Empty Souls

God knows what makes the comparison

When “Empty Souls” was first previewed on the 2003 Isle of Wight festival, it was a fast and powerful rocker. That version continues to hold a vague kind of legendary status because it presented the song as a powerful rock number, with volume and energy that lacked from the eventual album version. The final recorded version has something the live version lacked completely, though: the gorgeous studio space.

“Empty Souls” towers with atmosphere. Each drum beat, each clink of the ice-cold piano (yes it’s very “New Year’s Day”, we get it) and each vocal line is shouted out into a gigantic area of space, echoing and resonating through the ether. It’s as if a grand stadium stage was set up in the middle of an empty valley: everything sounds colossal. James refrains from his usual guitar antics and swaps for an e-bow, a rarity from him: the electronically sustained notes radiate their own atmospheric touch, adding a haunting underline behind the melody of the piano. The whole song sounds immense, gigantic, something that looms over the sky with its presence.

Which is, naturally, what the lyrics also aim for. The lyrics describe loneliness and internal darkness so vast that nothing makes for an appropriate comparison: not even the Twin Towers attack, which was still fresh in everyone’s minds only a few years after it occurred and had become considered a collective trauma in the US and an inescapably terrifying event everywhere else in the world. For the radio edit the line was lazily changed into a comparison against dying flowers (lazily, because you can still clearly hear the backing vocals sing the original line), which is less controversial but also far less dramatic and not quite the point the line is trying to make.

The song became the second single for Lifeblood and in comparison to the tightly controlled campaign for “The Love of Richard Nixon”, the campaign for “Empty Souls” was a thorough disaster in every way and spelled the end for the entire era. Thanks to the abrupt sub-campaign for the 10th anniversary reissue of The Holy Bible, the single was pushed back all the way to January 2005, typically considered a dead month for music: the single made it to #2 but only because of its multiple formats and mostly because no one else was releasing new music at that point. Between the release month, the radio edit controversy and the mixed reception that Lifeblood had received the song barely got airplay; nor did the video get any time in TV, which may as well have been a mercy kill given its depictions of the band spending a bored night in a German hotel made for a truly terrible video. The band’s performance of the song in Top of the Pops ended with Sean throwing his drumkit on the floor, apparently due to frustration of having to succumb to a playback performance but it may as well have been the band’s opinion on how everything was going. The planned third single off the album was cancelled shortly after.

Another majestic victim of a badly managed campaign and a Manics classic that never became acknowledged as one, though it’s one of the few songs the band have played off the album in the years to come (rarely).

“Empty” Souls had a number of sleeve quotes: one for each of the three issues of the single and a fourth for the limited edition box you could order to store them in (mine’s #4559, albeit bought second hand). All reference physical death, which is another way to interpret the looming emptiness described in the song.

“The ceaseless labour of your life is to build the house of death”
-Michel de Montaigne
“After the first death there is not other”
-Dylan Thomas
“By the light of our insistent truths we wander into death”
-Edmond Jabés
“Death came and he looked like a rat with claws – I made him go into the wall”
-Jenny Holzer

The official video for some reason is not on Youtube, so I’m embedding the aforementioned TOTP performance.

[edited 19/09/22]

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The Love of Richard Nixon

Yeah, they all betrayed you

“The Love of Richard Nixon” was a huge surprise to everyone. Yes, “There By the Grace of God” might have already hinted at a more electronic direction but no one was expecting Manics to pull out something out of their bag that was practically a synth pop song. Why do Sean’s drums sound so processed, where’s James’ guitar?

“Nixon” or rather how it became a single was even a surprise for the band. The tragic tale of Lifeblood‘s underappreciation and the mishandling of its campaign starts right here, its label-mandated lead single that had little to do with its parent album and misdirected everyone. It was a curveball – perhaps an intentional one – but it seemed to miss every goal it aimed for. It’s now widely considered as one of the worst choices of a single in the band’s history, certainly their most misjudged lead single, and if people ever tinker around with Lifeblood‘s tracklist it starts with this song almost out of spite.

