England’s “Britpop” movement in the mid-1990s has proven to be one of the most enduring music trends of recent memory. Checking the local club listings will reveal all sorts of dance nights aligning themselves with “Cool Britannia,” Creation Records and the like. Not many of the bands from that time are still together and making music though. The two stewards of the movement, Blur and Oasis, continue to release records now and then, although the make up of each group has changed somewhat since their respective heyday. If you were asked to name the most prolific artists to come out of the UK during that time period, you’d probably be too busy trying to recall all of Damon Albarn‘s side projects to perhaps even think of Welsh prog-rockers the Super Furry Animals. But the band has released seven albums since 1996, three other compilations or remix albums, a slew of b-sides and a few E.P.’s for good measure. Gruff Rhys (pronounced Griff Reese), the man responsible for writing a majority of those songs, recently released his second solo album and took the time to answer some of DCist’s questions before a gig last week at the Rock and Roll Hotel.
Gruff, you’re touring behind your recently released solo record, Candylion, but before we get to that, I want to talk about your “other” musical venture, the Super Furry Animals. The band been together something like 14 years, right?
Yeah. We started doing demos and stuff in 1993.
OK. So if a band has been together that long, is it inevitable that someone from the band is going to do a solo project?
I think so. Sometimes you need to make some solitary work, you know? We’re all pretty busy doing bits and bobs. Because we’ve been together for a long time we’re really strong. We’ve never really stopped touring or recording.
Yeah, you guys are perpetually busy. This year is really no different seeing as how you have a solo record and a group record out now. Candylion has gotten some great reviews. It’s a bit different from your first solo record.
My first record took a week to record. It was really spontaneous. I didn’t really know I was making a record. I just went to Gorwell Owen’s house and made a bunch of recordings that ended up being a record. I left in a bunch of mistakes because I wasn’t consciously making a record. I didn’t know it until the final two or three songs that it would be a record. But with Candylion, I knew I was making a record, so I took an extra week to define it a bit more. Musically I wanted to base it all around my acoustic guitar. My plan was to make a really quick record of stripped down songs, but I ended up embellishing it quite a lot, putting drums on it. I kind of got excited while I was making it.
Photo by Kyle Gustafson
