On 16 March 1979, Roxy Music released their sixth studio album, Manifesto. Following an almost four-year recording hiatus, Manifesto was Roxy Music's first studio album since 1975's Siren.
It was ranked 30th in The Village Voice's Pazz & Jop critics' poll of the best albums of 1979. The 1992 Rolling Stone Album Guide gave the album four stars, writing that "the regrouped Roxy seems better for the rest: deftly blending fresh rhythms into its signature sound, shortening the musical passages and concentrating more on song craft."