The tragic context around it does have a habit of hiding what a brilliant song it is though. Lifeblood isn’t quite as synthetic as many of its production tricks would have you to believe, but “The Love of Richard Nixon” revels in its electronic groove. Nothing in it sounds like it came from a real instrument – even James’ solo has a cold electronic tone – but that only makes it sound all the more menacing. It’s a heck of a catchy synth pop banger in its core, but Manics have approached it with cold detachment and the end result is something that gets your skin crawling as well as something you can dance to. Its emotional coldness is downright impressing. The level of detail around Lifeblood‘s arrangements is already clear though: the additional synths that continue on from the chorus right down to the second verse, where the vocal melody and the length of the lyrics begin to fill the full lines rather than break them apart like in the first verse, is a one-two hit of brilliance that turns up the intensity almost subconsciously. The first verse and chorus may be spent in confusion, but from the second verse on the song starts seeking a bullseye with intent. It’s a magnificently towering electronic groove and while it may be a sore spot to some degree, it more than holds up its weight on the album.

It’s no wonder, really, that the label heard a hit single in this. It’s instantly addictive and tremendously captivating. A weird pop song, but a pop song nonetheless.

The lyrics carry on the album’s ruminations of legacy. Nixon is never going to be retroactively considered a good guy and even Wire has gone against the notion, but he entertains the idea of “death without assassination”, condemning a public figure so deeply in the history books that the few acts of good they did are practically unmentioned. Which sounds very topical in the 2020s with the rise in famous people being discovered for notorious acts and the attempts to detach them from public consciousness afterwards. It’s one of Wire’s more interesting pieces of historical commentary, swaying away from writing a biography to consider an obscure point instead.

As the lead single the song also received a whole lot of promotional content, and even though the single was contested even within the band it was clear that everyone was secretly having a lot of fun running gung-ho with the theme. The omnipresent Nixon masks (including one obscuring the true identity of Wire’s replacement during a TV promo slot while he had to attend to family matters), the Nixon campaign quotes that accompanied each single sleeve, the ludicrous and kind of brilliant video where the band’s po-faced performance is set against a backdrop of Nixon clips. It’s the first – and only – time in Manics history where the entire campaign around the single had a connecting theme that was carried out from appearance to appearance, and it was fun to behold.

[edited 20/09/22]

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Always/Never

Always getting something wrong

The slap bass hogs all the attention. I get it. Even when you listen to this song with more contemporary (ca. 2022) ears which have gotten adjusted to Wire becoming a surprisingly multi-faceted bassist over the years, the overt funk thunk of the bass in “Always/Never” is still a conversation piece because it’s so front and center – and in 2004, it was almost radical for the Manics (which says more about them at the time than the riff itself). But once you get past that and you allow your mind to focus on the other parts of the music, “Always/Never” reveals itself to be a much more complex song than you first realise, and one of the clearest examples of the ideas behind Lifeblood.

Take James’ guitar for example – where is it? Buried in the mix of course: hiding behind the colossal bass and drums and the ice-like synths there’s a wah-wah-esque guitar, contributing yet more to the rhythm of the song rather than melody. In the chorus it transforms into an ethereal lead that plays in unison with the electric piano, or maybe what sounds like a piano is the guitar: the producer Greg Haver has said in interviews that Lifeblood is full of James’ guitar but often it’s hidden behind instruments or other effects which make it sound like synth or keyboard parts. Lifeblood is Bradfield’s most experimental guitar record and the subtle yet so important guitar sections of “Always/Never” really hammers down the idea. The guitar transforms along the track, always present but stalking in the shadows and changing form. But once you click on to its presence, you realise how lush and important it is.

“Always/Never” is built on details like that. It’s a strange song, partly because it’s so bold and brash with its big moves: the textural background keyboard work that drapes it in a strange, ambient light and the contrasting power of the bass and drums, dominating the song altogether. But then in the background there’s so much going on to twist and shake it: the crystal clear acoustic guitar that brightens up the chorus, the additional keyboard melodies buried into the mix, the rhythmic piano punctuations, the layering in James’ vocals, the suddenly much more ominous final guitar part where it rises rumblingly from behind the scenes. There’s so much going on, all of it important in their own minute ways.

The lyrics are atypically abstract and downright minimalistic for Wire, building on his traditional themes of introspection and self-defeat but expressed in an oblique manner, which further highlights how disorienting this song is. Part of that might be its genesis, as “Always/Never” to date is the only Manics song (we know of) that was composed music first, with Wire later on adding lyrics to what was effectively a jam session experiment. It’s no wonder the words practically take the backseat, with Wire having to for once operate under restrictions rather than having free control to write whatever he wants for James to later fit into music.

