Concert ticket and programme flyer for "Suicide: A Punk Mass" at Barbican Hall, London, 9 July 2015, part of the Station to Station happening, featuring a black and white photo of Alan Vega and Martin Rev.

The Last Time Suicide Ever Played

August 14, 2026 Alejandro De Luna

I've been listening to Suicide quite a lot again recently. The New York City synth menace from the early seventies. Everyone should own a copy of their first LP.

Alan Vega died ten years ago, on the 16th of July, 2016. While going through boxes of old papers and tickets, I found mine, a ticket to what surprisingly, and sadly, turned out to be Suicide's last ever show. Then I had to dig deep and find those crappy photos from my Xperia phone, or whatever I had that year.

The Ace Hotel, July 7, 2015

It happened at the Barbican in London, during Doug Aitken's Station to Station happening, in a show billed as "Suicide: A Punk Mass," on the 9th of July, 2015.

Two days earlier, on the 7th, there was a small and low-key event with Henry Rollins, a conversation with Martin Rev and Alan Vega at the Ace Hotel in Shoreditch. Harry Sword from The Quietus moderated. Alan's wife, Liz Lamere, was there too, helping him with the mic when he needed it. Bobby Gillespie was there, meeting his heroes, two days before he'd end up on stage with them.

Henry Rollins, Martin Rev, and Alan Vega seated on a small stage during an intimate conversation at the Ace Hotel London, July 2015, with folding chairs and low round tables in a close, dimly lit room.

Group photo from the Ace Hotel talk showing Henry Rollins, Martin Rev, Alan Vega, and other attendees seated together on stage after the conversation.

It was a small, close room, folding chairs and low round tables, nothing like the scale of the show that came two days later. Vega sat in a striped beanie and sunglasses, a cane resting against his knee. Rev sat beside him, more talkative, filling in the gaps when Vega's thoughts trailed off. Rollins leaned in between them, laughing, clearly at ease with two people he'd known for decades, he'd put out Vega's solo records on his own label back in the '90s. These are some of Henry's heroes, as he mentioned many times through the night and later on at the Barbican.

Henry Rollins with his arm around the author, smiling, at the Ace Hotel London, with Martin Rev visible seated in the background wearing sunglasses

I wish I could find the recording of that conversation. I know I have it somewhere.

The Barbican, July 9, 2015

At the Barbican two days later, that fragility carried onto the stage. It was already painful to see Alan that night. But as the title of the show suggested, "A Punk Mass," people came to pay their respects to the New York City outlaws.

Wide view of the Barbican stage during Suicide's "A Punk Mass" performance, showing a large lighting rig, modular synthesizer racks, and a projection screen behind the performers.

Most of the night belonged to Rev, working the synths in a cap pulled low, barely stopping between songs. Rollins came out for "Ghost Rider," standing next to Vega, half performing with him and half just being there for him. Later, Bobby Gillespie and Jehnny Beth joined for "Dream Baby Dream." Both moments read less like guest spots and more like people showing up to help carry a friend through a song.

Alan Vega and Martin Rev performing together on the Barbican stage, Rev at the keyboard in the foreground and Vega standing at a microphone nearby, lit in red stage light.

Martin Rev performing at a keyboard on the Barbican stage, wearing a cap, silhouetted against a brightly lit projection screen.

Setlist (partial, via setlist.fm):

Cheree
Saturn Drive
Surrender
Wooly Bully (Sam the Sham & the Pharaohs cover)
Frankie Teardrop
Ghost Rider (with Henry Rollins)
Dream Baby Dream (with Bobby Gillespie and Jehnny Beth)

Ten years on

Alan Vega died a year later, in July 2016, at 78. No full Suicide show is on record after that night at the Barbican, only Martin Rev appearing solo later that year. As far as anyone has documented, that was the last time the two of them stood on a stage together as Suicide.

I didn't understand the weight of it at the time. I've been listening to Suicide since NYC music first got its hooks in me. I just knew I'd seen something special, a hugely influential band that had been dangerous throughout the seventies, being carried, gently, by the people who loved their noise, right up to the end.