|
Watch The London Suede Perform “She Still Leads Me” Live In Brussels
Watch The Video For Manic Street Preachers “Orwellian”
About Manic Street Preachers:
Manic Street Preachers emerged from the Welsh Valleys in 1990 as a fully formed idea. Their plan was simple. They would release one glorious, sprawling debut album that would sell more copies than Appetite For Destruction, then they would split up. Generation Terrorists didn’t sell 16 million copies, and Manic Street Preachers didn’t split up. Instead, they set out on a unique path that made them one of the UK’s most fiercely adored rock bands for the last three decades, a position cemented by 1994’s peerless album The Holy Bible.
After the disappearance of guitarist Richey Edwards ahead of a 1995 U.S. tour, singer James Dean Bradfield, bassist Nicky Wire and drummer Sean Moore regrouped and rebuilt the band. 1996’s Everything Must Go was a masterstroke of reinvention. It would go on to sell over two million copies. Over the next two decades, Manic Street Preachers would explore multiple creative paths with a string of lauded albums and 2021’s The Ultra Vivid Lament saw the band’s return to the top of the UK album charts. Variously influenced by bereavement, the UK’s public school system and ABBA, and featuring Sunflower Bean’s Julia Cumming and one of the last vocal performances from the legendary Mark Lanegan, the beautifully realized album was a stunning return to form that saw Manic Street Preachers finish the year with a series of arena shows that ended up feeling like celebratory parties after two years of on-off lockdowns. That album - and those shows - proved more than anything that their idea, fully formed in the Valleys all those years ago, had been a stroke of genius.
About The London Suede:
An exhilarating reunion at London’s Royal Albert Hall in 2010. Three incredible and by turn bombastic, expansive and vital new records in 2013's Bloodsports, 2016's Night Thoughts and 2018's The Blue Hour. Infinite shows and festivals all over the planet. And now the raucous physicality of new album Autofiction. Since reforming, The London Suede have reminded us again and again that, beyond the breakthroughs and breakdowns, the trends and the bends, their brilliantly ascorbic, urgent, passionate songs have lasted the test of time. And ravenous artistic compulsion propels them ever forward.
So, in 2010, seven years after winding down, The London Suede unexpectedly wound up again. And “wound up” is about right for this band. Their return triggered a flood of memories; frenzied performances, high-wire ambition, life-changing impact. For once, the headline “The Best New Band In Britain” was warranted, positioned over their photo on the cover of Melody Maker. Top 10 crasher “Animal Nitrate” was followed by Suede, the biggest selling UK album debut since Frankie Goes To Hollywood’s Welcome To The Pleasuredome and, soon, winner of the Mercury Music prize. The London Suede were trailblazers, innovators, cultural aggregators, and everyone wanted a piece.
If anything, Britpop generated The London Suede’s next phase. The next album would be, “a lot stranger”. With Bernard Butler now engrossed by Joy Division and Scott Walker, the next single “Stay Together” weighed in at eight intensely dramatic minutes. But ironically, the partnership was ripped apart by attendant pressures on two quite different personalities and Bernard quit before Dog Man Star was even released. Dog Man Star topped the UK charts but was symbolically knocked off by Oasis’ Definitely Maybe. Bernard replacement Richard Oakes fitted The London Suede’s aesthetic of transforming your grotty reality, plus “he brought unity to the band,” Brett Anderson recalls. “We became a little gang. And he had the ability to make the kind of album we wanted.”
The gang became five when Simon Gilbert’s cousin Neil Codling also joined, bringing songwriting nous, insouciant presence and perfect cheekbones. Anyone doubting The London Suede’s chances of surviving Bernard were rocked when the resulting Coming Up, The London Suede’s pop zenith, charted at number one in the UK and spawned an astounding 4 top ten hits.The London Suede’s fourth album Head Music made more progress, toward a more electronic-rhythmic band. When Neil left, and Brett finally admitted drugs had got the better of him, something had stalled. Not even a cleaned-up Brett could salvage the next album A New Morning.
Brett’s escape was to announce The London Suede were on sabbatical. He and Bernard soon formed The Tears and released Here Come The Tears, but Brett’s three pastoral, personal solo albums indicate where his heart truly lies. As does The London Suede’s reunion. When Teenage Cancer (a charity Brett has championed since his mum died) asked if The London Suede would play a benefit, everyone – including a resurgent Neil – agreed the time felt right. After two intimate warm-ups, the Royal Albert Hall show was astonishing to even fervent fans, to feel the tension between them and The London Suede hadn’t dropped an iota.
Fast forward to September 16th 2022 and The London Suede release Autofiction, their punk album. A record that crackles with the sort of exuberant fire familiar to anyone who has seen the band live in recent years. If 30 years ago “The Drowners” was a rattling anthem for the blurred sexuality and vivacity of unusual youth, then Autofiction’s grappling with concerns of a different point in life sound no less vital. “It does feel like a new page to me,” says Anderson. “I always thought of the first three records as a trilogy in a way, and the last three too. Autofiction has a natural freshness, it's where we want to be.” And where The London Suede want to be is, in a way, the same place as they were when they began 30 years ago – a group of people living off the raw sensation of making a racket in a room.
For more on The London Suede: For more on Manic Street Preachers:
web/ facebook/ instagram / twitter web/ facebook/ instagram/ twitter
For more information on The London Suede & Manic Street Preachers Co-Headline Tour:
Chloë Walsh- chloe@theoriel.co / Anna Ross - anna@theoriel.co
| 