It’s a fascinating, weird as heck song. The fact that this crooked, angular experiment was chosen on the album rather than becoming a fan favourite b-side hidden from plain sight really emphasises the certain kind of fearlessness the Manics were operating under during these sessions: the desire to challenge themselves and present their eccentricities to the world without prejudice. And I’m really happy about that – it’s a strange and insular moment that throws a real curveball onto the album, but retains all the strengths of the record and in some cases even underlines them. Utterly spellbinding.

[edited 16/09/22]

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Glasnost

When did time start accelerating?

Glasnost was a Soviet Union policy initiated by Mikhail Gorbachev (in 1985, tying the album together…) that promoted openness and transparency in government operations. The Manics utilise that term to refer to an openness of their own: to do away with the antagonism of the yesteryear and to embrace, rather than push away. “Glasnost” is bathed in nostalgia and reminiscing the glorious past gone by (even the drum beat is a nod to “Motorcycle Emptiness”), but treats it like a distant chapter and it’s now time to start a new one, wiser with the years – asking if it’s possible for them to still fall in love, after spending the nineties adamantly opposing the idea of writing a love song. It’s wistful at times, but overall this is the closest the Manics have ever come to sounding truly at peace with themselves and their legacy, with the song defining this period’s desire for a re-examination of their ideals and rebirth as people. It’s a genuinely optimistic, hopeful song.

And what a musical arrangement it receives. “Glasnost” is another of Lifeblood‘s more guitar-focused moments but James’ leading guitar this time is a sublimely soaring piece of shining melody, with such stunning purity and clarity. The chorus at first sounds like a stumble, slowing down rather than accelerating, but it’s a quiet lead-up to the signature guitar appearing once more. It’s gentle and heavenly, radiating with harmony and genuine grace; where the rest of Lifeblood is a clear winter album, “Glasnost” represents a perfect summer’s day – or the moment in spring the snow begins to melt under the sun and reveals the green grass below. It’s hard to think that just an album ago these three men were trying to sound as dirty and rough as possible; here the outlook is crystalline, pristine. If anything is a guide to the soundworld of Lifeblood, it’s this.

There was seemingly some initial plans to make “Glasnost” one of the key tracks of the album, certainly promotionally – the title was explained in dang near every fluff piece and it was one of the couple of album tracks that received a preview radio airplay ahead of the album. I listened to those radio rips obsessively at the time and “Glasnost” was the one I found the least engaging. But a shoddy radio rip was never going to reveal just how bold the song came across in the sound quality it was intended. Like much of Lifeblood it never did get its time in the sun and is another classic Manics moment that’s been paid dust to, but that’s the story of the record.

If there’s ever been a dent in its armour, it’s the title itself. I get it, the Manics love their historic references and cramming them right in the front and center, but namedropping “glasnost” still sounds almost forced in. It’s grown on me – it’s a perfect song after all – but I remember being having a hang up about it for a long time, wishing that for once the band wasn’t educating me with new pieces of information.

[edited 15/09/2022]

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Cardiff Afterlife

Your memory is still mine

The Manics considered Lifeblood as a skin-shedding moment, a thoroughly personal excursion that they needed to record in order to survive as a group: hence the album’s title. Part of that personal healing process at the time was the idea of leaving the band’s heavy history behind and starting fresh once more. Richey’s unconfirmed fate was never going to stop haunting the band and Wire in particular felt this particularly close, having become the band’s sole lyricist and in the aftermath of everything that had happened since 1995 leading him to an increasingly more introspective route.

“Cardiff Afterlife” was intended to be definitive goodbye, the final eulogy for Richey: the band’s way of reaching for closure where one didn’t exist, so that they could continue without second-guessing themselves. The abrupt end of the song where it grinds to a sudden halt is meant to represent a full stop and a defined end. It’s not about burying Richey’s memory, but the final step in bringing an end to the long grieving process the band had been undertaking for the past decade: acknowledging, remembering, but allowing themselves to continue to live on.

