"The Secret He Had Missed" is a song by Manic Street Preachers presented as the second single from their 14th studio album The Ultra Vivid Lament.

It was released on 16 July 2021,[1] alongside an official YouTube video, directed by Kieran Evans and filmed in Tenby and Newport's Dolman Theatre.

[2] The co-singer is Sunflower Bean's Julia Cumming, in a conversation styled-lyric, although the official video features the actress Aimee-Ffion Edwards.

While joining a long line of art-related Manics songs (from 'La Tristesse Durera' to 'Interiors' to 'Black Square'), its closest cousin musically is 'Your Love Alone Is Not Enough', with an almost equally rousing chorus, and Julia Cumming's restrained vocal bearing a close similarity to that of Nina Persson.

"[5] The Line of Best Fit argues that the song is "a quasi-aria framework with Bradfield, the latter is led by the discipline imposed by the Sean Moore and Nicky Wire's rhythm section".