Track listing
- 1.1 Slow Life
- 1.2 (Drawing) Rings Around the World
- 1.3 Bing Bong
- 1.4 Organ Yn Dy Geg
- 1.5 Run-Away
- 1.6 Northern Lites
- 1.7 Inaugural Trams
- 1.8 Demons
- 1.9 Ice Hockey Hair
- 1.10 Juxtapozed With U
- 1.11 The Gift That Keeps Giving
- 1.12 The International Language of Screaming
- 1.13 If You Don't Want Me to Destroy You
- 1.14 Fire in My Heart
- 1.15 Run! Christian, Run!
- 1.16 The Piccolo Snare
- 1.17 Zoom!
- 2.1 Night Vision
- 2.2 God! Show Me Magic
- 2.3 Hello Sunshine
- 2.4 Hermann ♥'s Pauline
- 2.5 Patience
- 2.6 Do or Die
- 2.7 Ysbeidiau Heulog
- 2.8 Show Your Hand
- 2.9 Something 4 the Weekend
- 2.10 Smokin'
- 2.11 The Citizen’s Band
- 2.12 It's Not the End of the World?
- 2.13 Play It Cool
- 2.14 Golden Retriever
- 2.15 Lazer Beam
- 2.16 Receptacle for the Respectable
- 2.17 Hometown Unicorn
- 2.18 Mt.
- 2.19 Mountain People
- 2.20 The Man Don't Give a Fuck
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3 Reviews
I almost nearly dropped a massively clanger when it came to Super Furry Animals. Releasing their first album around the time that a load of late in the day chancers were hitching their fortunes to the dangerously overloaded Britpop bandwagon, I considered the SFA to be just another band that Creation Records were throwing their Oasis-earnings at. Yeah, they were just another rank and file 90s guitar band.
Oh, and then there were their television appearances, where they always seemed either rabbits trapped in the headlights, or so out of it that they could barely function.
Nah, I'll give them a miss. They're obviously just another flavour of the month that will fade away just like the rest of them.
Except they didn't.
In fact, SFA continued to release a string of albums that critics frothed over. Even when Creation imploded, they were one of the few acts from that label who didn't just seem to survive, but thrive, to the point where 2001's Rings Around the World topped a whole bunch of album of the year lists, and not just in the music press, but the broadsheets too.
Then, part way through 2003, I was sat in a pub with my friend Anna, and we were talking about our mutual favourite subject - bands we were obsessed with. Turns out Nibbsy had never heard much by Pink Floyd. Something had to be done about that, so I suggested that we should meet up in exactly one weeks time, and I would lend her every Pink Floyd album in my collection. Delighted at this suggestion, Nibbsy insisted that she be allowed to do the same for me. We then spent the next twenty minutes going through her favourite acts for one I had not had really given an appropriate listen to, until Super Furry Animals came up. Such was Nibbsy's enthusiasm for the Welsh act, I allowed her to talk me into giving them a chance.
One week later I found myself heading home from the pub with Nibbsy's copies of Fuzzy Logic, Radiator, Guerrilla, Mwng, Rings Around the World, and the recently released Phantom Power. A little less than 24 hours later, I messaged Nibbsy to thank her for introducing me to my new favourite band, and how embarrassed I was that I had almost missed out on them entirely. Within a few weeks I had acquired my own copies of each SFA album to date.
Although each of the SFA's first half dozen albums has something to recommend them, I have to admit that for me Radiator, Rings Around the World and Phantom Power are the stand outs. Fuzzy Logic is great, but their debut is their one album that is sonically close to Britpop. "Guerrilla" was the one that left me scratching my head, as it came swathed in electronica sounds and studio trickery. At first I genuinely didn't get it, but slowly I started to realise how important Guerrilla was in the band's evolution and how much it informed what would come in the next few years. Mwng is SFA's Welsh language offering, a gorgeous album in its own right, but one on which the lyrical content will always remain an enigma. Lastly there is Out Spaced, a collection of B-sides and general oddments. It's fine, but such a release could have waited until a bit later in their career.
Of the three standouts though, Radiator is the one I to this day hold up as the band's masterpiece, the album that saw them launch like a rocket into the creative stratosphere. "Demons" was the tune I listened to four times in a row the first time I heard it before I sent Nibbsy the message that Super Furry Animals were my new favourite band. Radiator isn't just about "Demons" though, as the whole album is a guitar-pop masterpiece from beginning to end, taking in influences far wider than any act that played mere Britpop.
Rings Around the World and Phantom Power are almost two halves of a double album to me, both seeing this most multi-faceted of Welsh acts at the top of their game both creatively and commercially. If anything "Rings Around the World" has a slightly more progressive rock tinge to it, but both are glorious demonstrations that to push the creative envelope, you didn't have to be as awkward and contrary as Radiohead.
By 2005 Super Furry Animals were riding high, releasing the superb Songbook: The Singles Volume One, a best of compilation which filled in a few gaps for me, of particular note their amazing standalone single "Ice Hockey Hair". They were already one of my favourite acts, and all I had to do now was see them live.
Then came Love Kraft.
