Suede have a kind of holy grail clasped between their long, artistic fingers – figuratively speaking. The ultimate prize for any enduring band is acclaim for their latest music as well as their foundational hits. Thirty years on from their self-titled debut album, recently rereleased, they are selling out tours, twice in one year, and have lined up hefty shows for 2024 alongside Manic Street Preachers. The rising 90s revival tide has lifted many of the era’s other best bands: Pulp had a feted reunion this summer; Blur played mammoth gigs and released one of the best albums of their career. Oasis aren’t really part of this calculus, but Liam Gallagher’s Definitely Maybe anniversary stadium shows next year should be noted.
Suede are no mere nostalgia act. Fifteen months since their last album, Autofiction, dropped – it’s just out again in deluxe form – the audience is baying the words to its songs back at singer Brett Anderson with spit-flecked commitment. It seems like “the litter on the breeze” – as Suede’s totemic 1996 song Trash had it – has become a kind of white plastic bag dancing on unseen thermals, as in the film American Beauty.
