still. life.

This song came on shuffle tonight (have not heard it in some time).




I was - umm - vacuuming the rug in the living room in front of the speakers.




I - umm - turned off the vacuum.






Started the song over. Turned off the light. Cranked the volume knob on the hi-fi to earth-shaking (apologies neighbor Kim ... ). Lied down on the floor. Memories in a flood washing over me. And the realization just then how Suede had forged my idea of symphonic rock at least a decade before Muse still-impressive-but-so-less-impressive-than-the-Dog-Man-Star-era-Suede. Still Life. The Asphalt World. The 2 Of Us. This song this one song the epitome of symphonic rock absolute. Brett Anderson's voice and his range and dynamics unbearable. This song this one song ...






... epic.

the asphalt world.

OK then. The. Greatest. Pop. Song. Of. All. Time.

Ever.

This is Beethoven's Ninth in D minor for pop music. Parred down from overdubbed guitars and synths and drums and samples and cymbal crashes and drugs to a piano and a cello and his voice in A minor.

Apparently before performing this and leaving, he played The 2 of Us which holds the ranking of the third greatest pop song of all time (okay, maybe second – and of course then second or third is also a Suede song coincidentally from the same album), and before that He's Gone. Someone who was at the theatre commented it was the best three-run song ever. I would have agreed had I made it through. If you really want to hear the nine-and-a-half-minute long album version, buy the vinyl and listen to it on a hi-fi as loud as you can stand. Louder actually. Much much louder.