To this day, I'm still not sure what SFA intended to achieve with Love Kraft. At the timer a lot of acts I liked were releasing disappointing albums, but I felt truly crushed by Love Kraft, and it took me a long time to find any redeeming features in it. Even now, after the echoes of disappointment have long since subsided, and I have accepted that it's actually an okay SFA album, it's still the one I reach for the least often.
It seems it wasn't just me baffled by Love Kraft either. Their next two albums were released on a different labels, and while both were significant improvements, neither really saw the band reach the heights they once had, at least not with any sort of consistency.
Then things went quiet.
Part way through 2011, I met the woman I continue to share my life with to this day, and we were delighted to discover that we were both Super Furry Animals fans, with a mutual love of Gruff Rhys's gorgeous sing voice, and the fact that the whole band had such a beautifully unique sound. In 2016 we even went to see the band perform live on the fifth anniversary of us meeting for the first time. It was an amazing gig, and a world away from those television appearance performances that almost put me off them for life.
ZOOM! was released at the end of 2016, and to date it is the final release by the band outside of a bunch of archival releases. Inevitably, it duplicates Songbook: The Singles Volume One almost in its entirety, however it also mops up the SFA singles released after it, as well as a selection of tracks apparently chosen by the band members.
Over 37 tracks ZOOM! provides a glorious career overview, and something it does really well is reflect the dynamics of a live gig. In fact it does it so well, you have to wonder why more career retrospectives aren't sequenced this way. Even the bands final three, arguably slightly weaker, albums are well represented by the very best tracks from this period, with the only notable omission being "Baby Ate My Eightball" from Hey Venus!.
Sadly it does seem that following the release of ZOOM!, Super Furry Animals have called it a day, at least for now, with Rhys having established an impressive solo career to date, and the rest the band having explored their own side projects, before recently reforming sans-Rhys as Das Koolies.
If you are in the market for a Super Furry Animals compilation, the choices are dependent on what you are looking for. If you are looking for a collection of singles released at the height of their powers, then Songbook: The Singles Volume One is the way to go. If you're looking for a more rounded career retrospective, then it is ZOOM! you should opt for.
Oh, and then there were their television appearances, where they always seemed either rabbits trapped in the headlights, or so out of it that they could barely function.
Nah, I'll give them a miss. They're obviously just another flavour of the month that will fade away just like the rest of them.
Except they didn't.
In fact, SFA continued to release a string of albums that critics frothed over. Even when Creation imploded, they were one of the few acts from that label who didn't just seem to survive, but thrive, to the point where 2001's Rings Around the World topped a whole bunch of album of the year lists, and not just in the music press, but the broadsheets too.
Then, part way through 2003, I was sat in a pub with my friend Anna, and we were talking about our mutual favourite subject - bands we were obsessed with. Turns out Nibbsy had never heard much by Pink Floyd. Something had to be done about that, so I suggested that we should meet up in exactly one weeks time, and I would lend her every Pink Floyd album in my collection. Delighted at this suggestion, Nibbsy insisted that she be allowed to do the same for me. We then spent the next twenty minutes going through her favourite acts for one I had not had really given an appropriate listen to, until Super Furry Animals came up. Such was Nibbsy's enthusiasm for the Welsh act, I allowed her to talk me into giving them a chance.
One week later I found myself heading home from the pub with Nibbsy's copies of Fuzzy Logic, Radiator, Guerrilla, Mwng, Rings Around the World, and the recently released Phantom Power. A little less than 24 hours later, I messaged Nibbsy to thank her for introducing me to my new favourite band, and how embarrassed I was that I had almost missed out on them entirely. Within a few weeks I had acquired my own copies of each SFA album to date.
Although each of the SFA's first half dozen albums has something to recommend them, I have to admit that for me Radiator, Rings Around the World and Phantom Power are the stand outs. Fuzzy Logic is great, but their debut is their one album that is sonically close to Britpop. "Guerrilla" was the one that left me scratching my head, as it came swathed in electronica sounds and studio trickery. At first I genuinely didn't get it, but slowly I started to realise how important Guerrilla was in the band's evolution and how much it informed what would come in the next few years. Mwng is SFA's Welsh language offering, a gorgeous album in its own right, but one on which the lyrical content will always remain an enigma. Lastly there is Out Spaced, a collection of B-sides and general oddments. It's fine, but such a release could have waited until a bit later in their career.
Of the three standouts though, Radiator is the one I to this day hold up as the band's masterpiece, the album that saw them launch like a rocket into the creative stratosphere. "Demons" was the tune I listened to four times in a row the first time I heard it before I sent Nibbsy the message that Super Furry Animals were my new favourite band. Radiator isn't just about "Demons" though, as the whole album is a guitar-pop masterpiece from beginning to end, taking in influences far wider than any act that played mere Britpop.
Rings Around the World and Phantom Power are almost two halves of a double album to me, both seeing this most multi-faceted of Welsh acts at the top of their game both creatively and commercially. If anything "Rings Around the World" has a slightly more progressive rock tinge to it, but both are glorious demonstrations that to push the creative envelope, you didn't have to be as awkward and contrary as Radiohead.
