There was one moment that restarted it all for Suede. After having split up after the difficult, post-substance-abuse LP A New Morning in late 2003, the band reformed eleven years later to perform a one-off charity show for The Teenage Cancer Trust at London’s Royal Albert Hall. After the glam-rock raucous of ‘Metal Mickey’, vocalist Brett Anderson, stumped in disbelief, lost himself in front of the rapturous applause echoing all around him. Even the misunderstood cynic of Britpop couldn’t help but smile. Suede were back.
Suede’s reunion has been more successful than any of their fans, and perhaps even the band themselves, could ever imagine. After a trilogy of albums every bit as good as their early-to-mid 90s output, Suede released yet another instant classic in the form of 2022’s Autofiction. Enthused with a nostalgic, fast-paced punk-rock disposition, the record felt destined for the grease and grit of UK gig venues.
And it was. Autofiction has become a bonafide tour-proof gem. Suede continued their immensely successful reunion ten years on in Lincoln’s Engine Shed, finding a spiritual home in the liminal spaces of the Midlands.
From as early as 1993, when the androgynous Brett Anderson started smacking his microphone against his rear-end in front of a corporate awards audience, it was clear that Suede’s frontman had something special about him – whatever that ‘something’ may be. Anderson, despite now being in his 50s, has not lost his insatiable energy. At Lincoln’s Engine Shed, Suede opened with three tracks off of the acclaimed Autofiction, churning through the verses with all the enthusiasm of a teenaged punk-rocker in the late 70s discovering what a bar chord is.
Anderson, already drenched in sweat by the set’s third number, ricocheted around the stage like a stray bullet – an effervescent mix of pleasure and frustration. He finished the youthful yearning of ’15 Again’ with a maniacal grin and outstretched arms, looming over the crowd to a deafening reception. It’s as if Anderson, a well-chronicled figure of destructive excess, was surprised that he’s still alive, let alone still performing with the same vigour as his 90s not-quite-Britpop persona.
Anderson reached out to his audience – “Lincoln… what are we?” – before launching into the outsider anthem, and the band’s self-proclaimed call-to-arms, ‘Trash’. As Richard Oake’s guitar crackled with regretful resolve, Anderson prowled across the front of the stage, addressing his audience directly: “No matter how many times they drag us down… no matter how many times they try to stomp us into the ground… we always come back. What are we? We’re the lovers on the streets… we’re the litter on the breeze… Lincoln, what are we?”
Anderson’s spoken-word ramblings evoked a spine-tingling union of outsider angst – of unrequited passions, of uncertain identity, of hedonistic abandon. In ‘Trash’, more than any other song of the set, Suede found a kindred disposition with their East Midlands audience; both parties voicing their own precarious, in-between identities. Suede, for four minutes, were the unlikely spokespeople of Midlands angst (“Oh, maybe, maybe it’s our nowhere towns… our nothing places, and our cellophane sounds”).
Not only did Anderson’s words evoke a passionate response from the Engine Shed’s audience, but they also rang with a certain resonance between the band themselves. The 90s were anything but a simple success story for Suede: heartbreak, grief, substance abuse, artistic disputes, multiple line-up changes, back-breaking touring schedules, media controversy, and a distaste for the genre that they inadvertently, alongside Blur, helped create.
Suede have seen it all. And their live performance of ‘Trash’ – a celebration of struggle, a rallying cry for difference over indifference – chronicled the band’s tempestuous past. Suede had already moved the whole venue, and they were only on the fourth song of the set. Now on album number nine, it’s true that Suede, no matter how many times they’re stomped into the ground, always come back.
The setlist was a telling testament to Suede’s rich back catalogue, featuring fan-favourite singles like ‘So Young’ or ‘Animal Nitrate’, beloved B-sides such as ‘To The Birds’ or ‘The Living Dead’, and even a plethora of cuts from their 2010s discography. The old and the new, the popular and the obscure, merged seamlessly. Here was a band whose discography excels across all bases – pop singles, hidden gems, unexpected highlights.
‘Sabotage’, initially growling with Matt Osman’s post-punk bass, sparkled in its hair-raising, cathartic chorus. ‘She Still Leads Me On’ cemented the band’s continuing indie-hit-parade success, a single so simultaneously catchy and emotional that it has seen almost constant radio play since its release. ‘The Drowners’, ringing out with Simon Gilbert’s tribal drum pattern, called back to Suede’s initial debut of Sex Pistols meets David Bowie, with Anderson foraying into the crowd. He locked eyes with his audience as he drowned in a sea of hands.
Whilst Suede’s latest record is defined by punk energy, the band also knew when to slow down. Highlights of the set were found in two acoustic numbers. Anderson, in need of a deserved break, sat down with an acoustic guitar to play B-side ‘The Living Dead’. His voice, no longer competing with a full band, was able to soar with all the more plaintiveness and heartache (all whilst playing ex-Suede guitar wunderkind Bernard Butler’s musical tapestries). The song’s lyrics find Anderson at his most concise, torn and melancholy – a heartfelt letter to a lover too engrossed in substance abuse to pay much attention (“I know where the money’s gone… I know what you do… ‘cos I’ve seen the holes in your arm, and the needle’s a much better screw”). Anderson cried for the lost art of the B-side.
There was also a stripped-back piano rendition of ‘The Asphalt World’, a seminal track which finds Suede at their most lyrically embittered and musically sprawling. Once again, the acoustic backdrop gave Anderson’s vocals even greater resonance, his throat seizing with unresolved pain (“And how does it feel when the sex turns cruel?”). Suede effortlessly weaved between the radio-friendly Britpop band behind Coming Up and the destructive Romantics behind Dog Man Star.
The tumultuous legacy of Suede marches on: Anderson and co continue to find new sounds and perform with immense tenacity. They’ve still got it. And will likely continue to have it – whatever that illusive ‘it’ may be – for a long time yet.
You can buy tickets for Suede’s upcoming co-headline tour with Manic Street Preachers here.
