Formed in their native Wales in the early 1990s, the Super Furry Animals were signed to Creation Records in 1995 by label head Alan McGee after seeing the band at the Camden Monarch club. He famously asked the band if they would sing more songs in English, only to be informed by the band that every song in their set that night had indeed been sung in English. Not the type of people to let their Welsh accents stand in their way, the band have since gone on to enjoy a distinguished career that can only turn their contemporaries green with envy - eight studio albums, critical acclaim and a fervent fanbase. They've recorded with Sir Paul McCartney after a chance meeting in the bathroom of an awards ceremony, toured in 5.1 surround sound, been recognized in the Welsh parliament for their contributions to Welsh culture, turned a new generation onto Howard Marks and Bill Hicks, and released a single that sampled Steely Dan and said the word "Fuck" over 50 times. Tuesday saw the U.S. release of their latest effort, Hey Venus!, and the band started a month long U.S. tour Wednesday in Hoboken. They will take the stage at the 9:30 Club on Sunday with the Fiery Furnaces and Holy Fuck. We spoke to bass player and footie fan extraordinaire Guto Pryce about the tour, Lee Perry and the shocking revelation that major labels aren't evil.

So are you still recovering from your New Year's show?

Yeah, kinda. It's that weird time of year, that lull where nothing really happens, right?

Over here we call that lull "The NFL Playoffs." Is it football season over there right now?

Oh yeah. It's raining, it's full-on football season right now.

Have you been to any games lately?

No, I've missed loads because we've been on tour, but I've got one tomorrow.

I wanted to start off by talking about the new record, Hey Venus! Would you be offended if I called it "a return to form?"

No, I'm not offended. People say so many different things to us now, like what you've just said or people will say it's not as experimental as our other records. So I'm not sure what our form is really.

Love Kraft was a bit of a departure for the band because everyone contributed to the songwriting. But this record reminds me of the unbridled energy of your first two records, Fuzzy Logic and Radiator.

One thing about this record is the songs were chosen because they were pretty direct and they were quite poppy and short. We knew what we wanted to do before we went into the studio. We had played the songs loads and just wanted to record them live. In the past we've sort of kept things open and had the luxury of time to pontificate and experiment and do vast soundscapes. But this time we had three weeks and we wanted to finish an album in three weeks.

You recorded this record in a French chateau, right?

Yes.

That's very Rolling Stones of you.

[laughs] It's very Pink Floyd actually. But yeah, it was in a vineyard so we were surrounded by grape vines.

So the record is heavy on the vino then?

We definitely had very fine wine every day. And we were lucky enough to be around when the harvest was going on as well. So we got involved involved with the pressing and the tasting of the first wines, which is a very big deal in France. They don't give a shit about rock bands. All they care about is wine over there.

There's a pronounced Phil Spector / Motown vibe running through this album. Where did that come from?

Definitely. On "Run Away" that was exactly what we were after, a fuzzy Phil Spector type thing. A dirty, grimy '60s pop song.

(Lead singer) Gruff Rhys keeps referencing Turkish pop in all the interviews I read...

Yeah, that's one of the many things, along with '70s prog and pop. Some of it is quite awful and some of it is mental, really distorted and loud. And we got a Saz, a Turkish string instrument, so we used a lot of that and a lot of dulcimer. Very Eastern European.

How did you guys decide on Dave Newfield to handle production duties?

I think we just heard that Broken Social Scene record and liked the vibe that he got on that. We said before that we wanted to record the album quite live, and we wanted someone who could just capture the songs without cleaning it up too much. We wanted it gritty but not sounding lo-fi.

Like very immediate...

Yeah. Yeah. I thought the songs were immediate and they just needed to be played and recorded well. Dave used to be a wedding DJ, so he has this vast knowledge of what makes people dance. Kind of in the classic sense, not an underground DJ. He'll get a wedding moving. During the takes the quest was to get Dave to strut his stuff.

How many songs did you end up recording for this record?

