{"id":67453,"date":"2025-10-09T09:11:06","date_gmt":"2025-10-09T09:11:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/67453\/"},"modified":"2025-10-09T09:11:06","modified_gmt":"2025-10-09T09:11:06","slug":"gruff-rhys-welsh-is-still-being-invented-as-a-pop-language-gruff-rhys","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/67453\/","title":{"rendered":"Gruff Rhys: \u2018Welsh is still being invented as a pop language\u2019 | Gruff Rhys"},"content":{"rendered":"

You can\u2019t swear properly in Welsh. I know this, because I\u2019m having a swearing lesson yn Gymraeg from 55-year-old Super Furry Animals<\/a> frontman, and solo artist, Gruff Rhys. Gruffudd Maredudd Bowen Rhys was born in Haverfordwest in west Wales, grew up in the Welsh-speaking town of Bethesda in north Wales, and has lived in Cardiff since the 90s. His first band, aged 16, were called Ffa Coffi Pawb. The translation is \u201cEverybody\u2019s coffee beans\u201d. But say it phonetically in Welsh and it sounds quite rude.<\/p>\n

\u201cSwearing in Welsh is a bit like swearing in Spanish, where you describe terrible things about someone\u2019s mother or something,\u201d Rhys explains. For example, in Spanish, \u201cla madre que te pari\u00f3\u201d translates as \u201cthe woman that birthed you\u201d which means, well, the MF word. \u201cYou can create offence for sure, but English is special, in that there\u2019s all these taboo swearwords,\u201d says Rhys. \u201cSo Welsh uses English swearwords because they are instantly offensive.\u201d<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve come to Cardiff to meet Rhys ahead of his new Welsh-language solo album, Dim Probs. This is the fourth time he\u2019s recorded an album entirely in his first language \u2013 one with Super Furry Animals (Mwng, still the biggest selling Welsh-language album of all time), and three of his nine solo albums.<\/p>\n

Show me magic \u2026 Gruff Rhys on stage with Super Furry Animals in 1999. Photograph: Peter Pakvis\/Redferns<\/p>\n

Rhys has been involved in Welsh-language music since before he could shave. There\u2019s a 2024 S4C documentary on iPlayer named after Ffa Coffi Pawb<\/a> that tells the story of the progressive DIY scene he grew up in, which rebelled against Thatcherism and the orthodoxy of much Welsh culture at the time (\u201cdrinking beer in a rugby shirt,\u201d as Rhys puts it in the doc), while celebrating the language itself. One early archive clip shows him, voice still unbroken, discussing the punk fanzine he had recently set up.<\/p>\n

\u201cI spoke Welsh with my friends and most of the subjects at school were taught in Welsh,\u201d Rhys recalls. He picked up his first English (\u201cWell, Anglo-American\u201d) word, \u201ccookie\u201d, from watching Sesame Street. \u201cThere\u2019s no wonder that I make music in the Welsh language,\u201d he continues. \u201cIt\u2019s stranger, really, that I\u2019ve put out so many albums in English \u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

Many of those albums came courtesy of Super Furry Animals. Formed in 1993, the band featured Rhys and Ffa Coffi Pawb drummer Dafydd Ieuan, along with Huw Bunford and Guto Pryce of Welsh-language punk band U Thant and \u2013 as unbelievable as it sounds \u2013 actor Rhys Ifans on lead vocals (he soon departed when his acting career took off). Later fronted by Rhys, the band were signed to Creation in 1996, where \u2013 legend has it \u2013 label boss Alan McGee asked if they could sing in English, not realising from Rhys\u2019s strong Welsh accent that he already was.<\/p>\n

The group soon built a reputation for musical experimentation and wild onstage presentation, including yeti costumes and inflatable bears, and for a period arriving at festivals in their own customised tank. They have been dormant since 2016 \u2013 their last single, Bing Bong, was released to celebrate the Welsh national football team\u2019s qualification for the 2016 Euros \u2013 but have just announced<\/a> 2026 tour dates.<\/p>\n

Rhys\u2019s career away from the Furries has been no less idiosyncratic. There has been Neon Neon<\/a>, his electropop duo with Boom Bip, guest appearances for Mogwai and Gorillaz, and a dizzyingly varied array of solo records, including an effort inspired by a mountain on the border of China and North Korea (Seeking New Gods) and a concept album about 18th-century Welsh explorer John Evans (American Interior<\/a>).<\/p>\n

What\u2019s it like writing in Welsh, I wonder? Do you quickly run out of things to rhyme with Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch? Or is it like Eminem, who has done a rap about how things <\/a>do<\/a> rhyme with orange<\/a>? \u201cIt\u2019s a playful language,\u201d he says, after laughing at my rubbish analogy. \u201cI think there\u2019s slightly fewer pop cliches in Welsh \u2013 it\u2019s still being invented as a pop language in comparison to English.\u201d<\/p>\n

Highly strung \u2026 Gruff Rhys. Photograph: Francesca Jones\/The Guardian<\/p>\n

