Release Date: 29 October, 2002
Audio CD
Tracks
- Positivity
- Obsessions
- Lonely Girls
- Lost in TV
- Beautiful Loser
- Streetlife
- Astrogirl
- One Hit to the Body
- When the Rain Falls
- You Belong to Me [*]
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Rating 3.5
Zzzzzzzzzzz.This album was supposed to represent lead singer and songwriter Brett Anderson's cleaned up and happy state of mind. Brett even sings in a grittier voice throughout to help signify a turn of the page for the band. This is a bit of a risk since his higher, dramatic voice is as signature Suede as anything. It is a bit disappointing, but ultimately isn't what sinks the album.
Positivity starts the album out fresh even though it's clearly a subpar song by Suede standards. From then on though it feels like the band already ran out of ideas and ditches any idea of a sunnier album. Notably, instead of a band that has always felt like they were on the cutting edge, Suede sound like they're chasing the sound of Travis and others or even past Suede chart success. This flawed concept barely stays afloat for a few songs as second song Obsessions is decently catchy and fourth song Lost in TV sounds fair. But next track Beautiful Loser sounds like a bad attempt at Oasis and the following Streetlife is the most obvious "mail it in" Suede song on record. The album feels defeated after these tracks and the rest of it goes by in a quiet whimper. It almost seems foregone that after touring with the album, Anderson decided to dissolve the band.
a shockwhat the hell has Brett done to his voice? . Brett has obviously made a concious effort to make his voice less "operatic", and in doing so has killed off one of the things that MADE Suede such a great band in the first place. Oh and they used to have ace tunes as well, not the bubblegum radio friendly pop scattered throughout this poor album. Get back with Ed Buller fellas!, oh and visit your dealer while your at it!Suede offer up a decent but disappointing final albumIn the wake of their late-2003 break-up, this is Suede's final album. And while a solid album, it's rather weak and certainly their worst effort. Anderson's voice no longer has the coked-up whine and snarl of old, which works on the more polished songs but sounds rather thin on other songs. Overall Suede seem to have been going for a more mature sound here, and it shows. However, some of Anderson's lyrics are almost self-parodic, such as the "beat of the concrete streets" and "you belong watching CCTV"...topics he'd written about many more times and much better in the past. However, there are some great songs on here, such as Positivity, Beautiful Loser, Lonely Girls, the suite of Untitled......Morning, and the near-perfect Astrogirl. |
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