There’s warmth to “Cardiff Afterlife”. Lifeblood sounds cold and pure as snow, but “Cardiff Afterlife” is personal and intimate. The heavy layers of textures have mostly been stripped back in favour of a more “organic” production, with the core Manics in the center and not overshadowed by the guest instruments (the glockenspiel, the violin). The choruses press pause, drowning in echo like a desperate shout into the ether eager to hear a voice back, before the band start another verse and carry on with their lives. It’s a poignant song with a beautiful arrangement, full of bittersweet memories and gentle reminiscing. The prior Richey songs have been draped in sadness or frustration: “Cardiff Afterlife” sounds like Wire’s simply happy to have known his best friend for a while and while the band must make the next step forward, the memories will always be close to his heart.

“Cardiff Afterlife” is also an eulogy of sorts to the fabled “cities project”, the album the band were on-and-off working on before Lifeblood started to take form in earnest. Wire was producing lyrics centered around different cities of the world the band had visited, infusing each location with the memories it brought up and the contextual historical commentary. The whole project was scrapped and originally “Cardiff Afterlife” was meant to be its only survivor, though in the years since the band have been releasing songs titled after cities and fans have been speculating whether they’ve had their origins in the cities project.

[edited 20/09/22]

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A Song for Departure

This is a song to break your heart to

Lifeblood, as a whole, is timid about its guitar solos. After the experience of putting together Forever Delayed and seeing so many of their classic songs having to be cut down and edited, Bradfield decided to become more economical with his songwriting: tightening passages, making sure every second of a song happens for a reason and brutally self-editing to remove everything that wasn’t essential. Guitar solos were one of the easiest elements to cut down on and throughout Lifeblood Bradfield avoids his trademark guitar heroics and often hides his guitar altogether behind studio effects and filters (for an album with a reputation of being their “synths & keyboards” record, quite a lot of it is actually just guitar). While solos do exist, they often act as a carry-forward from the main riff or appear so subtly alongside other elements that your mind fails to register it’s a solo spot to begin with.

“A Song for Departure” has the album’s most honest guitar solo, and in fact it has two of them: the traditional solo at its usual spot and a reprise to lead the song to its conclusion. James’ guitar takes the centre stage as it appears, the rest of the instruments almost fading into the background so as not to share the spotlight with the one genuine roaring solo of the album. It’s a reminder that the Manics traditions haven’t been washed away completely: they’re just now used when it’s absolutely necessary and integral.

The solos are really just an extension of the general emphasis around the core band instruments across “A Song for Departure”. There’s plenty of additional detail – atmosphering wind-swooshes, crystalline pianos – but the focus is always on the bass, drums and the guitar. The rhythm section has a particularly snappy touch both from a production perspective and in the performance – Sean and Nicky were allegedly instructed by James to play their instruments akin to “Beat It”, and there’s that crisp sharpness in both that really shakes you alive from the moment they enter. The clarity around James’ guitar is part of the same formula. Everything else in the song serves secondary under the core band instruments, and the result is an incredibly airy and light-as-feather feel because of all the space around the bass, drums and the guitar. It’s powerfully punctuating.

Suffice to say, it’s another stand-out: one of the sharpest cuts on the album and full of rich melodic touches. More backing vocals as well – this is perhaps the closest link to James’ impending solo album in its rich vocal harmonies, signalling Bradfield’s eagerness to play around with them.

Sadly the song was never a single, but it was one of the Lifeblood songs which received an online-exclusive video directed by Patrick Jones, and whilst most of them were sneakily uploaded behind the wider PR roll-out, the video for “A Song for Departure” received a full release on the band’s website. It’s nothing fancy – it’s a Patrick Jones video – but does have a few good shots of the band playing to the track.

The lyrics, which are as you’d expect from a song with this title and carry on with the album’s general themes of introspection, longing and loss, are inspired by the similarly titled poem by Elizabeth Jennings.

[edited 21/08/2022]

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Emily

It’s what you forget that kills you

The unofficial underdog of the album, given the fan reputation for “Emily” sees is as one of the least regarded Lifeblood tracks. The album overall trades much of Manics’ usual extroverted musical passages for a subtler approach, and “Emily” is perhaps the subtlest of all – just as much as it’s seen as the weakest link, it’s also often cited as the biggest grower.

