We return to Suede’s Coming Up, one of the finest records of the 90s that’s been reissued on vinyl for the 20th Anniversary. John Earls reports…
EDSEL
Suede’s first album to feature Richard Oakes in place of Bernard Butler remains their finest pop statement. Concise and belligerent, it finds room for the gutter glam exhilaration of Trash and Filmstar alongside their trademark sweeping balladry on Saturday Night and Picnic By The Motorway. It may lack the experimentation of Dog Man Star, but its 10 songs are lean, hungry and pretty much unbeatable for accompanying Suede’s high-octane concerts. As fans had come to expect, the B-sides are generally as good as anything on the album, with the grandiose Europe Is Our Playground still a staple of Suede’s live show. For the vinyl edition, 10 of Coming Up’s 17 B-sides have been added as the second LP. That means no room for the choppy WSD or the self-referencing These Are The Sad Songs. Still, it’s housed in an impressive double gatefold sleeve, on yellow vinyl matching the album’s lurid artwork. Confusingly, the Super Deluxe Edition only available from Amazon at £60 doesn’t feature the vinyl album – yet it does add an exclusive 10” comprising the first Anderson/Oakes co-writes in the form of three B-sides from Dog Man Star’s final singles, The Wild Ones and New Generation.
