Quietus, Bradfield remarked, “I remember when I got that lyric, it felt like that Bill Hicks notion: why is it that the good people always get assassinated?"[12]
Track listing
- CD version
No. | Title | Length |
---|---|---|
1. | "Motown Junk" | 4:00 |
2. | "Sorrow 16" | 3:45 |
3. | "We Her Majesty's Prisoners" | 5:22 |
- 12" vinyl version
No. | Title | Length |
---|---|---|
1. | "Motown Junk" | 4:00 |
2. | "Sorrow 16" | 3:45 |
No. | Title | Length |
---|---|---|
3. | "We Her Majesty's Prisoners" | 5:22 |
- 7" vinyl version
No. | Title | Length |
---|---|---|
1. | "Motown Junk" | 4:00 |
No. | Title | Length |
---|---|---|
2. | "Sorrow 16" | 3:45 |
Charts
Chart (1991) | Peak position |
---|---|
UK Singles (OCC)[13] | 94 |
References
- ^ a b Corcoran, Mark (5 April 2018). "ALBUM REVIEW: Manic Street Preachers – Resistance is Futile". Narc Magazine. Retrieved 16 June 2020.
- ^ Peppercorn, James (29 August 2020). "Manic Street Preachers – 'The Holy Bible': Why It Mattered". Happy Mag. Retrieved 14 May 2021.
- ^ "Chart Company". Official Charts.
- ^ "Motown Junk". Select. IPC Media. January 1991.
- ^ a b c Power, Martin (17 October 2010). Manic Street Preachers. Omnibus Press.
- ^ a b "Manic Street Preachers". Discogs.
- ^ Price 1999.
- ^ Heatley 1997.
- ^ Elan, Priya (7 October 2011). "Manic Street Preachers – Their 10 Best Tracks". NME. Retrieved 24 April 2022.
- ^ Petridis, Alexis (10 February 2022). "Manic Street Preachers' 30 greatest songs – ranked!". The Guardian. Retrieved 24 April 2022.
- ^ Barker, Emily (31 January 2014). "The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time – 300-201". NME.
- ^ https://www.thequietus.com/articles/00418-manic-street-preachers-a-heavenly-body-of-work-part-two.
{{cite web}}
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(help) - ^ "Manic Street Preachers: Artist Chart History". Official Charts Company. Retrieved 8 April 2017.
Sources
- Heatley, Michael (1997). Manic Street Preachers in Their Own Words. London: Omnibus Press. ISBN 978-0711969063.
- Price, Simon (1999). Everything (A Book About Manic Street Preachers). London: Virgin Books. ISBN 0-7535-0139-2.
External links
- BBC interview about the song
- Uncut article which mentions the single
- Motown Junk at Discogs (list of releases)
- v
- t
- e
- James Dean Bradfield
- Sean Moore
- Nicky Wire
- Generation Terrorists
- Gold Against the Soul
- The Holy Bible
- Everything Must Go
- This Is My Truth Tell Me Yours
- Know Your Enemy
- Lifeblood
- Send Away the Tigers
- Journal for Plague Lovers
- Postcards from a Young Man
- Rewind the Film
- Futurology
- Resistance Is Futile
- The Ultra Vivid Lament
- "Suicide Alley"
- "Motown Junk"
- "You Love Us (Heavenly Version)"
- "Stay Beautiful"
- "Love's Sweet Exile"/"Repeat"
- "You Love Us"
- "Slash 'n' Burn"
- "Motorcycle Emptiness"
- "Theme from M.A.S.H. (Suicide Is Painless)"
- "Little Baby Nothing"
- "From Despair to Where"
- "La Tristesse Durera (Scream to a Sigh)"
- "Roses in the Hospital"
- "Faster"
- "Revol"
- "She Is Suffering"
- "A Design for Life"
- "Everything Must Go"
- "Kevin Carter"
- "Australia"
- "If You Tolerate This Your Children Will Be Next"
- "The Everlasting"
- "You Stole the Sun from My Heart"
- "Tsunami"
- "The Masses Against the Classes"
- "So Why So Sad"
- "Found That Soul"
- "Ocean Spray"
- "Let Robeson Sing"
- "There by the Grace of God"
- "The Love of Richard Nixon"
- "Empty Souls"
- "Underdogs"
- "Your Love Alone Is Not Enough"
- "Autumnsong"
- "Indian Summer"
- "(It's Not War) Just the End of Love"
- "Some Kind of Nothingness"
- "Postcards from a Young Man"
- "This Is the Day"
- "Show Me the Wonder"
- "Anthem for a Lost Cause"
- "Walk Me to the Bridge"
- "Futurology"
- "Together Stronger (C'mon Wales)"
- "International Blue"
- "Distant Colours"
- "Dylan & Caitlin"
- "Liverpool Revisited"
- "Hold Me Like a Heaven"
- "People Give In"
- "Orwellian"
- "The Secret He Had Missed"
- "Rosebud"
- "4st 7lb"
- "Peeled Apples"
- Everything Live
- Leaving the 20th Century
- Louder Than War
- Forever Delayed