The year is 2000-something and I’m a two-time college dropout waiting tables and living paycheck to paycheck, with just a little bit of extra cash to blow on booze or the occasional vinyl record. This was before the present day vinyl cash-grab where every semi-popular band is getting the RSD colored vinyl repress treatment. Suffice to say, Suede’s Dog Man Star released in 1994, not exactly the height of the vinyl era, was hard to find. So, when a copy (albeit a bit worse for the wear) popped up on eBay for a mere $70, I told myself that it was less than the $100+ it usually sold for, gritted my teeth, and bought it.

In summary, I spent about an entire shift’s worth of income on 57 minutes and 50 seconds worth of music played on two round sheets of grooved plastic. Okay, maybe it’s not a Friday or Saturday night worth of tips, but I have certainly walked home on a Tuesday night with less.

Why did I make such a poor financial decision, you might ask. Well, I was a poor 20-something with not a lot going on besides music; and Suede’s Dog Man Star, along with a handful of other albums, represented the pinnacle of music from the Britpop era. Britpop if the mid-90’s was bombastic, glamorous, and, unrestrained – the opposite of the sad, dark, grunge music happening at that time across the pond in the US. And Suede was the most glamorous of all – with an androgynous Brett Anderson strutting around in his tight pants and eyeliner, singing about platinum spires and plastic flowers.

I fucking loved it. I loved all things Britpop, but I especially loved Brett Anderson, and tight pants, and eye liner, and songs you could dance to – like really dance to not that weird indie-hipster-head-nod thing.

I may have eaten more ramen noodles, but I bought that record with no regrets.