Manic Street Preachers: 'Indian Summer'

It's a great shame when a band is making some of the finest material of their career and everybody's too busy whistling about Umbrellas and pretending to dig the latest nu-rave-grindie crossover to pay the slightest bit of notice. 'Indian Summer' by the Manic Street Preachers isn't just one of the group's best singles for a while, it's one of their best ever - and that's from a band who brought you more ball-shaking stadium anthems than you could shake a ruddy great stick at back in the '90s.

'Indian Summer' could find its place on any of the Manics' finest albums, with its bone-crunching riffs and rousing "dah-dah-daah" harmonies to puff your chest out to, an equal to anything off Everything Must Go, while the lyrical incongruity and themes of God, eternity and time match up with the best works from their darker days on The Holy Bible. James Dean Bradfield sparkles, with his sun-drenched, Welsh holler gliding where most men his age croak and crumble. A proof - if any was needed - that truly great bands never lose it.