"WE'RE the anti-nostalgia band," declares Suede's Brett Anderson.
"If you want a headline, there you go. That's what we are. That's the way I think of Suede."
He doesn't refer by name to the noisy Mancunians bringing the Britpop Nineties back to packed stadiums everywhere. (And neither do I).
But he continues: "It's the way I delineate us from our so-called peers.
"Our creative momentum is all about what we're doing now — and what we're going to do next."
That being said, Anderson adds: "I have no problem with the past. When you're at a festival, it's suicide just to play the new stuff. You've got to pick your weapons.
"There are still absolutely brilliant moments when we play songs from the Nineties but, for us, it's all about the future.
"I really feel we're the only band of our generation that isn't going through the motions."
Today, Suede release their vibrant, visceral tenth studio album, Antidepressants, the follow-up to 2022's equally uncompromising Autofiction.
Rather like their latest efforts, there's a focused, forward-facing energy about frontman Anderson these days.
At 57, he knows he's not getting any younger but, if anything, his commitment to the cause is stronger than ever.
"We've fallen in love with being a rock band again," he affirms.
"We can experiment and push away to interesting places but it all snaps back to being a rock band. That's our DNA."
Despite arty credentials, Anderson decides that Suede are "most comfortable" when they're being "rough and gnarly".
"And I love still being physically able to play that kind of music live," he continues. "In fact, I love it more than I did in my twenties.
"As you get older, you see life as more precious. And that's one of the covert themes of the new record."
If the sound of Antidepressants hits listeners like a full-force gale, the songs and even the striking album cover are loaded with deeper meaning.
The second of what Anderson sees as "a trilogy of black and white albums" comes adorned with a stark monochrome image of the singer, stripped to the waist and in shadow, framed by two beef carcasses.
It's a homage to a photograph of the painter Francis Bacon, published in Vogue magazine in 1962.
Anderson describes it as a "memento mori" – a Latin phrase meaning "remember you have to die".
He says: "A memento mori, without wishing to mansplain too much, is a reminder of death in order to express the preciousness of life.:
"It's not as if life is endless — life is a moment.
"Lots of themes on the record are linked to that. The song Sweet Kid, which is about my son, says we've got to make the most of it.
"That's the message I apply to my family and to my career. They are the two great loves of my life.
"They're both very important to me and I need them both in my life."
What strikes me during my video call with Anderson is a duality about the man and his music.
'World is broken'
Looking at the album cover, you might imagine a tortured soul — he's certainly had his problems in the past — but I find him charming, engaging and, right now, in a really good place.
Anderson himself believes that his healthy state of mind is reflected in the songs on Antidepressants.
"The album has a sense of euphoria to it that possibly Autofiction didn't have," he says, "and a sense of defiance.
"The world is broken and the only choices are to give up or to find something beautiful within that brokenness."
He asserts that Suede have been employing the latter course since they hit the ground running in the Nineties with their self-titled debut (1993), Dog Man Star (1994) and Coming Up (1996).
But he adds that this way of seeing the world "has revealed itself to me more and more as I've got older," hence perhaps the Antidepressants track Broken Music For Broken People.
Of other latest compositions, Anderson says: "Dancing With The Europeans (about a "joyous" gig in Spain), Sweet Kid and The Sound And The Summer are all quite celebratory.
"I didn't want it to be a gloomy record — and I don't think it is."
The album opens with its mission statement, the glorious hard-rocking Disintegrate, doom-laden and uplifting at the same time.
I tell Anderson that the chorus of, "Come on down and disintegrate with me", actually brought a smile to my face.
"Well, I guess that IS quite gloomy," he replies with a broad grin.
"The English have always been good at gallows humour. You have to be. If you live in England, it rains most of the time and life is broken.
'My love of music just gets stronger'
"You have to find poetry within all that. Otherwise, things get too bleak."
Anderson sees Disintegrate as "being like a pagan celebration of one's own mortality, of returning to nature. I thought it was quite powerful."
As for the song's place at the top of the running order, he says: "The first track is always incredibly important to me.
"It's usually my favourite song on an album and it sets the agenda."
Another pivotal moment comes with the title track, which Suede have been performing regularly since last year's Isle Of Wight Festival.
Anderson says: "When we started playing that live, it wasn't the album title.
"I was happy to play it because it's quite a simple song to get into live and its themes are important to me.
"Antidepressants is a brilliant word. There's a cheekiness to it because it refers to the 11 songs on the album.
"And it's also about music being one's antidepressant."
This last comment opens up a fascinating window in Anderson's world. "My love for music just gets stronger," he says. "It is so much part of the rhythm of my day.
"First thing in the morning, it's got to be Joni Mitchell or Nick Drake — some of the most beautiful music ever made.
Antidepressants is a brilliant word. There's a cheekiness to it because it refers to the 11 songs on the album.
