(Translated from my original Italian text by ChatGPT and Piero Scaruffi)

New Model Army were one of the most important groups of political punk rock. Led by Justin Sullivan, they came to prominence with polemical anthems such as Bittersweet and Great Expectations (their first singles in 1983), and The Price (1984), in the vein of the The Clash of London Calling, from whom they borrowed the mid-tempo pace and melodic grit.

The searing battle cry of Christian Militia, on Vengeance (Abstract, 1984), the tense and vibrant single Brave New World, the furious No Rest, on No Rest For The Wicked (Capitol, 1985), the passionate tirade of Better Than Them, on the 1985 EP of the same name (played with acoustic instruments), and the single 51st State placed them at the head of the rebels.

The album The Ghost Of Cain (Capitol, 1986) offered an almost philosophical version of their cause. But musically, the standout tracks of 1987 were quite different: Poison Street, which openly echoes the Clash, and White Coats, one of their darkest and most pessimistic anthems.

Thunder And Consolation (Capitol, 1989) absorbed the folk inflections of Better Than Them into the post-punk anguish of Vengeance, thus forging a more commercial sound. I Love The World, with its grand melody and that somber, atmospheric touch reminiscent of Joy Division, proposed a mode of protest akin to U2, populist on an arena scale. Ballad Of Bodmin Pill exemplifies how pretentious political discourse, melancholic folk ballads, and communal sing-along chants can be fused together.
The pathos of U2 inspires the epic spleen and driving cadence of 225 and the solemn, martial elegy of Green And Grey, again built on a fatalistic refrain and a highly evocative arrangement. The most sincere moment, however, is Inheritance, a ghostly chant in which Sullivan seems to lash out at his own parents with a far more personal outburst of resentment than usual. By abandoning militant poses and frontal attack (a style still present in the obligatory anthem Stupid Questions), and shifting their focus from the public to the private, New Model Army became, if nothing else, a solid pop-rock band. Musically, there are moments (such as the syncopated, rustic drive of Vagabonds) that resemble the best progressive rock of the 1970s.

However, this marked the beginning of a rapid decline. Having lost their identity and compromised their ideological purity, New Model Army increasingly struggled to define themselves. Impurity (EMI, 1990) and The Love Of Hopeless Causes (Epic, 1993) repeated the same formula, emphasizing more resigned and melancholic tones (Get Me Out and Purity among the best of 1990, Here Comes The War the angry slogan of 1993), and carefully arranging the music with ethereal keyboards, acoustic guitars, violins, and vocal harmonies. New Model Army had, from another angle, arrived at the heroic and populist pop of U2, drawing on gospel and the �morality play.�

Raw Melody Men (EMI, 1991) is a double live album. History (1992) collects the singles up to 1991.

Small Town England (1997) is an anthology containing as many as 27 songs.

Wonderful Way To Go is the leading single of Strange Brotherhood (1998), which also includes Queen Of My Heart (1998). The best track on Eight (Attack Attack, 2000) could be the ballad Paekakariki, and that tells how far the band went from its original sound.

Great Expectations (Superfecta, 2003) collects the singles.

They kept releasing albums every few years or so: Carnival (2005), High (2007), Today Is a Good Day (2009), Between Dog and Wolf (2013), Between Wine and Blood (2014), Winter (2016), From Here (2019), Unbroken (2024), etc.