Suede – Studio Albums 1993-2002 Deluxe Editions 2011 (10CD+5DVD) [Сombined Re-Up]

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Suede – Studio Albums 1993-2002 Deluxe Editions 2011 (10CD+5DVD) [Сombined Re-Up]

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Digitally remastered and expanded three disc (two CDs + DVD) editions of studio albums by British alternative rock band Suede. Collection includes: Suede (1993), Dog Man Star (1994), Coming Up (1996), Head Music (1999) and A New Morning (2002).

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Suede – Studio Albums 1993-2002 Deluxe Editions 2011 (10CD+5DVD) [Сombined Re-Up]

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Suede – Studio Albums 1993-2002 Deluxe Editions 2011 (10CD+5DVD) [Сombined Re-Up]

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There is music on these albums. Obviously. The reason I'm saying that up front is that discussion of the first two Suede albums is invariably framed in a discussion of the bigger picture, both in terms of what was happening in British rock in the early 1990s and in terms of the discord within the band, particularly during 1994. There are good reasons for this. Suede were at the center of the conversation that gave us the Britpop narrative that so dominated the UK in the mid-90s. They were the band on the cover of the issue of Select that invented Britpop as a concept, they were massively hyped before they even released anything, and their debut album was the fastest-selling in British history. They were ignored in the United States and ridiculously had to change their name in this country to the London Suede after a lawsuit by an obscure lounge singer.

This stuff is all important to understanding who Suede were– the music they made, especially on their first three albums, is tied closely to their story as a band– but I really want to make sure that as I make my way through that story, the music doesn't slip to the side of the conversation. Stories and meta-cultural narratives aside, the music is what we have to listen to now, and there is a lot of great music spread over these elaborate reissues. The whole band, including once-estranged original guitarist Bernard Butler, was involved in putting together these packages, each of them a 2xCD/DVD featuring the original album, demos, unreleased outtakes, every contemporary B-side (plus one non-album A-side), music videos, interviews and live performances. The band's entire output, with the notable exception of three early unreleased tracks, "Be My God", "Art", and "Wonderful Sometimes", is now available on five very well-done reissues that include all of the original artwork for both the albums and the singles. They have curated their past well.

Consider the arena this band was entering when it debuted in May, 1992 with "The Drowners". The British rock world was dominated by two waning trends, shoegaze and Madchester, both of which emphasized sound and vibe over personality and pomp. And here Suede were, with a very bold, direct, and sexually charged song that had the swagger of glam rock and was focused on the voice of Brett Anderson, who was powerful and distinctive. Anderson's vocals had a little of Bowie and a little of Morrissey, but there was a lot more there than a simple swirling of influences. Here was a guy who could sing frankly about drug abuse and rough sex without plasticizing it or stylizing it– actions had consequences in the world he created, and wild nights had mornings after, but he was careful not to tell you the moral of the story.

It wouldn't always be like that, but during the brief years Butler was still in the band, Anderson was at his best as both lyricist and vocalist. The band had a good rhythm section, too. Bassist Mat Osman is a subtle force in the band, playing melodic lines that keep the songs light on their feet, even when Simon Gilbert's drumming locks in on a stomping and otherwise heavy beat. When they matched up with Butler's guitar, they were nearly as charismatic as a trio as the guy who was singing for them. "The Drowners"– which for all the early hype around the band (they were on the cover of Melody Maker a month before its release under the headline "The Best New Band in Britain") only charted at #49– has a destructive energy to it that I can understand hearing as a clarion call in the musical climate of Britain in the early 90s. The opening drum stomp, soon joined by Butler's crunching, metallic riff, seems to announce the band as something different and exciting. It drips with sex before Anderson even opens his mouth.

