111. Suede

Roundhouse

14 November 2015

Suede doing prog rock: words that once felt as likely as Oasis tackling free jazz, well at least until Dog Man Star hinted that this band had some progressive leanings. Yet here we are, Night Thoughts, a full-blown concept record, performed behind a vast gauze screen onto which ex-NME snapper Roger Sargent projects his art-house fever dream. Think The Wall without a Pink Floyd budget: band silhouetted like ghostly marionettes whilst a moody film unspools in front.

Naturally, the subject matter is pitch-black. Suede have always been princes of neon grime, and Night Thoughts fixates on youth, regret and the ruinous fallout between. The curtain rises with “When You Are Young,” as a man trudges into the sea in high-definition melancholy. “No Tomorrow” follows, sound-tracking an old man’s suicide attempt.

Things only get cheerier in relative terms: abductions, breakdowns, naked karaoke in a suburban garden. Brett Anderson still knows how to wrap kitchen-sink misery in glitter and eyeliner.

Musically, though, it’s their strongest suite of songs in ages; strings swelling, guitars snarling, Anderson’s voice sweeping from wounded croon to full banshee.

The crowd watch in reverent silence, as if at a particularly stylish wake, until the screen finally lifts. Then the place detonates: Brett strikes the classic foot-on-monitor pose, all lank limbs and velvet menace, and slams straight into “Trash,” “Animal Nitrate,” “We Are the Pigs,” and we’re back in ’93.

For the encore Anderson grins: “We started with the newest thing we’ve given you, now here’s the oldest.” Cue their debut EP front-to-back: “The Drowners,” “My Insatiable One,” “To the Birds.” Half the room forgets to film it on their phones.

So, yes, Suede in their fifties can still summon the sleazy, mascara-smeared spirit of Britpop’s gutter glamour while also pulling off a high-concept art-pop opera. Sleaze with a bassline, brains with cheekbones. Night Thoughts proves they’re evolving, not coasting; the second-act glow-up, most of their Nineties peers would kill for.