Album Review Suede - Autofiction

If it weren’t so deliberate, it would be easy for ‘Autofiction’ to feel like little more than Suede donning a musical costume of their early days. Instead, we’re getting a retelling. The veteran outfit’s ninth full-length is saturated with their well-honed symbiotic onstage energy: closer ‘Turn Off Your Brain And Yell’ rings with absent audience noise as Brett Anderson’s voice reverberates around an imaginary arena; ‘Personality Disorder’ shudders with intensity and performance; tempo shifts and hints of improv inject the title track with vital urgency. There’s not so much luxurious orchestration or dark flamboyance underpinning ‘Autofiction’’s construction, but Suede maintain their magnitude through emotional craft - single ‘15 Again’ is the perfect microcosm of ‘Autofiction’’s ups and downs, its euphoric chorus built around painstaking regret. In essence, ‘Autofiction’ finds Suede still fiercely in motion.