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Mar 04, 2022 By Mark Redfern

Beloved Welsh band Super Furry Animals once had another lead singer, Rhys Ifans, who would go on to become a famous actor starring in such films as Notting Hill, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1, The Amazing Spider-Man, and last year’s biggest movie, Spider-Man: No Way Home. Now the band have shared their first ever recorded song, the previously unreleased “Of No Fixed Identity,” which features Ifans on lead vocals. The song is only available on Bandcamp and only for one week. Some proceeds will benefit the Save the Severn campaign. Listen to the song below.

“Of No Fixed Identity” was recorded in 1993, three years before the band’s debut album, Fuzzy Logic, was released in 1996, and two years before their debut EP, 1995’s Llanfair… (in Space). Gruff Rhys, already a founding member of the band, took over on lead vocals before any Super Furry Animals music was released, so Ifans is mainly a footnote in the band’s early history. His acting career took off in the mid- to late-’90s.

“Of No Fixed Identity” was never reworked or released by the band in any form, but the sessions at Gorwel Owen’s studio on Ynys Môn in summer 1993 did produce an early version of their 1996 single “The Man Don’t Give A F*ck.”

The band had this to say about “Of No Fixed Identity” in a press release: “Our first, ever recorded work is out, in part an exploration of the past and in part a criticism of the present and a future where corporate interests are prioritized ahead of health, wellbeing and the natural world. Please download the track, support the cause and rediscover the considerable singing talents of Mr. Rhys Ifans.”

The Save the Severn campaign aims to “halt the reckless dumping of sediment from the site of discharges from a nuclear power station into a Marine Protected Area. A percentage of the proceeds will go towards funding the campaign group’s judicial review hearing versus the Marine Management Organisation and energy giants EDF.”

The press release adds: “The action to dredge and dump half-a-million tons of sediment from the nuclear site near to Bristol is reckless, treating fishing and ecological interests with contempt. The group points to the controversial and heavily challenged prequel dumping near Cardiff in 2018, following which an increase in radioactive material has been detected along the coast and not only near the Welsh capital.”

Donate directly to the campaign here.

Last year Super Furry Animals put out a 20th anniversary reissue of their acclaimed 2001 album Rings Around the World and shared one of its bonus tracks, the raw audio of Paul McCartney chewing celery and carrots. McCartney was asked to the contribute to the album’s “Receptacle For the Respectable” and in reference to when he “played” celery on The Beach Boys’ 1967 song “Vegetables” he sent them a track of him chewing celery and carrots, which was then worked into the song. Read our review of the reissue here.

Super Furry Animals’ line-up features Huw Bunford, Cian Ciarán, Daf Ieuan, Guto Pryce, and Gruff Rhys.

Rhys has had a prolific solo career in the last decade or so and released a new solo album, Seeking New Gods, last year via Rough Trade.

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