Night Thoughts

After safely negotiating those choppy comeback waters with 2013’s robust <i>Bloodsports</i>, Suede bed in for something altogether more ambitious. Their seventh album is a grand beast, decorously detailed with orchestras, sumptuous regret and desire untamed. Songs bleed into each other, there’s a wonderfully indulgent (and well-earned) reprise and Brett Anderson has rarely channelled his lithe, lascivious energy more effectively. He’s electric on “Outsiders” and “No Tomorrow”: that swagger now rich with self-reproach. “Pale Snow”, “I Can’t Give Her What She Wants” and “The Fur & the Feathers”, meanwhile, are exquisite portraits of a band using their gruelling past to move masterfully onto a new chapter.