"The Drowners" is joined by three other excellent singles on the band's self-titled debut. "Metal Mickey" was the band's only song to chart in the U.S. top 10, and it is one of their best– Butler didn't play much conventional rhythm guitar, and this song is a good early example of how his shifting lead style complemented Anderson's vocal melodies. The singles reinforced the idea that Suede were a breath of fresh air, and even though they are fairly basic rock, the band still didn't sound quite like any of their contemporaries. And there are the album tracks as well, which showed them to be a band with considerable range. The interplay between Anderson's vocal and Butler's lead guitar on "Sleeping Pills" is like some sort of dance, and the band makes a convincing modern murder ballad on "She's Not Dead". And Mat Osman's bass does as much to drive the quieter songs as Butler's guitar.

Between albums, the band released a non-album single, "Stay Together", that signaled a shift in direction. By this point, Britpop was a real thing, at least as far as the UK music press was concerned, and Suede were being lumped in with Oasis, Blur, Cast, and a host of other bands that were being championed as the saviors of British rock. This horrified Anderson, who felt his band had very little to do with the laddish groups he was being mentioned in the same breath with, and it strengthened his resolve to move the band further away from conventional rock. Butler's relationship with the rest of the group was deteriorating; on the band's messy American tour in late 1993, he sometimes left the stage mid-gig, having a member of the Cranberries, who were opening, fill in for him. Anderson sequestered himself to write, and the songs he came up with were much darker and more introverted than anything on their mostly demonstrative debut.

By all accounts, the recording sessions for Dog Man Star, the band's masterpiece, were fraught with tension, and Butler often recorded separately, ultimately leaving the band before the album was completed. Whether that tension helped or hurt the album is debatable, but what's not in dispute is that the album is the band's very best work, completely transcending the Britpop wave they'd supposedly helped launch. In many ways, it's more like an album that might have been released in the 70s than in the 90s, and not just because of its heavy glam riffs and towering vocals. It does everything to its extreme, is unafraid of excess or bombast, and is well-structured to play as a cohesive work. From its eerily throbbing, weightless opener, "Introducing the Band", to the orchestral overload of its sweeping closer, "Still Life", there's not a moment on the album that doesn't feel in danger of breaking down, flying apart, or disappearing entirely.

It's a thrilling record. I can't think of anything that's been released since that has quite the same balance of elements. It was enormously risky, but the risk paid off with big returns. Where Butler did play, he played his most inspired parts. "New Generation", "We Are the Pigs", "Heroine", and "This Hollywood Life" thrash and churn; "The Asphalt World" caps its slow burn with a wild and lengthy instrumental coda; and "The Wild Ones" might be Suede's best single, its sweeping orchestration, vocals, and guitar parts coming together in fragile but perfect balance. The quieter songs are stunning. "Daddy's Speeding" ends in a torrent of static and sampled engine noises that sounds like the earth tearing open, and "The 2 of Us" is simply gorgeous, a devastatingly sad song that doesn't feel forced or morose.

The reissue appends full-length versions of "The Wild Ones" and "The Asphalt World" that are significantly longer, and they're worth hearing, as are most of the other outtakes. The demos that fill out the first discs after the albums are marginally interesting, but the essential inclusion on these sets is the B-sides, all of them, from every single the band released through early 1994 (some recorded after Butler left are on the Coming Up reissue). Suede made B-sides that a lot of bands would die to release as lead singles– their Sci-Fi Lullabies compilation, now redundant, has long been considered an essential part of their discography, and for good reason. Here, you get the elastic snap of "Whipsnade", the stomp of "Killing of a Flash Boy", the breezy swagger of "Modern Boys", the majesty of "My Dark Star", the crystalline sadness of "The Living Dead", and the shimmer of "To the Birds" right alongside the albums, and they alone make these sets worth the price. Anderson even makes alternate tracklists in his liner notes for each album, which often swap out weaker album tracks for B-sides, and I can't really argue with any of his substitutions (dropping "The Power" for "My Dark Star" and "Black or Blue" for "The Living Dead" might have been the only way to make Dog Man Star better).

