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> Login to your account > RegisterMANIC STREET PREACHERS
From page 82 of Classic Rock Magazine May 2000
Cover of May 2000 issue.
Leaving The 20th Century
(Sony Music Video, 103 mins) *****
As the typically grand title implies, 'Leaving The 2oth Century' is a document of how the Manics spent the last few hours of 1999. Which was, of course, not passed out in the corner of a mate's front room covered in dribble and red wine but entertaining a shade under 60,000 punters in Cardiff s Millennium Stadium. So, yes, it's a live video. And, if truth be told, a pretty average one at that.
Performance and production wise, 'Leaving The 20th Century' isn't a patch on the 'Everything Live' set released a couple of years ago. Apart from raucous renditions of 'The Masses Against The Classes', 'Rock And Roll Music' and 'Stay Beautiful', the pace is pretty pedestrian, with some of the more stately 'This Is My Truth...' material actually dragging. And yet everybody on film was having the time of their life, Nicky Wire included: "Pete Townshend said being on stage was like heroin," quoth the bassist post-gig. "Well that was like four paracetamol which is the most drugs I've ever done in my life."
But then if you saw a recording of my New Year's Eve celebrations you'd probably wonder what all the fuss was about as well. I guess you just had to be there.
Daniel Silver
