CD: Brett Anderson - Black Rainbows

I never really dug Suede. I could hear great pop songwriting in some of their work, but their rampant adoption of Bowie-as-Ziggy-Stardust sonics and vocal tics seemed to be just as representative of Britpop's necrophiliac tendencies as did Oasis's tired Beatle-isms. So I'm slightly puzzled as to why I'm enjoying this record by their singer as much as I am, given that it is almost as retro – albeit in a different way.

The soundscape of Black Rainbows is a return to rock after the orchestral stylings of previous solo records, but it belongs to the mid-1980s. In particular there is a Goth jangle to the guitars that recalls The Cult, Siouxie & The Banshees and Anderson's fellow Ziggy obsessives Bauhaus. The Smiths' wiry grooves are there, too, and the occasionally narcotic grit of pre-Loveless My Bloody Valentine. You can even, for all Anderson's studied archness, hear the most gauche reach-for-the-stars romanticism of The Waterboys and early U2 in the self-abasing love song “Brittle Heart”.

Maybe it's because there's a wider spread of influences, maybe it's because in amongst all this, Anderson's voice is now really his own. Maybe it's just that age suits him and it feels like he's no longer trying overly hard to be a rock god while simultaneously undermining himself with that archness. Whatever, this is an easy record to get swept up in, the sound of a bruised romantic seemingly learning to be comfortable in his own skin. Sometimes it even suggests the shameless grandiosity that Coldplay could achieve if they weren't so cripplingly wet. As good an argument for middle age as I've heard in a while.