The DVDs are full of good stuff– Suede comes with all of its charmingly dated music videos, and Dog Man Star has the concert projections for the band's 1994 tour, though that album's videos are oddly absent. Each set has two live performances– and strangely, all but one appear to have been shot by audience members rather than professionally, though the sound is acceptable. They were a very good live band, but honestly, as with most bonus DVDs, these are likely to be watched a few times and shelved. It's not bad to have this stuff available, though. More importantly, the band's discography has been consolidated, and their first two albums feel more complete with the contemporary B-sides in tow. Suede were an important band, pivotal to what the 90s came to sound like in Britain, even if they distanced themselves from it. But Suede were also a great band, and these records still sound vital all these years later.

Review by Joe Tangari, Pitchfork

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Suede – Studio Albums 1993-2002 Deluxe Editions 2011 (10CD+5DVD) [Сombined Re-Up]

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Suede – Studio Albums 1993-2002 Deluxe Editions 2011 (10CD+5DVD) [Сombined Re-Up]

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Suede – Studio Albums 1993-2002 Deluxe Editions 2011 (10CD+5DVD) [Сombined Re-Up]

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Suede – Studio Albums 1993-2002 Deluxe Editions 2011 (10CD+5DVD) [Сombined Re-Up]

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It was released in October 1994 and artistically, the record cocked a snook at the notion of the ‘difficult’ second album. Anderson/Butler would never put a better collection of songs on a record. A widescreen evocation of a broken England, broken souls and broken dreams. Here was a band purposefully striding forward, shedding the indie-band Smiths influences, for a broader musical vision. Track one, Introducing the Band was a bold statement. A flag at the top of the mountain. We’ve reached the summit and this is what we are capable of. The album starts not with a song but a mission statement, a droning declaration of Dog Man Star themes and obsessions – suburbia, violence, sex, drugs, love and hope, all set within a world in the margins. Hollywood is another Dog Man Star preoccupation – in Heroine the narrator is aching for his ‘Marilyn’ and the swirling, brooding Daddy’s Speeding is a hypnotic meditation on the death of James Dean.

The album takes us on a journey through many musical styles – the acoustic Hunky Dory pop of The Power, the glam strut of This Hollywood Life and the orchestral crescendo that is Still Life. Brett’s voice is transformed into an instrument of depth and beauty, the thick tones resonating as never before, on The Wild Ones. The quality of the material never dips and the second half of the album hits the stratosphere with two incredible songs, The 2 of Us and The Asphalt World. The former, a heartbreaking piano-led tale of isolation and the later, a 9 minute guitar-driven Floydian epic on sexual jealousy. Both Anderson and Butler seemed to be operating at somewhere near their peak. Brett’s lyrics owed a smaller debt to Morrissey this time around – less flowery, with a more direct approach deployed on songs like New Generation, while Butler’s guitar was everywhere. Economic and sprawling. Delicate and aggressive.

Unfortunately, Suede ended up in the absurd situation where the very act of creating and recording their masterpiece, broke up the band. Guitarist and co-writer Bernard Butler was struggling. His relationship with his fellow band members was souring and in particular he was frustrated at having his songs produced by Ed Buller in a way that was not to his liking. The author was losing control of his own compositions. Surely his co-writer Brett Anderson would side with his fellow songwriter? Apparently not. Artistically frustrated, Butler was also grieving over the recent death of his father. Brett has admitted that he didn’t have the “emotional tools” to console Bernard over his loss. So words went unsaid, tensions built and resentments festered. So frustrated did Butler become that he gave the band an ultimatum. Either Buller leaves or I do. An analyst might conclude that by issuing this relatively drastic demand Bernard was looking for a way out, but regardless, the band refused to bow to this demand.

The rest, as they say, is history. Butler left, but not before recording guitar parts alone, to fulfill contractual obligations. A sorry and untimely end to the most fruitful and creative of songwriting partnerships. Butler’s departure and the circumstances surrounding it would be something that Anderson would come to “massively regret”.

We will never know the heights that Suede might have scaled with the Anderson/Butler partnership intact for a third album and beyond, but we can be thankful, at least, that the two men had written enough great songs to fill the album and sprinkle the singles with the usual generous amount of quality b-sides and extra tracks. Killing of a Flashboy (“think of the sea as you murder me”) and Whipsnade stand out as highlights.