Anderson
"Later in the day, I might listen to something new. A band I like called NewDad made a really good record.
"Choosing music for dinner is very specific. It's got to be the background — something like Nina Simone.
"After dinner, particularly in the winter, me, my son and my stepson, play table tennis so then I find table tennis songs by bands like The Who or Sex Pistols.
"Then it's time for winding down towards bed, which always, every day is Brian Eno for me."
Anderson considers his daily soundtrack and adds with a sigh: "Music is such a beautiful thing. I lament the fact that it seems to mean less to people these days, that it doesn't have such cultural resonance."
He maintains that "live music is life affirming. It allows band and audience to become children again, to become primitive".
"It reveals a simpler, nobler version of yourself which you can take back into your everyday life."
'A little more darkness has crept in'
This brings us to the burning issues highlighted by the Antidepressants song. It's the idea, says Anderson, that we live in a society "where everyone is diagnosed with some sort of personality disorder".
He adds: "We seem desperate to solve problems in a scientific way, to fix everything through pills. But personality disorder is basically the definition of what it is to be human."
He also bemoans a society "where the Government shepherds us around like livestock" with commands and announcements.
Anderson says: "That was something I tried to get across with little background noises on the record.
"As a citizen of 21st-century life, you're told things like, 'If you see something that doesn't look right,' as you get on a train.
"This record is about defying that suppression and becoming human again."
Anderson says an attitude of "f*** you, don't f*** with me," permeates The Sound And The Summer.
"It's a song about driving, which I love," he says. "I learned quite late in life. It's that sense of power and freedom you have behind a wheel."
As you might expect, Anderson loves listening to music in the car, "often it's my own stuff when I'm making a new record".
"There's a physicality about listening to music in cars. You can feel the bass going through your ass!"
He also uses his 13-year-old son — the subject of Sweet Kid — as a sounding board, as he explains.
"At nine, he was the first person to hear most of the songs on Autofiction and now, with Antidepressants, he's hearing a lot of stuff before anyone else gets to hear it.
"I'll be working on something all day, then I'll pick him up from school.
"If he's not in a bad mood, I'll go, 'Do you want to listen to something I did today?' And he says, 'Oh, go on then.'"
Anderson admits he hasn't played Sweet Kid to his son "because the message is a bit too complex" and not as "wide-eyed and positive" as a previous song about him, Life Is Golden (from 2018's The Blue Hour).
"A little more darkness has crept in but hopefully it captures a little of our relationship."
He says: "My family is such a generator of songs for me. You won't find me doing songs about farming in Kenya like some leftfield band."
'I'm obsessed with family relationships'
Anderson deals in familiar themes — love, loss, pain, desire — which he calls "simple human emotions".
"When you're young, you find them when your girlfriend leaves you or you see some woman on a train that you fancy.
"When you're older, passions aren't so fleeting. I'm obsessed with my family and the relationships within my family."
To give an example, he draws my attention to the opening song on Autofiction, She Still Leads Me On, a defiant tribute to his late and "amazing" mum.
Anderson's other family is, of course, the band which comprises fellow founder member Mat Osman (elder brother of TV personality and author Richard on bass), Simon Gilbert (drums), Richard Oakes (guitars) and Neil Codling (keyboards).
He would add their long-time and "brutally frank" producer Ed Buller, who returns to helm Anitdepressants.
"When me and Mat first met, we became very close friends and hung out a lot," says Anderson.
But he confesses that over the years, relations with band members have become "more business-orientated".
"You spend so much downtime with them, sitting around in hotels and airports, that you're not going to socialise with them as well.
You spend so much downtime with them, sitting around in hotels and airports, that you're not going to socialise with them as well. I love the guys in my band in a very different way to my family or my friends.
Brett Anderson
"I love the guys in my band in a very different way to my family or my friends.
"We've been together for such a long time that we have many complex in-jokes.
"We'll sit and chatter away. If there's a stranger present, they won't know what the f*** we're talking about because we'll probably be referencing something that happened in 1998."
Anderson reserves special praise for guitarist Oakes, who replaced original guitarist Bernard Butler in 1994.
"One of the great things about Autofiction and Antidepressants is Richard's role in everything. He's really come into his own as an artist on these two records.
"He had been a bit in the shadow of Suede Mk I but now he has confidence to shape the sound with his own identity."
Another fascinating song is June Rain, which finds Anderson developing a spoken word vocal style to winning effect.
Two tracks, Between An Atom And A Star and Life Is Endless, Life Is A Moment were originally intended for a Suede ballet album, shelved because of the band's current infatuation with rock.
Next up for them is a "takeover" of London's Southbank with a series of shows — but I'm keen to find out how Anderson envisages Suede's longer-term future.
"We're still evolving," he replies after a moment's consideration
"I hope we make some of the best and most challenging music we've ever made.
"That is always the goal."
Suede – Antidepressants
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