Super Furry Animals |
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Mon. March 18.2002 6:16 PM EST |
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Super Furry Animals: Talking Rings Around the WorldWelsh band talks about veggie McCartney, sonic Sounds, and global phone pranks. by C. Bottomley |
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“One of the reasons you start a band is to have an adventure with your friends,” explains Super Furry Animals bassist Guto Pryce. The Welsh quintet has had a remarkable career, and Pryce enjoys the ride. “The more twists and turns it takes, the
The Animals' nine years together has been an awfully big adventure. While England sent us Britpop exports like Oasis and Blur, Super Furry Animals were a cult concern who slowly crossed into the mainstream ... in odd ways. Marijuana smuggler Howard Marks became a household name in Britain after he appeared on the cover of Fuzzy Logic, their irresistible 1996 debut. And Mwng, recorded for a mere $5000 after their record label Creation imploded in 2000, became the best-selling Welsh-language album ever. The new Rings Around the World also became a landmark last year, when it was the industry's first contemporary album to be simutaneously released on CD and DVD. Britain’s Mojo magazine dubbed it the best album of 2001 - and it could be the most exhilarating example of Furrymania to date. Rings swirls with garage rockers about extreme sports (“Sidewalk Serfer Girl”), sunny strum-alongs that turn into frenzied techno (“Receptacle for the Respectable”), and an ode to surviving roommates that sounds like the Love Boat theme (“Juxtapozed With U”). This last title was originally set to feature singer Gruff Rhys duetting with one-time New Jack kingpin Bobby Brown. “I don’t think [our request] letter ever reached him,” says Gruff in a Charmin-soft Welsh burr. “He’s got a great voice, and we wanted someone with the weight of experience to give some gravity to the song. I like ‘My Prerogative,’ and I suppose it was his prerogative to turn us down.” Instead, the band settled for guest appearances by John Cale and Paul McCartney. Sir Paul is heard munching carrots on “Receptacle,” and it's not the first time he's turned garden roughage into art: in 1967 he did the same thing on the Beach Boys’ classic “Vegetables.” “Our keyboardist Cian accosted him in the toilets at an award ceremony,” says Guto, “He offered Paul his services as a remixer. I didn’t know this before, but Paul McCartney also does ambient music. He made this piece using old Beatles outtakes and some new recordings he’d done on a street in Liverpool for an exhibition by Peter Blake, the artist who did the Sgt. Pepper cover. We mixed it for an album called Liverpool Sound Collage and figured he owed us one. Except we really didn’t know what we wanted him to do, so it came down to getting him to munch carrots and celery." Working with the Velvet Underground’s Cale was a different story. The band first met him during the filming of Beautiful Mistake, a 2000 documentary about the Swansea-born art rocker’s return to Wales. “It was like E.T.,” smiles Gruff. “A leather-trousered John Cale spends a couple of weeks in Cardiff playing with local talent. We supported him on one of his songs and he played piano on ‘Presidential Suite.’ We jammed with him. It was obvious that he’s the boss; he was always going, “This is the way it’s going to be.” I can see why Lou Reed and John Cale only lasted one album!” Mwng, released on their own Placid Casual label, cemented the Animals' place in Welsh musical history. Its success positioned them to sign with Epic in Britain that same year. With major label loot at their disposal, the band realized they could use the studio to try any idea they’d ever had. Hence the decision to bring out Rings as a DVD in order to enjoy the full effects of Surround Sound stereo. “You go to the cinema and you see some crap film like Apollo 13 and the sound is incredible,” says Gruff. “When we were growing up, we used to go and see dance groups like Tackhead and Orbital, and in those kind of clubs the music's never restricted to two speakers. It always surrounds the room. We never understood why people who play songs seem to care less about sonic quality than people who make dubby dance music.” “Then we realized that if it’s going to be on DVD, you’ve got the potential for visuals,” Guto said, “so that opened up a whole new thing.” The band got filmmakers to supply their own visions for each song. On “Receptacle for the Respectable,” illustrator Pete Fowler provides a mutant hybrid of 2001, South Park and Super Mario Brothers. Vintage clips of nuclear warhead tests accompany the fragile ballad “It’s Not the End of the World?” The Ministry of Truth, a Texas media cult led by the improbably named Armand Geddyn, lend their brand of gonzo fundamentalism to the slow-burning groove of “Run! Christian, Run!” It’s obvious that for the Super Furry Animals, there’s no such thing as a hare-brained scheme. On the space rocker “(Drawing) Rings Around the World” the group decided to emphasize their anti-cellphone crusade with a closing montage of prank calls. “It was a great idea,” muses Gruff. “We’d phone around the world and bring the world together in a phone call. In reality we just got a few irate people from distant countries pissed off that we were waking them up. We phoned the U.S. embassy in Moscow and Madagascar. The doorman in Madagascar was livid because it was four in the morning.” Why not call earlier? “They were cheaper calls for us to make,” says Guto, sensibly. “The idea was to get people to go ‘Hello’ in their mother tongue. But it just didn’t happen. The irony was nobody wanted to speak to us. So there’s your great communication theory all f*cked up. Cellphones haven’t helped anything.” So the band is bringing their cosmic gospel to the U.S. with a tour beginning April 18 in Minneapolis. Assuming they play to more Americans than a long-ago gig in Bellingham, Washington (“There was about one moose and six people,” says Gruff), is there anything left for SFA to achieve? They’ve had prizes thrown at them, worked with most of their heroes, and continue to fight the great war against American indifference … “I’m sure there are a few more labels for us to be on!” says Gruff. “And we still need to build a theme park.” It’s sure to be a great adventure. |
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