With the album finally completed (The Power has no Butler guitar on it at all) Suede were quick to regroup. They had to be. They had singles to release, videos to make, an album to promote, a tour to organise and most importantly they needed to find a new guitarist. 17-year-old Richard Oakes was hired and he would mime to Butler guitar parts in the videos and replicate the same guitar parts on stage for the impending tour.

Suede’s fans’ reaction can be measured in the chart placings of the singles. The Orwellian blast that is We Are The Pigs, stalled at no.18, much lower than the no.3 peak of the non-album single Stay Together from seven months earlier. The Wild Ones – almost universally acknowledged to be Suede’s best single – could do no better, and again peaked at no.18. The final single New Generation (promoted as a double-a side with new Anderson/Oakes composition Together) failed to break into the top 20 at all. It is fair to say that there was a feeling of confusion and bewilderment at this time. Are the band splitting up? Will there be another album? Who is this Oakes fella?

It’s a pop tragedy that the co-creators of this truly superb album could not promote, tour and enjoy it together as part of the same band. At the same time one has to admire the steely resolve of Brett Anderson. Rather than just let the band fall apart, and call it a day, he, along with Mat Osman and Simon Gilbert found a new guitarist and just got on with what needed to be done. Brett would be rewarded for his dogged determination to continue without Butler, when only two years later the next album, Coming Up, would be the big commercial success that Dog Man Star deserved to be.

Edsel Records have reissued the Dog Man Star album in the same deluxe format as the self-titled debut. It comes as a three disc set with two CDs and a DVD.

Once the album proper concludes on CD 1, there are five 4-track demo recordings. For some reason the very original, very silly, names given to these demos by the band have been maintained with the actual track they refer to in brackets afterwards. So we get Squidgy Bun (Introducing the Band), Ken (The Wild Ones) and Banana Youth (The Power) amongst a few others. I’m not sure how important it is that we know that The Wild Ones was once called Ken, but that’s just me. As usual with demos, it’s really interesting listening to them a couple of times, but once your curiosity is sated, they don’t really reward repeated listening.

CD 2 provides us with the b-sides and extra tracks from this period including all three tracks from the Stay Together single. Stay Together itself appears only in it’s long version but for some reason the last minute of piano tinkling and windy atmosphere are missing. A little bit naughty for a deluxe archive release to snip the end off a song. The original CD single remains the only place to get the full unedited version on CD.

Another point to note with this release is that it doesn’t contain ALL the b-sides to the Dog Man Star singles. This is because a decision seems to have been made to keep this Dog Man Star Deluxe Edition a strictly Anderson/Butler affair, and CD 1 of the New Generation single contained two Anderson/Oakes compositions, namely Together and Bentswood Boys. These songs get time-shifted slightly and appear on the forthcoming Coming Up Deluxe Edition. The same consideration denies us the videos to all the Dog Man Star singles because Oakes features heavily in them. This is more annoying because they do not appear elsewhere within the reissues. Maybe a DVD ‘easter egg’ could have allowed us to access these videos, while official track listings kept their presence hidden?

A real treat for fans is that CD 2 also contains the original unedited versions of The Asphalt World and The Wild Ones. It’s not clear if anybody seriously considered releasing these longer versions (unlikely) but they do make for fascinating listening. The Wild Ones has a three minute instrumental coda and The Asphalt World is a couple of minutes longer than the album version (mainly due to an extended middle section) but the mix is also significantly different with Brett’s vocals much higher and the organ is hardly audible.

The DVD is packed full of interesting content. The Dog Man Star tour films are included in their entirety, going some way to make up for the lack of promo videos. Live at the Casino De Paris in Nov ’93 is reasonable amateur footage of the band playing a set which includes We Are The Pigs and New Generation long before they had been recorded. A further live spot in the FNAC store in Paris has an acoustic rendition of Still Life amongst other tracks. As with the first album’s deluxe edition, this DVD contains a ‘bonus feature’ of Brett and Bernard discussing all aspects of the album. Fascinating again, although talk of the acrimonious departure of Butler is notable by it’s absence (perhaps understandably).

