Brett Anderson

When Suede released their self-titled debut album in 1993, vocalist Brett Anderson endeared himself to U.K. critics longing for another David Bowie or Morrissey. Born in Haywards Heath, England on September 29, 1967, Anderson spent much of his childhood playing sports but fantasized about becoming a rock star. In his teens, he played guitar for garage bands such as the Pigs and Geoff, the latter featuring future Suede bassist Mat Osman. Anderson then formed Suede with Osman and guitarists Bernard Butler and Justine Frischmann, Anderson’s girlfriend. Drummer Simon Gilbert joined Suede in 1991, but Frischmann quit the group a year later to front the band Elastica. Even before Suede’s first album appeared in stores, Anderson’s vague confessions about his sexuality stirred up controversy in the British press. In 1993, Suede hit number one on the U.K. charts. Combining Morrissey’s homoerotic posturing with Bowie’s glam theatrics, Anderson achieved instant fame in England. America, however, was still spellbound by the grunge revolution and Anderson’s melancholic, over-the-top vocals clashed with the raw anger of Nirvana’s Kurt Cobain and Pearl Jam’s Eddie Vedder. Although the departure of songwriting partner Butler in 1994 led many to fear Suede’s eventual demise, the band continued to release critically and commercially successful albums in the U.K. Suede split in the wake of 2002′s A New Morning and Anderson unexpectedly reunited with Butler for the Tears, releasing an album — Here Come the Tears — in 2005. This reunion was short-lived, and Anderson launched a solo career afterward, releasing three progressively quieter albums in the next three years: Brett Anderson in 2007, Wilderness in 2008 and Slow Attack in 2009. He returned to rock in a big way in the new decade, reuniting Suede in 2010 and touring the band into the next year. In 2011, he released Black Rainbows, his hardest-rocking solo album to date, in the fall. ~ Michael Sutton