“Emily” is, above all, smooth. Suave, even. It’s one of the most guitar-oriented songs on the album but doesn’t really feature riffs as such, as it does find James tactfully navigating a multitude of gentle melodic passages with his guitars in a manner that’s very unlike a traditional lead guitar: the approach is more so about filling the gaps in the sound, guiding the melodic patterns through the cracks in the lightly shuffling rhythm section and the keyboards. Even the solo sounds decadent, and not a show-off segment of guitar virtuosity in the slightest. It simply glides forward from its opening point, making a path through the rest of the song. It’s some of James’ very best guitar playing on the entire album, but played with such a gentle touch that you barely even notice its presence.

None of the instruments, in fact, ever rise above one another. “Emily” is all about the harmony among its elements, each player deftly giving space for the song itself and doing only what is necessary to underline, harmonise and nudge forward its core melodies. The chorus is a giant showpiece – or would be, if the instruments had the ego to make it as big as its components threaten it to be, and so its hugeness could almost pass the listener by. But listen to that swoon, the anthemic rise, the boldness of it all: it’s a classic Manics segment.

Its nonchalantness is so at odds with how much the band hyped the song during the Lifeblood pre-release interviews and soundbites. “Emily” was clearly a key song during the sessions, at least for Wire who would always mention it whenever the band was asked about the album in the lead-up to its eventual release. Perhaps part of it was that on an album that largely sidestepped or obscured the band’s political side, “Emily” was the only real statement piece of the album. It’s a song about the suffragette icon Emily Pankhurst, and more specifically Wire’s frustration that the UK public seemed to have had all but forgotten her importance as a feminist keystone, while praising people Wire saw first and foremost as celebrities rather than anyone significant (he would specifically mention Princess Diana as an example and how the nation lost itself in grief after her death, in continuation with his dislike for the royals). In hindsight the sentiment might seem a little strange as Pankhurst has seen a bit of a public reintroduction and her presence has grown significantly in the years since the album’s release, but at the time it felt a cause Wire thought needed to be rallied over. And yet, there’s no vitriol or anger in “Emily”: a mere wistful sense of frustration and a quiet remembrance of Wire’s own.

Naturally for the Manics, despite its big profile during the promotional cycle it never saw a live appearance. And so like how Wire was concerned would happen to the real Emily, “Emily” the song has somewhat become lost in Manics history, sandwiched between two big extrovert anthems and quietly and subtly disappearing into the album’s middle cycle. But take it from someone who did once underestimate its power as well: “Emily” is a beautiful composition that’s perfectly earned its place on the album, in all its subtle elegance.

[edited 03/09/22]

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I Live to Fall Asleep

Needing to remember how and why to live

If the richly melodic grace of Lifeblood wasn’t apparent already, “I Live to Fall Asleep” hammers the point across. Is there a more sublimely, impeccably, effortlessly melodic song in their back catalogue – a song where those harmonious passages of note seem to simply glide across the air. The glacial piano that’s just about the most delicate thing you seem to have come across, the guitar lines that move through the production like hot knife through butter, and of course the vocal melodies: the backing harmonies, James’ sighing end-of-stanzas, the interplay between call-and-answer vocals on the suddenly rhythmic chorus. It is as if everything simply glistens with the purest expression of melody.

Wire has talked about his relationship with sleep many times and they’ve inspired equally many Manics lyrics: the absence of thought during unconsciousness, the only time that the mind can truly get some peace. The chorus lyrics do bring Richey to mind (as is always the chance with Wire, “lost friend” in lyrics is almost an alarm bell for the fans), but Wire has said the song is all about him, his depression and the bittersweet relief he gets through rest. It’s a beautiful and touching – and very wistful – lyric where Wire downright amicably accept his tendencies and simply lays it out.

With the gentle and swooning musical accompaniment (rife with details as usual for this album – love the alternating snare sounds), that lyric becomes the mournful heart of a song so beautiful it sounds almost serene and optimistic. It’s a surprisingly gentle song from the Manics, and in a wholly different fashion than their other softer and more intimate moments: “I Live to Fall Asleep” embraces that aspect and transforms it into an anthem more befitting for the band without losing any of its subtle grace. It’s a phenomenal tearjerker and a moment of bittersweet comfort, where the album’s incredible production shows a level of warmth that hadn’t yet had the chance to be revealed earlier on.

With such open arms the song has, it’s no surprise this was on the board to be the third single off the album before the plugs were pulled; even the band seem to genuinely appreciate this one despite their opinions of Lifeblood flailing sheepishly across the years.