A highly recommended album for all rock/pop fans, with this new deluxe edition Dog Man Star just got even better.

Review by Paul Sinclair, Superdeluxeedition.com

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Suede – Studio Albums 1993-2002 Deluxe Editions 2011 (10CD+5DVD) [Сombined Re-Up]

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Suede – Studio Albums 1993-2002 Deluxe Editions 2011 (10CD+5DVD) [Сombined Re-Up]

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Suede – Studio Albums 1993-2002 Deluxe Editions 2011 (10CD+5DVD) [Сombined Re-Up]

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Suede – Studio Albums 1993-2002 Deluxe Editions 2011 (10CD+5DVD) [Сombined Re-Up]

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Coming Up. The perfect title for the follow-up to the dark and brooding Dog Man Star, since the commercial fortunes of Suede were about to be dramatically revived. This was no ironic title. The band had recorded a hit album and it would be named appropriately.

Dog Man Star had been a relative commercial failure, and Bernard Butler had gone, so freshly recruited band members Richard Oakes and Neil Codling (drummer Simon Gilbert’s cousin) completed the new version of the band. Suede redux.

Many ‘commentators’ predicted that Suede would have no future without Butler, but Anderson was having none of it. Relieved to have finished touring Dog Man Star with the ‘wrong’ version of Suede, he was very keen to get on with the next album. He wrote some songs alone, some with new guitarist Richard Oakes and even collaborated with Neil Codling on two tracks (Starcrazy and The Chemistry Between Us).

Coming Up is all about simplicity. Breezy, singalong pop songs, big choruses, handclaps, whoa whoas and la la las. Ten tracks, five singles, and lots of one word titles. Trash, Lazy, She, Starcrazy, Filmstar.

The album’s ‘keep it simple’ approach was also reflected in Brett’s lyrics. The literary lines of Dog Man Star were gone and Coming Up adopts a more traditional pop sensibility. The areas of interest hadn’t changed much though – drugs, relationships, Hollywood, empty lives – and Brett could still pull some great lines out of the bag “Class A, Class B, is that the only chemistry between us?” (The Chemistry Between Us). Although, for some tastes, his lyrics could occasionally be a little too simple “Bills and Bens and their mums and their friends who just really, really want to be loved” (Lazy).

Trash, the first single, was released in late July, 1996 and stormed up to number 3 in the UK charts. The perfect preface for Coming Up, which would hit no. 1 in the UK album charts a few weeks later. Four new tracks were issued across the two CD singles: Europe is our Playground, Every Monday Morning Comes, Another No One and Have You Ever Been This Low? All excellent, and all included in this new deluxe edition (Europe is our Playground is the original b-side version, not the remake included on the Sci-Fi Lullabies compilation)

Beautiful Ones (the second single), arguably even stronger than Trash, was a melodic delight – the second half of the song – CHORUS (“Here they come…”), BREAK (“you don’t think about it…”), and CODA (“And if your baby’s going crazy…”) – is up there with anything they ever put down on record. The singles kept coming, and a year later all five singles from the album had hit the UK top ten. An incredible achievement, which would represent the commercial peak of the band. There were also very prolific during this period, giving the usual, generous amount of quality b-sides and extra tracks to all the singles in their various formats.

The album ends on a sweet note, with the earnest Saturday night (“Whatever makes her happy…”). The video for this (included on the DVD) stars Keeley Hawes from UK TV’s Spooks and Ashes to Ashes.

The 2CD+DVD Deluxe Edition follows in the footsteps of the Suede and Dog Man Star Deluxe Editions. At the end of the album on CD 1 we get a fairly large chunk of the album in demo form. We also get the b-sides of New Generation not included on the Dog Man Star Deluxe Edition (all either Anderson or Anderson/Oakes compositions). CD 2 provides all the b-sides and extra tracks (except Digging a Hole – effectively a Neil Codling solo track – from Lazy). Some tracks (Sam and Feel) make their debut appearance on an album, not having appeared on Sci-Fi Lullabies.

