Review Summary: Bloodsports is an album so convincing that we can stow away our fears and celebrate – Suede is back.
Rummaging through my local library's CD stash shortly after the new millennium had dawned, I ran across a neon green themed double-disc set with the rotted out husk of a space shuttle on the cover. Intrigued by songs titled "My Insatiable One," "Where The Pigs Don't Fly," and "Whipsnade," I checked out Sci-Fi Lullabies by Suede and a love affair was born.
I came upon Suede late in the game, though there wasn't much of a game in the US. I encountered no fellow Suede enthusiasts, let alone apologists, but I still snapped up all the studio albums. I actually listen to 2002′s A New Morning, and I won’t track past “Positivity” or “One Hit To The Body” when they emerge from a random troll through iTunes library. Given that, I certainly recognize the band’s precipitous decline in quality from their opening triptych to that supposed swan song. The announcement of a new Suede album dropping in 2013 stirred a melange of emotions – the excitement even the most cynical fan feels at the existence of new material; the trepidation even the most optimistic fan feels at the potential of being underwhelmed; and the curiosity that any modern rock music fan would have as to why Suede would even bother? And, of course, that million dollar question – is it any good? In the case of Bloodsports, why, yes, and very much so.
Addressing the inevitable media queries of what the new album sounded like, front man Brett Anderson described a “cross between Dog Man Star and Coming Up.” Intentional or not, this was chum in the waters of the ”best album since” ocean that drowns every “comeback” release. Fortunately, by gum, Brett is pretty spot on. Bloodsports marks a partial return to the grandiosity of Dog Man Star, though leavened by the dollops of glam that have been the band’s calling card since guitarist Richard Oakes climbed aboard for Coming Up. Suede have actually crafted a concept album - ordinarily a species of beast capable of prompting listeners to run for the hills, here it works. A decade and a half removed from the band’s heyday and advancing toward middle age, Brett addresses the foibles found in adult relationships – from the giddiness of the first glance to surveying the bruised landscape of a romance gone awry - rather than retreading the pill-gobbling, creatures of the night escapades of early albums.
The album’s first three tracks launch quite the opening salvo and shove the band’s mission statement right into our faces. A martial tom-tom beat and pulsing synths propel opener “Barriers” until snare cracks burst it open as Brett howls - with more vitality and conviction since the album’s two self-professed doppelgangers – over Oakes’s unmistakable tremolo. Brett skulks through the hook-up anthem “Snowblind,” while Oakes’s quicksilver slashing and endless riffage frames one of their most muscular songs to date. The urgency and immediacy here portray a unit on the attack – loud, confrontational, with airs of danger and a whiff of unhingedness – far from the stilted complacency dogging A New Morning. Even when the album lets up on the gas slightly midway through and turns inward with ”Sleeping Pills”-esque atmosphere – as the “story,” so to speak, moves through the erosion and dissolution of the relationship – Suede never relinquish their determination and dedication.
Having your fears allayed that Bloodsports would be a crushing disappointment could be cause for critical hyperbole – indeed, this album has seen perfect scores. While a rousing, nay, seemingly inconceivable, return to form, Bloodsports is no second coming of the debut or Dog Man Star. Though Brett has avoided the increasingly silly nods to the underground that plagued later releases by opting for a more mature theme, plenty of trite lyrical passages are present throughout. Of all metaphors, “aniseed kisses” appears in both of the first two tracks, the oft-rehashed “stinging like aerosol” pops up in “For The Strangers,” and the typical over-reliance on similes pervades the album. As one might conjecture from Brett’s pre-release chatter, there’s nothing musically novel here, and there are points where the album veers toward hamminess or retread. “Sabotage”s bass-driven creeping melts into Coldplay-like arena rock by song’s end, Brett comes across as the Phantom rowing Christine to his underground lair as “Sometimes I Feel I’ll Float Away” comes to a close, and some may find “Always” a little too close to “The Asphalt World” for comfort. All this said, the Suede sound is distinguished enough that those who have drunk the Kool-Aid will gladly welcome more of the same, particularly when delivered as intently as Bloodsports.
As closer “Faultlines” halts and freezes in mid-air, Brett cries out, “Celebrate!” and assures us “there is no fear now…for us to feel.” It took a decade for Suede to arrive at this emotional juncture, and for that, they have offered us Bloodsports, an album so convincing that we can stow away our fears and celebrate – Suede is back.
