Super Furry Animals frontman Gruff Rhys is to release a new memoir documenting his musical career over the last four decades. The upcoming book Resist Phony Encores!, due for publication in February 2021, will cover his varied work as a solo artist and hugely-influential band member with Super Furry Animals and electro-pop duo Neon Neon.
‘Most of what you want to read about Gruff Rhys is not going to be in this book’ Graham Erickson
Yes that right, this is an announcement that my new book
Resist Phony Encores!
Is being released via @hatandbeardbks / @AntenneBooks on February 21st, 2021 pic.twitter.com/FwZPrbZQQH
— Gruff Rhys (@gruffingtonpost) October 19, 2020
Announcing news of the upcoming book release on Twitter this week, the North Walian singer-songwriter promised fans “a selective memoir“, with the inclusion of graphics and photographs from long-time collaborator Mark James. The publishers, Antennae Books, have hailed a biography that will “appeal to students of linguistics, propaganda, and graphic design, and anyone interested in music and live performance.”
Rhys has been one of the most prolific figures on the indie, folk and electronic pop-rock scenes in recent years. The Gwynedd product’s burgeoning discography now contains six solo albums – most recently 2019’s Pang – nine studio albums with the Super Furry Animals; two LPs with Neon Neon; and a plethora of collaborations with an eclectic mix of acts including De La Soul, Simian Mobile Disco, Mogwai and Goldie Lookin’ Chain. He also composed the acclaimed soundtrack for the 2014 film Set Fire To The Stars, inspired by Dylan Thomas’ infamous reading tours in the United States.
Rhys contrasted the differing challenges of book and song-writing in an interview with Rolling Stone this week, saying “Maybe songs are more fun in that you can be really playful and not spend all day on it – more like solving a crossword puzzle – but then to write a good song you have to be really concise – which is really tricky. Whereas with a longer book you can mainline coffee from 9 am till and midnight and ramble on as long as you like – but then you have to proof read and verify facts and things like that which doesn’t really come into song writing. You can use incorrect spelling and really mangle and destroy language in songwriting in a way that seems completely acceptable.”
Resist Phony Encores! is not Rhys’ first foray into the literary world. His 2014 travelogue American Interior, a study of 18th Century Welsh explorer John Evans who traversed America’s Great Plains in search of a Welsh-speaking Native American tribe, was listed for The Wales Book of the Year, a Guardian First Book Award and The Gordon Burn Prize.
The multi-talented Rhys has also penned two musical plays – Praxis Makes Perfect and Candylion – with National Theatre Wales. He worked with the company again on his stunning 2018 song No Profit In Pain, which celebrated the 70th anniversary of the NHS. The melodic and poignantly political track, which Rhys has described as an “agit-synth power ballad” was re-released this year.