The DVD is another treat, providing us with all the videos (although curiously missing the US version of Trash) and two live concerts, the best of which is from Paris in October 1994 where Richard Oakes looks suitably fresh-faced and does an amazing job of sounding like Bernard Butler as they work their way through a Dog Man Star set. This footage is grainy and amateurish, and the sound isn’t great, but it’s a real blast. The venue looks tiny but there are some great moments, such as Brett singing the “we all watch them burn” refrain from We Are The Pigs while some of the crowd start lighting sparklers and waving them around. Enough to give Health and Safety Officers everywhere nightmares! For the second half of this live footage our ‘camera man’ moves to the very front and we get some excellent close-up coverage of the energy and chaos as the band try to complete their set. Richard’s guitar packs up during So Young and Brett does a good job of singing along to just bass and drums. Normal service is resumed for the Metal Mickey encore but Brett ends up toppling over into the crowd of enthusiastic Parisians. He extracts himself laughing, obviously enjoying every minute.

Arguably the last classic Suede album, Coming Up might not be the connoisseurs choice, but if you want to shake your bits to the hits, look no further.

Review by Paul Sinclair, Superdeluxeedition.com

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Suede – Studio Albums 1993-2002 Deluxe Editions 2011 (10CD+5DVD) [Сombined Re-Up]

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Suede – Studio Albums 1993-2002 Deluxe Editions 2011 (10CD+5DVD) [Сombined Re-Up]

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Suede – Studio Albums 1993-2002 Deluxe Editions 2011 (10CD+5DVD) [Сombined Re-Up]

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Suede – Studio Albums 1993-2002 Deluxe Editions 2011 (10CD+5DVD) [Сombined Re-Up]

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Coming Up was every bit the triumphant comeback Brett Anderson and company were expecting and it was a terrific little record, but it did suggest that Suede had begun to reach the limits of Ed Buller's production ideas, while also feeling a little superficial. The very fact that its sequel was produced by Steve Osbourne, the man behind classics LPs from New Order and Happy Mondays, suggested they were returning to the dark undercurrents of their first two records, yet, Head Music is Coming Up, Pt. 2. Working with Osbourne has added some vague elements of electronic and dance music to Suede's signature sound, but these primarily manifest themselves in the form of gurgling analog synths and canned, old-school drum machines. Essentially, they're just window-dressing, since the songs themselves are extensions of the glam flash of Coming Up. While that hardly qualifies as an artistic progression, it hardly qualifies as a bad album either, and they've never sounded quite as unself-conscious as they do here. Suede even gets downright silly at times, whether it's the goofy puns of the title track or the ridiculously intoxicating stomp "Elephant Man." It's hard not to miss early Suede – the psychedelic "Indian Springs" comes close to capturing the feel, but it's bright, not menacing, and the ballads are pretty, not majestic – but even in this streamlined incarnation, nobody does this kind of trash pop as alluringly as Suede. Nobody can turn out a single as thrilling as "Electricity," nobody can grind out sex'n'drugs anthems as electrifying as "Can't Get Enough," or swoon as fetchingly as "She's in Fashion." When it comes down to it, nobody makes cheap sleaze sound so alluring.

Review by Stephen Thomas Erlewine, AMG

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Suede – Studio Albums 1993-2002 Deluxe Editions 2011 (10CD+5DVD) [Сombined Re-Up]

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Suede – Studio Albums 1993-2002 Deluxe Editions 2011 (10CD+5DVD) [Сombined Re-Up]

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Suede – Studio Albums 1993-2002 Deluxe Editions 2011 (10CD+5DVD) [Сombined Re-Up]

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The story of Suede splits well into two acts: the first version of the band, with guitarist Bernard Butler, and the second version of the band, with Butler gone and replaced by Richard Oakes, as well as keyboardist Neil Codling. The first version of the band released two albums, the crackling, sexually aggressive debut and the grotesque, brilliant, and dark follow-up, Dog Man Star, made as Butler and the rest of the band were pulling apart. The original version of the band fed on the tension between its two songwriters, Butler and vocalist Brett Anderson, and the records it made were harrowing and complex, both musically and lyrically.

