They could've even chosen to sideline the 2022 triumphant ‘comeback’ success of Autofiction’s punk energy and decided to settle. But instead they arrive with Antidepressants, a tenth studio album that feels less like a late-career coda and far more like a daring new beginning.
The band, for all their beautiful intimacy and orchestration, have always thrived on rawer sounding, more fractured songs that crack with a live electricity. Brett Anderson, when angry and anxious, seems to embrace the chaos in a way that feels assured and perversely safe. Antidepressants is deliberately darker, adopting a reverberating post-punk approach making “broken music for broken people,” but it’s exactly those people who will save the world.
From the thunderous opener “Disintegrate”, Suede fling themselves into the melee, with a visceral anthem that reframes fear and mortality. It’s a stark opening statement, glitching with little polish and pulsing with intent. It’s a heartbeat and the urgency isn’t accidental, they’ve honed their sound over time to communicate with fans directly through its umbilical tether. There is a real sense this time though that the cord could be cut at any moment, but not intentionally. Anderson's lyrics are laced with dread, paranoia, neurosis, and the dissonance of our disconnected age. This is a Suede album that doesn’t console us, it's deliberately confrontational – even dishing out a frustrated ‘tough love’. Kind of like saying wake up and do something, or fail. That may sound bleaker than it comes across in reality but with titles like, “Antidepressants,” “Broken Music for Broken People”, “Trance State”, “Life Is Endless, Life Is a Moment” it’s not entirely wrong. The band aren’t averse to surrender either, “come and disintegrate with me,” Anderson sings in a moment of solidarity and concession.
There’s a stark emotional gravity to the angular, icy guitar production of the title track as it interpolates Magazine’s “Shot By Both Sides”, and the sneer of The Teardrop Explodes literate pop. It’s a time machine directly into the turmoil of that post-punk era, but reflected through our contemporary mirror. Anderson’s voice is weathered, precise, and weary, perfect for this material. He has an ability to sound utterly shattered by age and experience, and then exude refined elegance on “Somewhere Between An Atom And A Star” and “Life Is Endless, Life Is a Moment”. The latter two are softer bookends to the harsher pressures in between. “Tance State” is suitably hypnotic, in that communal singalong sense. We must obey.
Throughout their career, Suede have evolved in phases, from deviant provocateurs of a Britpop-era they despised, to emotive anthem-makers, introspective dramatists, and visceral social commentators, album after album. There’s always been a defiance at play, too. Brett has said that even when they stretch out into experimental territory, it always snaps back to raw rock and that restlessness has been Suede’s secret engine.
There is something electrifying about watching a band exist so authentically in their present, not trapped in nostalgia or chasing youthful audacity. Suede’s life exists between glamour and grit, between intimacy and spectacle; now, they embrace that tension fully. Antidepressants is not about memory, it’s real life now, trembling in its own imperfection. Not necessarily healing, it’s just honest. And sometimes, that’s what we need most. As the languid chords of the final track drift away only the cold sounds of the outer atmosphere surround us. Time to contemplate. We’re adrift, weightless. After all, we're all just floating on a rock in space and we have to make the most of our time here.
