Welsh rock stars Manic Street Preachers have shot to number one with their limited-edition single Masses Against The Classes.

The track ends Westlife's reign at the top of the charts with their cover versions of Abba's I Have A Dream and Terry Jack's Seasons In The Sun.

But the limited edition CD and 10-inch vinyl single will not be in the charts for long - it was deleted the same day it was released, 10 January.

The single contains the tracks Masses Against the Classes, Close My Eyes and a cover of Rock and Roll Music.

Bassist Nicky Wire had expressed despair at a chart full of boy bands such as Westlife at the Manics' sell-out Millennium Stadium concert in Cardiff on New Year's Eve. He urged the 60,000 fans there to buy the single and topple the Irish pop group.

The single shifted around 33,000 copies in just a day at a time when record sales are traditionally in a post-Christmas slump.

The band said they had wanted to get back to the old "indie" band ethic of releasing records in small numbers that are not included on albums.

Wire said: "It is a separate entity, a complete one-off and has nothing to do with the next album."

But music writer Simon Price said the appeal of snapping up the single fulfilled one of the Manics' wishes to depose the likes of Westlife at number one.

Charts attack

The author of Everything - A Book About the Manic Street Preachers said the return to their punk rock roots was not a gimmick to sell more records.

"They always were a Marxist-Transvestite-punk-rock band and they pretty much still are.

"If you saw Nicky Wire at the Millennium Stadium gig wearing a pink dress and as much make-up as Vanessa Feltz you could not argue with that."

He added: "They have always wanted to use their music to reach a mass audience to spread their message. At the Millennium gig they were selling t-shirts with quotes from Mao Tse Tung."