Animals

The Welsh stars bring their fuzzy logic spectacular to the South Bank

The second time we saw Super Furry Animals was on their 'Rings Around The World' tour in 2001. They had complicated visuals, mostly taken from the album's accompanying DVD but screened in perfect time with the music, and a quadrophonic sound system all the better to transmit their electro wigouts. It was also at a large venue, resulting in an overwhelmingly loud and grand psychedelic AV feast. Seeing them last night at End Of The Road couldn't really have been much more different.

The band also sing 'Happy Birthday' in Welsh to guitarist Bunf

Brand new Bristol festival also features Dead Meadow

Welsh stargazers chalk up eighth wonder

A few interesting posts turned up on the blogs these past few days. The Super Furry Animals love continues, and Harri writes, "On first listen it sounded good, but maybe little bland by SFA's lofty standards; by the 4th or 5th listen I realised how much depth it actually has. Another SFA classic then, in my opinion - here's hoping one of the two on the way is the long lost techno record!"

No more quotes from Yeats landed in the comments box today, sadly, but there is a pretty interesting discussion about Super Furry Animals over by the "Hey Venus" blog.

Just having a look through your recent comments while i wait for the troops to make it back from Glastonbury and Knowsley Hall. Thanks, as ever, for your comments; even Madison, who appears to have spammed the recent Richard And Linda Thompsonthread with a hunk of WB Yeats. Cheers for that.

Super Furry Animals's just finished a brilliant set, and the sun looks like it's back for a while, woo hoo. "Juxtapose With You" was simply amazing - lots of silly dancing and flag waving from the audience. I even spot a sun-caught Howard Marks singing along to the poptastic moment in the sun.

I know this is going to sound a bit churlish, but is it wrong to expect a very good band to really extend themselves? I ask because, for the past week or so, I've been playing the new Super Furry Animals album most days. It's lovely, without a doubt. But for some reason, it leaves me fractionally disappointed - as if them coming up with another 11 fine songs is somehow not quite good enough.