Cardiff, UK · psych-pop · Welsh rock

Super Furry Animals

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Wales's beloved psych-pop pranksters, reunited — techno tanks and golden melodies, national-treasure status long confirmed, Welsh weirdness in full bloom.

Super Furry Animals formed in Cardiff in 1993, its members drawn from earlier Welsh bands: Gruff Rhys and Dafydd Ieuan had played together in Ffa Coffi Pawb, while Huw Bunford and Guto Pryce came from U Thant. Actor Rhys Ifans was the group's original lead singer before his acting career pulled him away and Rhys took over vocals.

The band's name came from T-shirts Rhys's sister printed for a fashion and music collective, a connection they kept nodding to on record and through their own label. Their earliest releases were Welsh-language EPs, including one whose title, a long Welsh place name, is listed in the Guinness Book of Records as the longest ever given to an EP.

Their reputation rests as much on melody as on mischief: songs like 'Something 4 The Weekend', 'Northern Lites' and 'Juxtapozed With U' sit alongside a long history of unusual live presentation, including the techno-blaring tank they bought and toured in the 1990s. The catalogue moved from scrappy guitar pop into orchestral psychedelia and studio-heavy electronica, often recorded in both English and Welsh, with the album Mwng sung entirely in Welsh.

Across nine studio albums that all reached the UK Top 25, the band became central to the Cool Cymru era of Welsh music alongside acts like Manic Street Preachers and Catatonia, and they hold the record for the most UK Top 40 hits without ever cracking the Top 10.

The group went on hiatus at the end of the 2000s before reuniting for further live shows.

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psych-popWelsh rock