When the band reconstituted after its messy split with its guitarist, Anderson was in no mood to make another Dog Man Star. It's a difficult kind of record to follow up– to come back with something that aimed for the same epic sweep and catharsis of that album would have ensured failure. Instead, when Anderson began to write with his new partners, he sought to change almost everything. The new Suede would be a very different band from its predecessor, even though it had the same singer and rhythm section. The new pieces had a lot to say about that. Oakes and Codling immediately began writing new material for the band, and Anderson found that what they were writing fit well with the new direction he hoped to take the band in.

It wasn't a clean stylistic break, necessarily. Oakes had found his way into the band by sending a demo tape to the Suede fan club; when Anderson overheard drummer Simon Gilbert listening to it, he thought it was an old Butler demo, and the 17-year-old guitarist vaulted to front of the long line of people auditioning to be Suede's newest member. Codling came to the band more conventionally: He was Gilbert's cousin, and the new songs they'd been working on immediately after Oakes joined required keyboards, so he was hired. This new three-way creative partnership was considerably less volatile than the Anderson/Butler pair, and partly as a result, the music lost its dark edge.

Back in the band's early days, Suede were heralded as one of the banner acts of the UK music media's new Britpop obsession– a fact that chagrined and even disgusted Anderson– and Dog Man Star had in some respects been Anderson's attempt to show that Suede were something distinct from Britpop. The band's next album, Coming Up, released in 1996, feels somewhat like Suede jumping back on board the movement it helped launch. At the very least, it finds the band returning to its glam-rock roots, and it's about the most day-glo rock record this side of Ziggy Stardust, with an intentionally garish Peter Saville sleeve to match. It vaulted the band back to massive commercial success in the UK, selling over a million and a half copies and spawning five top 10 singles.

Listening today, the album's biggest shortcoming is its lack of low-end. Producer Ed Buller chose to highlight the vocals, guitar, and synths over the band's formidable rhythm section, a decision that unfortunately leaves the album's roughly 50/50 mix of bouncy pop songs and melancholy ballads sounding a little thin. Coming Up is still a very good album, though. Anderson's lyrics are considerably more superficial and humorous than they had been in the past; this would eventually become a problem, but on uptempo, fluorescent rock songs like "Beautiful Ones" and "Trash" it works because these songs are just so damned catchy. And there is a lot of depth in the ballads. "By the Sea", actually written by Anderson during the Butler years, is simply beautiful and heartbreaking, while "Saturday Night" works perfectly as a long exhalation at the end of the album's long and disorienting party.

The album is reissued with all of its contemporary B-sides, minus the Neil Codling demo "Digging a Hole", which is omitted without explanation. This is very important, because there's a whole second album on disc two that's easily as good as Coming Up itself. The epic slash of "Every Monday Morning Comes", the relentless dub stomp of "WSD", the grinding descent into debauchery of "Europe Is Our Playground", the exhilarating pop rush of "Sound of the Streets" and Anderson's baritone-voiced lead on the scuzzy, Dog Man Star-ish rock song "Have You Ever Been This Low?" are all essential to understanding just how versatile this band was at this point in its career, and that's just a sampling of the 19 B-sides included on this set. This is an important theme of this reissue campaign, and one that will become even more important later.

The huge success of Coming Up left Suede in a position to do basically anything they wanted with their next album, but it took three years for the band to put together the follow-up. Codling was at times bed-ridden with chronic fatigue syndrome after the grueling 18-month world tour in support of Coming Up, and Anderson had fallen deeper into drug addiction, especially crack. Bassist Mat Osman, who along with Simon Gilbert has always been a source of stability and reason for the band, recalls Anderson's drug buddies hanging around a lot during the sessions and generally ruining the atmosphere. The UK music press interpreted the long wait between albums as a sign that things were going wrong and that the next LP might be another Dog Man Star. When Head Music finally came out in 1999, anticipation was so high in Britain that Virgin Megastores all over the country changed their name to Head Music for a day on the release date.

