Manic Street Preachers - Postcards From a Young Man

Before you ask - no I don't have a copy and no I can't share the songs with you. I was lucky enough to hear two songs from the new Manic Street Preachers album, 'Postcards From a Young Man'. I was invited with a handful of people to hear a couple of songs at the Sony offices in London. I'm assuming they were rush mixes although they sounded as good as finished. I heard the title track 'Postcards from a young man' and a second song called 'The end of love'. They both sounded like potential singles. They both sounded very upbeat. Surprisingly happy in the vocal department. Postcards sounded like motown/doo wop crossed with Queen. It sounded excellent. The beat and tempo of 'Design for Life' with a piano over the intro and a bit at the end that sounded like the finale of Queen's 'Somebody to love'. It was grand and excellent and pretty catchy. 'End of love' started with some descending arpeggios on the guitar and a rim shot pattern on the drums before crashing into a majestic song with lots of vocals and harmonies and a guitar solo. Sounded a bit like the Darkness at times (no falsetto though!). Both songs were very much Manics songs - but Postcards with its piano bits could be a different band if you couldn't hear the vocal. I'm no Manics super fan - but I quite like the big hits...these two songs I heard sound like big pop hits. They aren't listen-in-your-bedroom-hate-yourself-and-want-to-die numbers, they are grand rocking pop songs with catchy bits and stuff you could hum.