Dark Days/Light Years

Track-by-track review of the new Super Furry Animals album Dark Days/Light Years

Crazy Naked Girls – The title really says it all. Starting off with some random chatter, and turning into an electronic noise groove that’s half-sung, half-rapped like only Gruff can do. This then reveals (two minutes in) to some heavy-ass riff rock, with a bit of a glam punch to it.

Mt. - I don’t know if it’s Bunf or Cian (or Daf or Guto) Just checked Wikipedia, and it’s Cian on lead vocals. King of an acoustic glam stomper of a sort. Some nice strings at the end.

Moped Eyes – Originally called Hot Nutz this one is pretty laid-back, with a crooned chorus, and a nice groove.

Inaugural Trams - A nice poppy synth-based number, with a great sing along chorus. Nick McCarthy of Franz Ferdinand does a rap part way through. In German. Wild. It chugs along nicely (just like a tram, get it! Wait. Trams don’t chug. Never mind.)

Inconvenience – A song that wouldn’t sound too out of place on Fuzzy Logic – though definitely benefiting from the thirteen years of production experience between the two.

Cardiff In The Sun – The first epic of the album – clocking at 8 minutes. It builds slowly from a simple ticking drum machine, with additions of some guitar feedback, and a plucking bass (or bass synth, I think) ’til eventually the “Sha La La”s roll in, followed by a ghosted out singing of the title. It really just keeps building from there, and doesn’t reach it’s full power/volume/density until quite a few minutes in. It’s quite glorious, really.

Halfway through – I’ll finish this later.