Brett Anderson - Black Rainbows

December 2009, and Brett Anderson finds himself at the Kentish Town Forum for a concert by The Horrors. "I got there early, and was sat watching all the roadies setting up, and remembered what it was like, and I though 'I really want to do this again''," recalls Anderson. "The gig was fantastic, but it was the setting up, the little details, that really fired my imagination."
That winter's night was pivotal in both Brett Anderson's decision to reform Suede for their triumphant concert at the Royal Albert Hall in support of the Teenage Cancer Trust, and also to record Black Rainbows, the album that marks a return to his roots writing with a full band.  "I was ready to make rock music again," Anderson explains. "I'd gone away and tried something else, and I had to do that. It's important to be brave."
The brave decision that led to this, his fourth solo album, was to take a leap out of his comfort zone and usual way of writing, and go with collaborator Leo Abrahams' suggestion that they make the new record by improvising in a recording studio, and building songs from the raw material jammed out by three formidable musicians: himself, jazz improv drummer Seb Rochford (Polar Bear, Acoustic Ladyland) and bassist Leo Ross (The Big Pink).  "I looked at him and thought you're fucking mad, that's not how records are made" says Anderson of his initial response to this radical approach. "I've never made a record like that before, I've always really carefully prepared and written stuff, I thought how are we going to do that?"
What the group did was head to London's Miloco studios for an intense, three day session unlike any other in Brett Anderson two decades in music: "It was us jamming, with me in the control room, I wasn't playing any instruments but I had this strange role, I was a sort of tastemaker," explains Anderson. "I'd say this is the sort of thing we want to do. I had a load of records as starting points, Public Image, Siouxie, a couple of Interpol tracks, or Nico. I wanted the spirit of those records to be there." All these Anderson-curated jams were committed to tape, edited by Abrahams, and then worked on by the singer as he crafted the songs in his West London home. In a way, the unusual method turned out to suit his approach: "As long as I feel there's something good about the music I am terrier-like, and just keep going at it." From that cloud of music, Brett Anderson has created his most fully-realised work and eloquent pop songs since Suede's Coming Up. It's the record that sounds most like the Brett Anderson album you might imagine if you'd only heard Suede, and wondered what music he might be making now. "I was writing my parts as we were doing the Suede gigs, and realising what I love about what I did in the past," Anderson explains. "Playing To The Birds and Asphalt World gave me the sense that I was really competing with these songs, wanting to tease that element out of what I was doing as a solo artist. I was definitely embracing my past on this album, rather than rejecting it as I had before."
This meant that Brett Anderson was freed to write the songs he does best: relationships against the backdrop of the city. "I bring the detail and the neurosis," laughs Anderson of his role in honing the ten songs of Black Rainbows with his unique voice and lyricism that develops Suede's exploration of the inevitable dark twists of life and love. He even feels that Black Rainbows is just another step, not the culmination of his solo work: "This one I feel like I'm going in the right direction, and I think the next one will be even better. Now I know what I want to write about again, and this is it: the endless, fascinating detail of human relationships," Anderson says. "Love songs and hate songs and songs about jealousy, sex and anger are the currency of pop music, and always will be."

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