The album wasn't another Dog Man Star, but it was considerably darker and thornier than Coming Up. The band worked with producer Steve Osbourne to get a much heavier, more groove-oriented sound, and Codling's synths moved to the center of the sound. Head Music is neon to Coming Up's day-glo, and it's aged well sonically– it is easily the band's most underappreciated album. Part of the reason for that is Anderson's lyrics, which on certain songs were simply terrible. "Savoir Faire"'s notorious opening couplet, "She live in a house/ She stupid as a mouse," is the worst offender, but the slide toward superficiality that began on Coming Up accelerated here, with Anderson sounding more like a bored observer than participant in the nightlife he sings about.

Most of it sounds splendid, though. "She's in Fashion" is a simply effervescent and weightless pop song; the mysterious orchestral swirl of "Indian Strings" is captivating; "Hi-Fi" has a chunky electro bounce that still sounds modern; and the slinking pop noir of "Asbestos" easily forgives the sometimes clunky lyrics. The band's attempts at stomping, punky rock on "Can't Get Enough" and "Elephant Man" might have been better replaced by breezy fluid B-sides "Leaving" and "Let Go", though, and Anderson's solo acoustic stab at political commentary on "Crack in the Union Jack" is expendable. Perhaps reflecting the band's unsettled state at the time, the period B-sides overall aren't the world-beaters of the past, and they're spread across different producers (here again, a Codling-sung B-side, "Weight of the World", has been left off).

Suede's final album, A New Morning, is almost an afterthought in the context of the band's whole career. In his liner notes, Anderson wonders whether it even should have been made and imagines a much different tracklist from what actually went on the album. The disc of B-sides here is very important, because it's easily better than the proper LP– it's the reason I'm rating this reissue higher than I did the album on its original release. The band was coming apart as it made the record. Codling had left due to his illness, though he still contributed some songwriting; he was replaced by Alex Lee, the former keyboardist for good-but-forgotten Britpoppers Strangelove. For his part, Anderson had kicked drugs and isolated himself to write songs.

The record that came of all this is Suede's sunniest and most organic, but also its least substantial. On "Lonely Girls", Anderson outright repeats himself– the song is a list of girls, coupled briefly with something that each of them does, which makes it a virtual re-write of the old B-side "Young Men". His voice was also worn by years of abuse, and he sounded a little ragged singing the otherwise buoyant hooks of "Obsessions" and "Positivity", though it's hard to begrudge him the brighter outlook he displays on those songs. Listening to all the music here, though, it's easy to hear how, by bringing songs such as the stately ballad "Simon", the strangely haunting acoustic singalong "Campfire Song", and the unusual, slightly psychedelic "Instant Sunshine" out of B-side exile, they could have pieced together a better album from these sessions. Still, A New Morning is not a bad record, and it sent the band out on a hopeful note that was strikingly at odds with much of what had preceded it.

The five-piece Anderson/Codling/Gilbert/Oakes/Osman version of Suede has reunited and is touring, and a few years ago Anderson and Butler reconciled and made an album together as the Tears. Anderson has a budding solo career but has left the door open to a possible Suede album sometime in the future. If it never happens, so be it– the band's legacy is already sealed. These three albums, and Coming Up in particular, show a band that picked itself up remained creative and worthy in the wake of what could have been a fatal loss. These releases give us that whole run in all its messy imperfection.

Review by Joe Tangari, Pitchfork

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Suede – Studio Albums 1993-2002 Deluxe Editions 2011 (10CD+5DVD) [Сombined Re-Up]

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Suede – Studio Albums 1993-2002 Deluxe Editions 2011 (10CD+5DVD) [Сombined Re-Up]

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Suede – Studio Albums 1993-2002 Deluxe Editions 2011 (10CD+5DVD) [Сombined Re-Up]

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