[edited 23/08/22]

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To Repel Ghosts

Build bridges and not roads

Lifeblood isn’t quite as removed from rock-Manics as it would seem at first impression, but across the twelve tracks “To Repel Ghosts” is still the outlier, the one out-and-clear guitar energy moment of the record. And still, even this takes a somewhat askew approach to the Manics’ usual formulas and rather than roaring out all guns blazing, it’s an appropriately ethereal and haunted creature. The post-punk push, the powerhouse drums and James’ desperate yelps may be familiar elements, but they’re caught within swirling guitar melodies, echoing keyboard walls and distant vocal harmonies.

On the otherwise mid-tempo Lifeblood, “To Repel Ghosts” shakes things up at the mid-point but it’s clearly formed from the same DNA. I’m not talking just about the pristinely crystalline production but also how it’s not fueled by fury or defiance like most Manics rockers, and instead it sounds aching and desperate. “A soul in pain has no image to reclaim” is a heck of a line and captures the mournful nature of the song perfectly, with that propulsive energy acting as a cry for help. Like much of Wire’s writing during this period the focus is on imagery rather than clear meaning, but it’s another song obsessed by the past and the legacy you make catching up with you (after all, what are ghosts if not remnants of the past you can’t let go of?) – and that perhaps the best way to embrace them is by maintaining your connections and not simply push forward, that any emotion is worth experiencing more than losing your track (“build bridges and not roads / make love, make hate, make war”). For all its thunder and lightning it’s a tortured song, and James’ wistful vocal delivery is the first clue towards that.

That middle eight quited above is in strong competition to be one of the band’s most best-positioned: simple in structure (we’ve all heard instruments dropping around a few central lines before), but absolutely pitch perfectly aimed and placed in the song’s emotional core. That simple breakdown is what elevates “To Repel Ghosts” from great to truly incredible as it builds back up again and unleashes its last roar into the void.

What a haunting giant of a song. Now if I could only stop mishearing the first line of the second verse as “so when the ghosts fuck you”.

[edited 22/08/2022]

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Solitude Sometimes Is

If black were truly black not grey

The strengths of “Solitude Sometimes Is” are obvious, but there’s one little particular, almost inaudible detail that really marks this as a truly incredible song for me.

Back around Lifeblood‘s release there was a thread on the album’s use of backing vocals on the Forever Delayed fan forums. Some of the band’s interviews around the album had briefly mentioned Sean contributing a number of backing vocals across the album, and of course all the fans wanted to know where – the last time anyone had been aware of Sean contributing backing vocals was back in “Born to End”. Someone took it upon themselves to put a number of the album’s vocal sections through a sound editor, isolating the vocals from everything else as much as they could. Sure enough, it was the chorus to “Solitude Sometimes Is” that revealed Sean’s voice the clearest. The aftereffects of the editing job – the push of all the still-audible instruments into the very back, leaving an echo around everything – just made it all the more arresting. Here there was a brief clip of the band’s quietest member singing harmonies in a broad Welsh accent, surrounded with distant echo like a ghost of a song coming briefly back from the nether realm. I still have that clip.

“Solitude Sometimes Is” is a phenomenal song, one of the album’s clearest traditional Manics anthems but one that takes its time to bloom into one: each run of the verse and chorus adds just a little bit more, from the quiet walk of the first circuit into the full blown drums and soaring guitars of the last set. It’s only three and a half minutes but it sounds like a gigantic showpiece, one that somehow distills a good 5-6 minutes of breathtaking growth into a length half that size without the end results suffering. It’s almost too short you think, but only because it sounds so majestic that you’d want it to go on for longer. James’ vocals are among the best on the entire record, gifting the song the weariness and the curious kind of serenity that are so characteristic with the album. The glockenspiel, the quietly churning guitar, the glacial piano, all accompany its majestic march beautifully.

It’s one of the signature stand-out songs of the record which holds a reputation even beyond the album’s fanbase, and in another life it would be a setlist regular; it was even one of the songs the band sheepishly previewed live long before we even knew what the record was called, impressing everyone.

And yet, it was Sean’s invisible contribution that somehow sealed its greatness to me. I hear it clearly now whenever I listen to the song, so attuned are my ears it. Lifeblood is an album of magic details, here’s one again. The cherry on top of a magnificent cake.

[edited 16/09/22]

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