Suede - She's In Fashion

"She's in Fashion" was Suede's biggest radio hit. "She's in Fashion" has been described as 'the most summery-sounding pop song Suede have recorded,' yet its light feel disguises what proved to be months of heavy production work, several re-recordings and a lot of experimentation. According to Osborne, the recording process took six months and several studios were used. "It happens quite often that you go on a journey, attempt various things and end up preferring the first thing you did. 'Fashion' was a song that we started in the first week of recording -- but we didn't finish it until the very last week!"

Suede - Stay Together

Suede were formed in 1989 by Brett Anderson, the year he lost his mother to cancer and guitarist and co-songwriter Bernard Butler was soon recruited via an advert in Melody Maker. By 1994 there were growing tensions between the pair and Suede released this tale of two suburban lovers united in narcotic nihilism as a stopgap single, whilst Butler's father was dying of cancer. Anderson's lyric was inspired by vivid childhood memories of nuclear war, while Butler conceived a tumultuous and multi-tiered ballad lasting over seven minutes. "I was desperate to do something emotional and strung out, Butler told Mojo June 2011, who admits he was constantly stoned on weed during that period. "I'd seen all these tragic characters around the band, and I felt the world had become a nasty place. Brett had retreated. Probably because of what had happened to his mum, he didn't want to connect to me."

Suede - The Wild Ones

Immersed in lyric writing, frontman Brett Anderson spent hours in London's Highgate library, looking through biographies of old film stars. This ballad was named after the 1953 Marlon Brando outlaw biker film, The Wild One.

Lyrically, Anderson's 17-year-old girlfriend, Anick, inspired this ode to a relationship being slowly lost. The Dog Man Star tracks "The Asphalt World" and "Black or Blue" were also written about his teenage beau. "Our relationship was fiery and fractured," he recalled to Mojo, "the kind you have when you're young."

 

 

Iron Maiden - Fear Of The Dark

Kerrang! magazine, while interviewing singer Bruce Dickinson, quoted the Iron Maiden biography Run To The Hills, in which Steve Harris professed that Bruce "made very little effort" on the Fear of the Dark Tour. Bruce's response: "I've got my version of events and he's got his. It all comes down to how you see the world. For Steve, Maiden's more important than anything. To me, there are some things that are more important than the band I'm in. I didn't know it was going to be that much of a big deal when I left, but as soon as I walked out onstage and looked at the audience I thought 'Sh**! If I run around grinning like a fool, the audience is going to think, "What a wanker! If he's so happy, why is he leaving?".' And if I wander around looking miserable as sin, they'll wonder why they paid £20 for a ticket to see this tosser. I was stuffed. Some nights the audience was hostile. It was like doing a gig at a wake! Some nights I enjoyed it, but on others I was thinking, 'I wish I wasn't here!'. The moment I left Maiden I made a deal with myself that I wouldn't do anything that I didn't believe in ever again. Steve and myself always used to clash. He wanted to fire me after the first month of the 'Number Of The Beast' tour - because I kept getting in his way onstage! I had an extra six inches added to the base of my microphone stand so I could trip the bastard up! I got fed up of him standing in front of me when I was singing. I got all these chips in my teeth where he used to elbow me. After a gig in Newcastle in '82 we were going to go outside, sleeves rolled up. But we learned to live with each other. And if Steve hadn't had that personality, Maiden would never have existed."

Suede - Europe Is Our Playground

Coming Up is the third album by Sude, released in 1996. A commercial and critical success, Coming Up was the album that introduced Suede to a worldwide audience, in places such as Europe, Canada and Asia. Europe is Our Playground is a B-side of one of the singles from this album.

Green Day - American Idiot

Billie Joe Armstrong was inspired to write this after hearing a jingoistic Lynyrd Skynyrd song being played on his car radio, whilst driving to the studio. He told Q magazine May 2009: "It was like, I'm proud to be a redneck and I was like, Oh my God, why would you be proud of something like that? This is exactly what I'm against. When he got to the studio, Armstrong furiously penned this song. He said: "I looked at the guys like, Do you mind that I'm saying this? And they were like, No, we agree with you. And it started the ball rolling."