Professional ratings
Aggregate scores
Source	Rating
Metacritic	57/100
Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic
Alternative Press	6/10
Robert Christgau
Dotmusic
Mojo
NME	7/10
Pitchfork	7.5/10
PopMatters	unfavourable
Q
Rolling Stone	unfavourable

Know Your Enemy is the sixth studio album by Welsh alternative rock band Manic Street Preachers. It was released on 19 March 2001 by record label Virgin. It was supported by four singles; two of them, "Found That Soul" and "So Why So Sad", were released on the same day as a publicity stunt.

Know Your Enemy was a commercial success, albeit not as successful as its predecessor This Is My Truth Tell Me Yours. Critics were somewhat divided in their opinions, but its reception has been mostly positive.

The album features Nicky Wire's debut as a lead vocalist, on the track "Wattsville Blues", and James Dean Bradfield's debut as a lyricist, on "Ocean Spray". Kevin Shields of My Bloody Valentine plays guitar on the album's final track.

The left-wing political convictions of the Manic Street Preachers are apparent in many of the album's songs, such as "Baby Elián" as they comment on the strained relations between the United States and Cuba as seen in the Elián González affair, a hot topic around the album's release. The band also pays tribute to singer and Civil Rights activist Paul Robeson in the song "Let Robeson Sing".

About the political side of the record Wire spoke in an interview about the subject: "Unfortunately it was four years before everyone else got interested in politics. It took everyone else a war. Where have these people been the last four years? Forty years? American foreign policy's never changed. There's a track called 'Freedom Of Speech Won't Feed My Children' about forcing freedom on societies that says everything we ever needed to say." Wire also described the album as "a deeply flawed, highly enjoyable folly".

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Wikipedia