Sunday 25 August 2013

The man with the white shirt


When the man with the white shirt came onto the stage last night, my heart skipped. I was again 16, in my room, listening to his songs and learning his lyrics by heart. Yesterday, he was handsome but plain: a white shirt, black trousers, his hair not as long. But he was still Brett, he was still the one.

When I first moved to the UK, back in 2001, I thought I had missed the train of seeing Suede live. And then I sort of forgot them for a while, their angst and melancholy didn't seem to fit my newfound life. But they were always there, in the background, singing my dark star, she's not dead, still life and the asphalt world to my deaf ears.

And then last night I saw them live for the first time. It's exhilarating to see the band that you felt defined you for years, there, in front of you, some few meters aware from you. And when Brett came down to the crowd, I felt like running to him, like an infatuated groupie. I got embarrassed and stayed where I was.

When the played Trash last night, followed magnanimously by Animal Nitrate (my God that riff still sounds good), I was back. Back to my room, back to my 16 year old self, back to this feeling of discovering the world, of discovering myself. Discovering oneself through others, isn't this what adolescence is all about? And I felt this happy nostalgia, seeing my old self from afar, I nodded and she nodded back, we said hallow and parted ways again. What a feeling to see your youth, albeit briefly, and like what you see.

Love always, Brett, Suede. Let's chase the dragon from our home, indeed. 

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