This year Suede (or the London Suede as they were known in the US) reformed to play a well-received show at the Royal Albert Hall in the Teenage Cancer Trust series, and they are also scheduled to play the O2 Dome in December 2010. Coincidentally I had recently been listening to their debut album, Suede for the first time since listening to it to death upon its release 17 years ago, and had come to the conclusion that it is one of the best British debut album ever released.
Suede may be something of a forgotten band of Britpop, particularly when compared with the cartoon personas of Jarvis, Damon and Liam, but that is probably because they hit their peak at the very onset of the movement they helped create. Lest we forget, the early 90’s were dominated by grunge bands from Seattle, very little of interest was happening on these shores, and then along came Suede, with that famous Select Magazine cover which saw Brett Anderson draped in the Union Jack. The last time an artist had played with the flag so blatantly, Morissey was shot down in flames and accused of being a racist by the NME. But here was a magazine heralding the start of a movement, a British reaction against the second-rate post-Cobain music coming from the USA.
Suede enjoyed huge amounts of hype, resulting in the album charting at number 1, but it seems strange that in those days lead singer Brett Anderson was criticisied for aping Bowie, and for being overly theatrical. Critics, for better or worse, were harsher then, things had to be 4 REAL. Suede may have been labelled Smiths/Bowie copyists, but by today’s standards they were highly original, and in Bernard Butler had a guitarist with an ear for a catchy hook and a mastery of the fretboard that followed in a great British tradition from the likes of Johnny Marr and John Squire.
Luckily, the Suede hype was backed up by the music. Released in 1993, Suede still sounds fairly fresh, although the production values are not great. It sounds rather tinny, although partly that is Bernard Butler’s trademark scuzzy guitar sound. Butler’s extremely gifted guitar playing was they key to this album’s success, along with Anderson’s sleazy rock n’roll life lyrics, and androgynous posing.
Opener “So Young” sets their stall out early, featuring Anderson’s shrieks and climaxing with some superb guitar lines from Butler. This is follwed by “Animal Nitrate”, one of the best pop songs of the 90’s. “She’s Not Dead” is the first of five, excellent slower songs on the album, with its gentle descending riff. Another great single, “Moving” follows, although when Anderson complains of the song sounding over-produced and lacking the energy it had live, you can kind of see what he means.
The self-pitying “Pantomime Horse” is saved by its powerful ending, as Anderson sings “Have you ever tried it that way” and the guitar ramps up before the song closes with a few sparsely struck high strings. Debut single “The Drowners”, one of the album’s rowdiest and strongest tracks, is followed by the sparse “Sleeping Pills”, one of my favourite tracks on the album because of the atmosphere it creates, despite the somewhat unsubtle lyrics about suicide. This is topped by Breakdown though - this song is all space and sparse guitar effects, and at 6 minutes long, by far the longest track on here. Another classic piece of Butler riff-making is highlighted in “Metal Mickey” and “Animal Lover”, before the staggering closer “The Next Life”, featuring Anderson’s best vocals on the album as he sings over a gentle piano riff.
This record brought inspiration when it was desperately needed. It paved the way for a movement, on which, to some extent, the jury is still out. But more than that, it is a superb debut album by a band who never scaled those heights again.
For those in the know, the cartoon-feud between Damon and Liam was irrelevant - Pulp were the true band of the era, their witty lyrics and stomping disco soundtracking the Britpop movement and giving it a real bona fide star in the (mis) shape of Jarvis Cocker.
