Suede (band) - Legacy

Legacy

A significant part of Suede's legacy consists in having inspired the Britpop scene which eventually overshadowed the band's own achievements in the public mind. Alexis Petridis wrote in 2005, "These days, rock historians tend to depict Suede's success as a kind of amuse bouche before the earth-shattering arrival of Britpop's main course". In an article about the British music press' "ferocious one-upmanship campaign" of the mid-1990s, Caroline Sullivan, writing for The Guardian in February 1996, noted Suede's appearance as an unsigned band on the cover of Melody Maker as a pivotal moment in the history of Britpop:

Suede appeared on Melody Maker's cover before they had a record out... The exposure got them a record deal, brought a bunch of like-minded acts to the public's attention, and helped create Britpop. It was the best thing to happen to music in years, and it mightn't have happened without that Suede cover.

The year following the Melody Maker cover saw Suede captivate a pop phenomenon of critical praise and hype. Not since the dawn of the Smiths had a British band caused such excitement with the release of just a few singles. Suede are regarded by many as the first British band to break into the mainstream from the new wave of alternative rock in the '90s. With their glam rock style and musical references of urban Britain, Suede paved the way for acts such as Blur and Pulp to enter the British mainstream. They were influential in returning some of the creative impetus to English guitar music in a scene increasingly dominated by Madchester, Grunge and Shoegazing. A March 1993 article in The Independent wrote that "Suede have had more hype than anybody since the Smiths, or possibly even the Sex Pistols. The reviews are florid, poetic, half-crazed; they express the almost lascivious delight of journalists hungry for something to pin their hopes on."

Suede's laurels would remain intact through their early career until Butler's departure, which the press signalled as the end of Suede. As new rock groups were arriving on the scene, British pop culture was in the midst of a shift towards lad culture and the same critics who championed Suede were now plotting to extinguish them. A 1996 article on the eve of the release of Coming Up wrote the following: "Cast in the classic mould of the androgynous rock star, Anderson appears curiously anachronistic in a British rock scene polarised between the laddishness of Oasis and the suburbiana of Blur and Pulp." In a 2007 article in The Daily Telegraph, Bernadette McNulty wrote that while the frontmen of those bands "are all being bestowed with reverential status, Brett Anderson has become the lost boy of Britpop". Since the Britpop movement ceased to exist, like many bands associated with it, Suede's popularity sharply declined. As one writer put it at the end of Suede's career, "Suede slid from zeitgeist into a smaller, pocket-sized cult band." In the same article, Anderson spoke about their legacy:

"It's not in my nature to be bitter. We may have been overlooked somewhat, but all you need to do is listen to the music. Our legacy speaks for itself." He added, "...Fate dealt us this card, and I don't think we've done particularly badly with it. Music today seems so very worthy, so very dull. Nobody wants to stick their neck out any more, and I think that is a great pity. We did, and we left our mark."