Gruff Rhys Interview: Bearer of Bad News
BY JORDAN MAINZER
Super Furry Animals frontman Gruff Rhys has not gotten serious on us, but he’s certainly talking about some heavy stuff. The music of a band that perfected a sort of melancholic psychedelic whimsy--sometimes in English, sometimes in Welsh--is decidedly different from Rhys’ solo work, especially his latest effort Babelsberg. The record was inspired by--what else--Trump, Brexit, and the rise of fascism. It was made in three days with drummer Kliph Scurlock, bassist Stephen Black, pianist Osian Gwynedd, and supermodel/actress Lily Cole but sat for 18 months before Stephen McNeff and the National Orchestra of Wales added arrangements. That its political analyses seem more relevant now than when the album was recorded is a sad simalcrum of the times.
So it seems fitting that Rhys has just started touring the record in Brett Kavanaugh’s USA with Scurlock, Black, and Gwynedd in tow, including a stop at the 1st Ward at Chop Shop here in Chicago. The themes will certainly translate. When I asked Rhys over the phone earlier this year whether he was worried the album, frozen as history went by, wouldn’t age well, he admitted he did. “Obviously, I’d prefer that [aging well] hadn’t been the case,” he said selflessly, an irrelevant product meaning something good happened for the world.
Still, even the lines that sound the most politically biting don’t necessarily have to do with the state of the world. When I asked Rhys about the line on “The Club”, “Threw me out the club I built with my own two hands,” he doesn’t cite oppression of the poor or racial minorities. “It’s about being left out from friends,” he said. “There’s no specific story.” And the cover art is probably the truest representation of the album’s tone, richly detailed, black-and-white, eerie. “It fit the bleakness of the record,” Rhys said. Babelsberg’s bleakness comes from its fatalism. The humorous album closer, “Selfies in the Sunset”, is about people taking selfies when the world ends. But according to Rhys, the selfies--capturing a happy moment--aren’t the target of rancor. He’s simply acknowledging Armageddon. He’s the bearer of bad news.
The true challenge in bringing Babelsberg to a small stage is translating the sound of the record. “It’s a four-piece band versus a 79-piece band. Unfortunately, we can’t bring [the Orchestra] to Chicago,” Rhys said. Nonetheless, the four should do a fine job next Sunday channeling the sweeping lushness of the record into sweet sounding anger.
Gruff Rhys North American tour dates:
Oct 9th – Brooklyn, NY – Rough Trade Oct 10th – Philadelphia, PA – Johnny Brenda’s Oct 11th – Washington, DC – DC9 Oct 12th – Pittsburgh, PA – Funhouse @ Mr. Smalls Oct 13th – Columbus, OH – Ace Of Cups Oct 14th – Chicago, IL – 1st Ward at Chop Shop Oct 16th – Minneapolis, MN – Cedar Cultural Center Oct 19th – Vancouver, BC – The Fox Cabaret Oct 20th – Seattle, WA – Barboza Oct 21st – Portland, OR – Doug Fir Oct 23rd – San Francisco, CA – The Chapel Oct 24th – Los Angeles, CA – The Echo