I think we started with 16 and 11 made it to the record, so after a while we sort of concentrated on the songs that actually made the album. We try not to do too many b-sides now. We've learned that you get too attached to 20 songs and you end up with a really long album, so songs end up as b-sides. I mean, b-sides are great, but not everybody hears b-sides.

The band hasn't recorded any songs in Welsh in quite a while. Is there a specific reason for that?

Gruff has been putting his Welsh songs on his albums and that has sort of cleared up the backlog of Welsh songs. Every time we come 'round to doing an album -- we want to do an instrumental album as well -- it comes round every two years and we end up making another rock album for the world. I think we will do another Welsh album soon. It's about time we did. It's coming up on the 10th anniversary of MWNG.

This is your first record for Rough Trade. Were you happy to be free of Sony?

It wasn't really case of being happy to be free of Sony. They were good to us. They let us do a whole lot of expensive things, like the DVDs, which we couldn't have done on an indie label. Basically all of our labels have just let us get on and do whatever the fuck we want, which is what we like. And Sony was the same, so we've got no complaints there. It's just that Sony changed hands and the guy that signed us got promoted and moved to New York, so the guy that signed us wasn't at the label any more. It seemed very easy to switch labels. And Rough Trade wanted to sign us. We'll go where we're wanted.

I was in Seattle not too long ago and I picked up a copy of Furry Selection, the reggae and dub compilation that you put together for Trojan. How did that whole thing come about?

I did one of those iTunes playlists that they get bands to do and there were a load of reggae songs that I put on there. They just approached me. I think the guy in Radiohead did one, it's part of a series. For me, it was a total pleasure. They sent me a whole load of music and I went through it, but in the end I just chose songs that I've listened to for years, songs that I know and really like.

I really like the Lee Perry song on here.

Yeah, he's been a big influence on the band.

Have you ever approached him about working together?

No, I'd be a bit scared really. I'd love to meet him but I don't know about working with him. We've got out own ideas, and the stuff I listen to by him he made years ago, so he might not even be in the same place now. We just take what we want influence-wise from his records. It'd be interesting though. Definitely. He's mental isn't he?

Yeah, I read an interview he did recently where he was talking about trying to record the sounds that trees make. Not the wind through the leaves, the tree.

Yeah. Bunf's [guitarist Huw "Bunf" Bunford] really into that at the moment, actually. He does a lot of field recordings. He takes the tape recorder with him everywhere. He's got a lot of airports and ambient noise.

Switching topics, the band tours over here in the States fairly regularly, much more so than most of your peers. Why do you think you get such a good response in the States?

I dunno. People keep asking us to come back. And we have great shows in America. It's always worthwhile going over there. We do much better in America than we do in France for example.

That's strange considering how many times you jumped labels over here.

America seems to respond to a band touring. You can actually see a difference when you go to a town for the first time. It feels organic to go there a second time and your profile's grown and more people have come to see you and the word's spread. Where in Britain especially, we're a small country and all the media is in London, so it's real easy to hype a band and everyone hears about it instantly. In America, you've got to go everywhere for people to hear you. You can't just go to New York and L.A. and expect everyone in the middle of country to hear about you.

A few tours ago you guys dressed up as Yetis, last tour you dressed in glow in the dark space suits. What's on tap for this tour?

This time we've had some suits made inspired by the Flying Burrito Brothers but using Keiichi Tanaami, who is the artist that did the Hey Venus! stuff, using his work as the embroidery as opposed to western or Mexican vibe. We're more suited and booted on this tour.

Awesome. One last thing I wanted to ask you about, because you're the biggest football fan I know, what do you think about David Beckham coming over to MLS?

Who?

Oh, come on.

I dunno. The guy's Sylvester Stallone or some Hollywood dude. He's not much of a footballer. I'd rather talk about real workhorses like Carl Robinson who's just joined Toronto, and these old, solid professional footballers that can't get work over here. Like how ice hockey players come over here when they're not good enough for North America.

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The Super Furry Animals play the 9:30 Club on Sunday, with support from Holy Fuck and the Fiery Furnaces. Tickets are $17.

Photo via superfurry.org.