Rise of The Super Furry Animals. Ric Rawlins
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The Friday Project
An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers
1 London Bridge Street
London SE1 9GF
Published by The Friday Project 2015
Copyright © Ric Rawlins
Ric Rawlins asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
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Source ISBN: 9780008105235
Ebook Edition © 2015 ISBN: 9780008113377
Version: 2015-01-16
To Marianne and Acorn
CONTENTS
Copyright
Dedication
Author’s Note
Dramatis Personae
Prologue
Chapter One: Mountain lessons / Hot Puke / The pirates of Bethesda / Citizens band
Chapter Two: Festival time / The wildest man in North Wales / Heavy metal hoax / Ffa Coffi Pawb
Chapter Three: Ankst Records / Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci / Why aren’t we making techno? / The long walk home
Chapter Four: The teacher / Rock and squat / Cardiff in the sun / The rave
Chapter Five: SFA Soundsystem / The man don’t give a dub / Rhys says adios / Into space
Chapter Six: Birth of a ringtone / London turns on / Moog Droog / The wisdom of Robert Plant / Outlaw aircraft carrier
Chapter Seven: Tour of Cornwall / The number 23 / Fuzzy Birds / Outlaw hunting / Something out of Killing Joke
Chapter Eight: Fired from a cannon / Hanging with Howard Marks / Meet the press / Baz
Chapter Nine: Turning Japanese / F-16 Jetstreams / Cian-do attitude / Off the map
Chapter Ten: Painting demons / Bouncy castle licence / S4C on the attack / Overtaken by a wheel
Chapter Eleven: Rise of the Shinto gods / Air panic / Gringos in the mist / Unbridled freedom
Chapter Twelve: Deep sleep earthquake / Big trouble in Bogotá / Death to the monarchy
Chapter Thirteen: William Hague’s letter / Ice hockey hootenanny / Britpop turbulence / Electric harps
Chapter Fourteen: Taekwondo music / Love letter to El Niño / Das Koolies
Chapter Fifteen: Placid Casual, Acid Casuals / Bear in a vice / Gods and monsters
Chapter Sixteen: Kamikaze at Glastonbury / Bouncy ghetto blaster / Mash it up / Creation goes down
Chapter Seventeen: Recovered histories / The Roman road / Smoking goats / Pop strike / America
Chapter Eighteen: East coast negotiations / Lost in time
Chapter Nineteen: Intermission / Experiments with earthquakes / The Skull God / Furrymania / Yeti psychosis
Chapter Twenty: Wasteland Gods / Travels in a space buggy / Pizza trippin’
Epilogue
Footnotes
SFA Mixtape
Song Title Translations
Thankyous
About the Publisher
With the band’s consent – and hopefully not too much distress from anyone I’ve forgotten to ask – some of the sections in this book have been ‘cinematised’: that is to say, scripted up and CGI’d into narrative-friendly shape. That said, everything you’re about to read is based on the subjective truth of interviews taken during the research process. It’s also worth noting that, although this is a book in the English language, many of the conversations replicated here – particularly those spoken by the band – would have originally taken place in what Gruff describes as a ‘cracked youthful version’ of the Welsh language.
SUPER FURRY ANIMALS
Cian Ciaran
Dafydd Ieuan
Gruff Rhys
Guto Pryce
Huw Bunford
FFA COFFI PAWB
Gruff Rhys
Dafydd Ieuan
Rhodri Puw
Dewi Emlyn
WALES MOVERS AND SHAKERS
Gorwel Owen
Record producer
Rhys Mwyn
Founder, Anhrefn and Recordiau Anhrefn
Dafydd Rhys
Brother of Gruff Rhys, founder of Pesda Roc festival
Emyr Williams
Co-founder, Ankst Records
Rhys Ifans
Actor, fanzine writer, Super Furry Animal
LONDON MOVERS AND SHAKERS
Brian Cannon
Photographer, filmmaker and creator of imagery
Alan McGee
The boss, Creation Records
John Andrews
Marketing manager, Creation Records
Dick