We chat briefly about the decline of the spoken language: 50 years ago, Welsh was spoken by 80% of people in some communities; today it\u2019s only 30%, though there has been a resurgence in recent years. And, Rhys tells me, there\u2019s simultaneously been more activism for the Welsh language, in that it\u2019s become far more visible, thanks in large part to the 1993 Welsh Language Act that ensured that Welsh was put on an equal footing with English in Wales. Today \u201ceven the self-service checkout speaks Welsh\u201d, he smiles.<\/p>\n

We\u2019re chatting over cups of tea at St Catherine\u2019s Church Community Hall, Pontcanna, where local odd-job man Clive has been roped into letting us in for the morning. (\u201cYou found where the tea was?\u201d he interrupts, helpfully clearing away our dirty mugs.) Rhys\u2019s current tour, you see, includes a run at various village, church, town and civic halls. \u201cI was asked to find somewhere that looked like a rural Welsh venue,\u201d he adds, of today\u2019s photoshoot. \u201cI\u2019ve been to a child\u2019s birthday party and a wedding here, so I thought: it\u2019s gotta be St Catherine\u2019s.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rhys\u2019s tour is rational as well as romantic. \u201cIt\u2019s just practical, really, putting out a Welsh-language album, then touring it in areas where they speak the language,\u201d he continues. \u201cThere\u2019s some beautiful venues. There\u2019s a set of industrial circuits built up in the UK for pop music. Sometimes it\u2019s great to leave those pop markets and play where you really want to. I don\u2019t want to over-romanticise it. I\u2019ll just be playing in villages and towns, to maybe not enough people \u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

skip past newsletter promotion<\/a><\/p>\n

Sign up to Inside Saturday<\/p>\n

The only way to get a look behind the scenes of the Saturday magazine. Sign up to get the inside story from our top writers as well as all the must-read articles and columns, delivered to your inbox every weekend.<\/p>\n

Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain information about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. If you do not have an account, we will create a guest account for you on theguardian.com<\/a> to send you this newsletter. You can complete full registration at any time. For more information about how we use your data see our Privacy Policy<\/a>. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy<\/a> and Terms of Service<\/a> apply.<\/p>\n

Shiny happy people \u2026 Super Furry Animals. Photograph: Andy Willsher\/Redferns<\/p>\n

These gigs won\u2019t be his weirdest. He\u2019s just got back from playing Nestival<\/a>, a mini-festival in the forest in Stockport with Badly Drawn Boy, Andy Votel and Graham Massey from 808 State, where he inadvertently ended up announcing the winners of a \u201cguess the bird call competition\u201d. Does he know his chaffinches from his song thrushes? \u201cNo. I was terrible. I didn\u2019t have a clue.\u201d<\/p>\n

With Clive keen to shut up shop (\u201cAre you aware you\u2019re in the midst of a celebrity?\u201d I ask), Rhys offers to give me a lift back to the train station in his father-in-law\u2019s Jeep \u2013 his own faithful van of 20 years has unfortunately just blown up. On the way back to the car, Rhys is keen to show me around a local Welsh bookshop, where \u2013 for the first time \u2013 I hear him speak Welsh to the nice lady behind the counter. I\u2019d like to buy a card for my mum\u2019s Welsh friend, Glenda, who didn\u2019t speak English until she was 16. I opt for one that says \u201cTi ym fy ffefryni yn bendant\u201d. I hope it\u2019s appropriate.<\/p>\n

Back in the car, chat turns to other Welsh celebs. \u201cI love Charlotte Church. We\u2019ve done a few gigs with her. I think she did sing at one of my concerts. I really admire people who can articulate political ideas,\u201d he says, referencing her vocal opposition to austerity and Israel\u2019s war on Gaza. \u201cI\u2019m always there if she needs me \u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

Rhys talks about one of his most unlikely Welsh-language projects: 2117\/Hedd Wyn, the opera for which he wrote the libretto, about a group of post-apocalyptic Welsh schoolchildren learning about the life and work of the famous Welsh poet, who died at the battle of Passchendaele in the first world war. Hedd Wyn\u2019s is a story that \u201chas been told many times before, so I wanted to tell it differently. It was for a film that was abandoned, but we\u2019d already recorded the opera with the 90-piece orchestra. It came out on CD but it was never performed. There\u2019s talks of performing it, so I\u2019ve got that on the back burner.\u201d Would he like to release music in any other language? Rhys isn\u2019t sure. He\u2019s already done English, Welsh and \u2013 briefly on his 2019 album, Pang! \u2013 Zulu.<\/p>\n

Rhys drops me at Cardiff station. There\u2019s 20 minutes until my train, so just time to buy a stamp and post my card to Glenda. I Google Translate it: \u201cTi ym fy ffefryni yn bendant\u201d \u2013 \u201cYou are definitely one of my favourite people.\u201d Perfect. I should have sent it to Gruff Rhys<\/a> instead.<\/p>\n

Gruff Rhys\u2019s album Dim Probs is out now. He is touring<\/a> the UK throughout October, with US\/Canada dates in November and Europe next March; Super Furry Animals tour the UK in May 2026.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"You can\u2019t swear properly in Welsh. I know this, because I\u2019m having a swearing lesson yn Gymraeg from…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":67454,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[430,156,111,139,69],"class_list":["post-67453","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67453","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=67453"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67453\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/67454"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=67453"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=67453"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=67453"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}