Manic Street Preachers - Motown Junk (Live Reading 1992)

Motown Junk is an early stand alone single from the rock band Manic Street Preachers. It was released on January 21, 1991. The track has long been a live favourite from the earlier part of their career to the present day. The title track shows the band during their pinnacle of iconoclastic attitude, such as in the lyric, "I laughed when Lennon got shot". The Motown in the title refers to famed 60s and 70s label Motown Records.

Both b-sides featured on the single (Sorrow 16 and We Her Majesty's Prisoners) were on the later singles "Slash 'n' Burn" - "You Love Us" respectively - from the band's debut album, Generation Terrorists. The single was the band's first from their then record label, Heavenly Records. Despite its relatively poor charting, the single gained the band much attention from the press.

When performing live, the band begin the song with a few lines from another song. From around 1991 until 1997, James would sing the chorus to the Motown classic "Baby Love", often changing the lyrics on the spot. During 1998/99, the song began with the riff from Lynyrd Skynyrd's "Sweet Home Alabama"; since then the Manics have used the "Motown Junk Medley" to pay tribute to Van Halen's "Jump" and Guns N' Roses "Sweet Child O' Mine". On their May 2007 tour, the Manics used the first verse of "Condemned To Rock And Roll" to begin the song, and during the December tour the band played a shortened version of The Cult's "She Sells Sanctuary" as an intro. In the summer of 2008, they returned to preceding live performances of the song with "Baby Love."

The band have played the song at virtually every gig since 1990. Nicky Wire commented around 2003 that the day they stopped playing 'Motown Junk' live was the day they stopped being the Manics. It is noticeable, however, that on recent live performances, James Dean Bradfield does not complete the line "I laughed when Lennon got shot", only singing "I Laughed". Critics of the band's "Lifeblood" album were quick to make much of the fact that the song was dropped from the setlist of the band's December 2004 Lifeblood arena tour. It returned for the April 2005 "Past Present Future" tour, as the final song in the set.

The single's cover features a watch recovered from the Hiroshima bomb site depicting the exact moment of detonation.

Category:

Music

Tags:

• manic
• street
• preachers
• live
• reading
• festival
• 1992
• 1991
• james
• dean
• bradfield
• richey
• edwards
• nicky
• wire
• generation
• rock

[BELLZEBOSS]

This is fucking Rock n' roll!!!

[Lovesrichey]

wow. Richey looks so stunning in this...beautiful (': oh...and i love nicky's blow-a-kiss at 1.59 XD

[Libertinedreamful]

@Terramax at least the ones iv mentioned are real artists that sing about real life. Not some pathetic attempt at making love songs. Tell you what, who listens to motown now eh? the same people that listened to it back then where rock n roll has always remained relevant. My list was typical because they are all major artists around that time, just a shame i forgot the doors to add to that list

[Terramax]

@Libertinedreamful

And for everyone one of those artists mentioned, you had about 50 shitty white acts. Half of the ones you mention are overrated anyhow - only loved due to hype or because they're told to by douchebag wannabes. Your list is so typical.

[Libertinedreamful]

@Terramax are you sure about that?? There was The beatles, kinks, hendrix, the who,stooges, bowie, T rex zeppelin,queen, cooper, pistols, the clash, the damned, the ramones,joan jett and a whole lot of other truly amazing artists yet you think motown is better. ...lol

[Terramax]

@Libertinedreamful

Let face it. Motown was better than any of the shit that was out in the 60s and 70s.

[Libertinedreamful]

@stankler no you're wrong, motown was/is junk - pub rock all the way!

[empathybaby]

James Dean Bradfield is a fucking machine. It was only when I saw them play last year and whilst the support band were playing I noticed him at the side of the stage eating a bag of crisps that I finally realised he is in fact....human.

[alexboisnufc]

@stankler I think when they say it's "junk" it's not about the quality of the music, it's more about the concept of exploiting artists to do sour soulless pop music and from a very young age. They are not wrong, and this is by no means pub rock : sound quality is not good. Listen to more manic street preachers and you'll discover what real lyrics are : even after being bought by big companies they still put what they want in their songs, not like most of the other so called "political" bands.

[RocklandsTV]

love it. people still arguing about the manics. either way. an all time highlight set at reading festival.

[channnel6tv]

that was such a brilliant day!