• News

• All

Oct 19, 2020 By Christopher Roberts Photography by Mark James Gruff Rhys

Gruff Rhys, Welsh frontman of Super Furry Animals, has announced a new book, the amusingly titled Resist Phony Encores!, which a press release describes as a “selective memoir.” For the book Rhys has worked with designer and long-term collaborator Mark James, who provides Xeroxed graphics and doctored photos. The book includes anecdotes from his life and also features Rhys’ cue cards that he has used in live performances for 15 years now. Rhys did a performance version of Resist Phony Encores! as a “one-man slide show” at the Edinburgh Festival in 2018. Resist Phony Encores! is due out February 21 via Hat & Beard Press. Below is the book’s cover art.

Speaking of the cue cards, Rhys had this to say in a press release: “Suddenly there was little pressure for me to communicate with the audience, when all I was interested in was writing and singing songs. Which was just as well as I had very little in the way of social skills and couldn’t speak very clearly or look an audience in the eye, and I wasn’t interested in people having a good time.”

In 2014 Rhys released the book American Interior, which accompanied the album of the same name (there was also a film and mobile app). This past August, on Record Store Day, Rhys put out a new solo album of sorts, (Don’t) Welcome the Plague as a Blessing / The Babelsberg Basement Files, which was a companion piece to his 2018 album, Babelsberg, which was recorded with the 72-piece BBC National Orchestra of Wales. The new take featured the original versions of the songs, sans orchestra. The album was previewed via a video for the new album’s version of “Negative Vibes.” Rhys released another solo album, Pang!, in 2019 via Rough Trade.

Read our 16th Annual Artist Survey interview with Gruff Rhys.

Read our 2015 interview with Gruff Rhys about American Interior.

Support Under the Radar on Patreon.