The Blue Hour
by Suede
  • Record Label: Rhino
  • Release Date: Sep 21, 2018
Metascore
77

Generally favorable reviews - based on 16 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 12 out of 16
  2. Mixed: 4 out of 16
  3. Negative: 0 out of 16
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  1. The Observer (UK)
    Sep 24, 2018
    60
    Dark and absorbing, The Blue Hour is never dull, although in an age of playlist-friendly immediacy it’s hard to imagine its appeal stretching far beyond already committed fans.
  2. New Musical Express (NME)
    Sep 19, 2018
    60
    While there’s a comforting familiarity that comes with all things Suede, it’s wonderfully shrouded on The Blue Hour by a very new, romantic and alluring strangeness. These are not hits to shake your bits to. Nor will these beats shake your meat. Rest assured, Suede remain the beautiful ones, but are just looking for beauty in ever more curious places.
  3. Mojo
    Aug 30, 2018
    60
    His commitment is palpable, the sequencing deft, and whole wilfully hit-free bombast-fest commendable, if scarcely palatable to anyone apart fro card-carrying Suede-heads. [Oct 2018, p.93]
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  5. Q Magazine
    Aug 30, 2018
    60
    Intriguingly between success and failure, as if occupying a musical hinterland of its own. [Oct 2018, p.118]
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User Reviews

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User Score
7.7

Generally favorable reviews- based on 47 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 36 out of 47
  2. Mixed: 4 out of 47
  3. Negative: 7 out of 47
  1. acalvoelorri
    Sep 21, 2018
    10
    The Blue Hour is the most fascinating, expansive, groundbreaking Suede's record. And yes: it's their best record, and maybe forever. At leastThe Blue Hour is the most fascinating, expansive, groundbreaking Suede's record. And yes: it's their best record, and maybe forever. At least half of the tracks are absolute highlights in their career along with a similar amount of old classics, others are really beautiful, haunting pieces of music, and, well, DBAINL (sure, a very fine song) feels misplaced, lessened, maybe pointless, and that would explain by itself the kind of achievement we're talking about.

    There are immediate songs (Wastelands, Mistress, Life Is Golden, Tides, Flytipping...) and there are a bunch of miraculous growers (Chalk Circles, Beyond The Outskirts, All The Wild Places or the unfairly questioned The Invisibles, a monument when played live).

    Regarding live, all feels as if the crafting of The Blue Hour had informed their approach to their previous repertoire. There's a theatrical "mise-en-sound", and at the same time all the old songs breath with fresh air, show unheard layers, a new power. It's as if Suede could just take any song now and turn it into something entirely unexpected. Special mention here to the Night Thoughts tracks: they sound liberated from the film, tearing down the curtain, free to establish themselves in the Suede canon.

    God Brett is better than ever. His voice is astoundingly expressive, at full strength, pitch-perfect. And on stage, wait and see him move, smile, take the wand and orchestrate the cult.

    I regret having listened to the four songs released before, The Blue Hour demands like no other Suede's record to be listened to in its integrity. I admire and envy those of you who resisted.

    It's not the record I'd recommend to enter Suedeworld. The Blue Hour is a huge gift to those who already worship them. Yes, the 3-star reviews are understandable, because if you loathed or neglected them, rest assured: you'll utterly loath or neglect them with The Blue Hour. And you know what? They don't give a **** and we, the fans, have every reason to go nuts. God forbid, please, please, please, but if this was to be their last record, I'll be left wondering until the end of my days what on Earth was in stock for us after The Blue Hour.    … Full Review »
  2. VDS
    Sep 21, 2018
    8
    They will (of course) be forever judged on Dog Man Star. That’s unfair, because DMS was very much of its time and times change. As a fan I’veThey will (of course) be forever judged on Dog Man Star. That’s unfair, because DMS was very much of its time and times change. As a fan I’ve changed too. I don’t want another DMS, and I guess Suede don’t want to make that record again either.

    This is a new Suede, expanding on a sound that’s different to both the debut and DMS, and the post Bernard records. This is Blood Sports and Night Thoughts taking the next step. The Blue Hour is its own record but at the same time it works with the previous two releases in what feels like a whole.

    Insomnia had me listening to it at 2am on 21 September (New Zealand time) when I guess the rest of the world may not have got their grotty little paws on it just yet. It didn’t grab me like that sacred moment when I first listened to Dog Man Star, and realised that I wasn’t the only one who both loved and hated the housing estate hopelessness of suburban England in the first half of the 90s. But it had me in a different way.

    The Blue Hour isn’t afraid and it isn’t trying to be what it’s not. It’s that melodic bass, sustained yet riff laden guitar, synth and piano sound that only Suede have mastered. Add to that lyrics that touch a hopeless Englishness that’s both romantic and doomed, and you’ve got the record in a nutshell.

    When I heard Life is Golden and then saw that it was sat in the middle of the record, I thought that it should have been the closing number like Next Life or Still Life. But it’s position at the centre is perfect. It’s an equal to Next Life and Still Life, yet at the same time is its own thing. For my money, it’s their best tune this side of Head Music.

    If your idea of a rock band with depth is 5 craggy Brits with more musical talent in each individual little finger than 99% of everything that’s streaming to oblivion, then get The Blue Hour. And then if that’s your initiation, work backwards and weep with joy at Europe is our Playground and Pantomime Horse.    … Full Review »
  3. madelena
    Sep 23, 2018
    10
    This is Suede at its most adventurous, Gothic, audacious, and confident yet. The Blue Hour gives us an insane yet carefully orchestratedThis is Suede at its most adventurous, Gothic, audacious, and confident yet. The Blue Hour gives us an insane yet carefully orchestrated journey of funeral dirges, witch chants, words from Brett's son, unexpected power chords, ridiculous amounts of orchestral strings juxtaposed against cheap synth strings, and of course ample walls of guitar sound. It loosely chronicles an episode of child abduction, whether by an abductor, by forces of nature, or by the lure of cities, yet somehow manages to sound optimistic and hopeful in its twisted way.

    Despite all that strangeness, the album is quintessentially Suede, and in fact, it sounds like something the band had aspired to for years yet unable to reach until now. Every song will send chills up your spines, either musically or lyrically.

    Having listened to them for two decades and was disappointed that they couldn't quite get things right in their past two comeback albums, I'm ecstatic that they had finally nailed it. The Blue Hour will be the most underrated album of the year, and I'm glad they don't need to care about it anymore.    … Full Review »
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