It has been a very long wait. Suede are returning to Australia for the first time since 1999, and they are making up for lost time with three nights at the Sydney Opera House that dig straight into the records that made them one of the defining British bands of the 1990s.
Brett Anderson and co. make their Opera House debut in the Concert Hall from January 28 to 30, 2027, with these their only Australian performances. Better still, each night gets a different Suede album played live and in full: Suede, Dog Man Star and Coming Up, one record per night.
For anyone who lived through British guitar music in the early ’90s, those three albums tell quite a story. Suede’s 1993 debut arrived with glamour, sex, drama and guitars at a point when British rock desperately needed all four, becoming the fastest-selling British debut album in almost a decade and winning the Mercury Prize. A year later came the darker and more ambitious Dog Man Star, before Coming Up hit number one in the UK in 1996 and delivered Trash, Beautiful Ones and Saturday Night.
But this isn’t being presented simply as a trip through the band’s first act. Each concert will also feature a second set drawing from Suede’s later catalogue, including 2022’s Autofiction and 2025’s Mercury Prize-nominated Antidepressants. Three decades in, the band are still making records rather than simply living off the ones everybody already knows.
And then there is Brett Anderson. Suede’s frontman has always treated a stage as somewhere to be conquered rather than merely occupied, which should make the prospect of the band playing in the round inside the Concert Hall particularly interesting. The Opera House isn’t exactly the first room that springs to mind when imagining Suede at full tilt, and that’s precisely why these shows could be so much fun.
Three nights. Three albums. No other Australian shows. After 28 years, Suede aren’t easing themselves back into Australia. They’re heading straight for the Opera House and bringing the first decade with them.
EVENT DETAILS
Suede – Australian exclusive
WHEN: Thursday 28 January, 8pm – Suede, Friday 29 January, 8pm – Dog Man Star and Saturday 30 January, 8pm – Coming Up
WHERE: Concert Hall, in-the-round, Sydney Opera House
TICKETS: From $129.90 + booking fee // sydneyoperahouse.com // +61 2 9250 7777
Insiders pre-sale: Tuesday 6 October, 9am AEST
What’s On pre-sale: Wednesday 7 October, 9am AEST
General public on sale: Friday 9 October, 9am AEST