By 2005 Super Furry Animals were riding high, releasing the superb Songbook: The Singles Volume One, a best of compilation which filled in a few gaps for me, of particular note their amazing standalone single "Ice Hockey Hair". They were already one of my favourite acts, and all I had to do now was see them live.
Then came Love Kraft.
To this day, I'm still not sure what SFA intended to achieve with Love Kraft. At the timer a lot of acts I liked were releasing disappointing albums, but I felt truly crushed by Love Kraft, and it took me a long time to find any redeeming features in it. Even now, after the echoes of disappointment have long since subsided, and I have accepted that it's actually an okay SFA album, it's still the one I reach for the least often.
It seems it wasn't just me baffled by Love Kraft either. Their next two albums were released on a different labels, and while both were significant improvements, neither really saw the band reach the heights they once had, at least not with any sort of consistency.
Then things went quiet.
Part way through 2011, I met the woman I continue to share my life with to this day, and we were delighted to discover that we were both Super Furry Animals fans, with a mutual love of Gruff Rhys's gorgeous sing voice, and the fact that the whole band had such a beautifully unique sound. In 2016 we even went to see the band perform live on the fifth anniversary of us meeting for the first time. It was an amazing gig, and a world away from those television appearance performances that almost put me off them for life.
ZOOM! was released at the end of 2016, and to date it is the final release by the band outside of a bunch of archival releases. Inevitably, it duplicates Songbook: The Singles Volume One almost in its entirety, however it also mops up the SFA singles released after it, as well as a selection of tracks apparently chosen by the band members.
Over 37 tracks ZOOM! provides a glorious career overview, and something it does really well is reflect the dynamics of a live gig. In fact it does it so well, you have to wonder why more career retrospectives aren't sequenced this way. Even the bands final three, arguably slightly weaker, albums are well represented by the very best tracks from this period, with the only notable omission being "Baby Ate My Eightball" from Hey Venus!.
Sadly it does seem that following the release of ZOOM!, Super Furry Animals have called it a day, at least for now, with Rhys having established an impressive solo career to date, and the rest the band having explored their own side projects, before recently reforming sans-Rhys as Das Koolies.
If you are in the market for a Super Furry Animals compilation, the choices are dependent on what you are looking for. If you are looking for a collection of singles released at the height of their powers, then Songbook: The Singles Volume One is the way to go. If you're looking for a more rounded career retrospective, then it is ZOOM! you should opt for.
Published
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Tremendous value if you are new to the band. Basically you get everything from the previous compilation 'songbook' (basically all the singles) plus some key album tracks from right across their catalogue up to their most recent work.... and a few rarities thrown in to complete the package.
At 37 tracks its probably going to be too much to digest for even the biggest fan,but it should hopefully send you off to digging out/buying some the albums, especially with the band now touring again.
That new track is pretty rotten though. Skip it. Concentrate on the fact that you have 20 years of being a brilliant band here.... Not many british acts have pulled that off. Scary how quickly the time goes.
I've met them and they are all lovely guys too.
At 37 tracks its probably going to be too much to digest for even the biggest fan,but it should hopefully send you off to digging out/buying some the albums, especially with the band now touring again.
That new track is pretty rotten though. Skip it. Concentrate on the fact that you have 20 years of being a brilliant band here.... Not many british acts have pulled that off. Scary how quickly the time goes.
I've met them and they are all lovely guys too.
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Catalog
30 Aug 2023
17 Aug 2022
21 Apr 2022
-
1.1
Slow Life
-
1.2
(Drawing) Rings Around the World
-
1.3
Bing Bong
-
1.4
Organ Yn Dy Geg
-
1.5
Run-Away
-
1.6
Northern Lites
-
1.7
Inaugural Trams
-
1.8
Demons
-
1.9
Ice Hockey Hair
-
1.10
Juxtapozed With U
-
1.11
The Gift That Keeps Giving
-
1.12
The International Language of Screaming
-
1.13
If You Don't Want Me to Destroy You
-
1.14
Fire in My Heart
-
1.15
Run! Christian, Run!
-
1.16
The Piccolo Snare
-
1.17
Zoom!
-
2.1
Night Vision
-
2.2
God! Show Me Magic
-
2.3
Hello Sunshine
-
2.4
Hermann ♥'s Pauline
-
2.5
Patience
-
2.6
Do or Die
-
2.7
Ysbeidiau Heulog
-
2.8
Show Your Hand
-
2.9
Something 4 the Weekend
-
2.10
Smokin'
-
2.11
The Citizen’s Band
-
2.12
It's Not the End of the World?
-
2.13
Play It Cool
-
2.14
Golden Retriever
-
2.15
Lazer Beam
-
2.16
Receptacle for the Respectable
-
2.17
Hometown Unicorn
-
2.18
Mt.
-
2.19
Mountain People
-
2.20
The Man Don't Give a Fuck
2 Jan 2022
28 Jun 2021
23 Jan 2021
4 Jan 2021
2 Dec 2020
6 Aug 2020
10 Jul 2020
6 Nov 2019
17 Aug 2019
6 Jul 2019
12 Mar 2019
19 Aug 2018