Super Furry Amazing

There have been a couple stabs taken at the meaning behind the title of the new Super Furry Animals album, Love Kraft. Here are my suggestions:

- Possible, but quite unlikely: The misused "K" is a tribute to George Herriman and his classic comic strip, Krazy Kat.
- Possible, and much more likely: The misused "K," while not being a direct tribute to Herriman (or a conscious reference at all), embodies his spirit. Along with all of the phonetically altered song titles on the album ("Lazer Beam," "Atomik Lust," "Psyclone"), it represents the different perspective toward art and life taken by the Super Furry Animals. This is a perspective that produces music that is decidedly different from most other things, with lots of peripheral reference points but no real comparable precedent, and yet still comprehensible by those of us willing to put in a little extra time. In other words, the musical equivalent of Herriman's Krazy saying lines like, "I wunda if it's sinful to be a mizzil twarta -- ?"

That is to say, the title is a sign of assurance that the ways of the Super Furry Animals have not changed. What's changed is the tone. The SFA are entering the most dreaded of career stages for rock artists: "maturity." But just as they've done pretty much everything up until now differently, they do maturity differently as well. There's simply no room for such conventions as introspective ballads about parenthood and domesticity (although as we well know, if they do a relationship ballad, it's as likely to be about Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky as any personal experience). Instead, we get the swirling psychedelic majesty of "Zoom!" complete with a full choir and string and horn sections. It's easily the most grandiose tune in their considerable catalog, and the lyrics are oblique as ever:

"Saw the Virgin Mary,
She was crying blood,
Tears congregate
Into a mighty flood,
Gave her some directions to a specialist,
An eye doctor to help her cyst,
She took the wrong turn to the family planning"

This all may not sound too different from what they've done already, but as I mentioned earlier, the change is more subtle. It's a change in tone, or in attitude. These Super Furry Animals still want to thrill and entertain, but they demand to be taken seriously, and by and large, they deserve to be. There are no manic genre-smashing bursts of insanity here ("Lazer Beam" aside, and even that one is straight-faced by the time it ends), there are no songs that end in psychotic drum and bass techno freakouts, there are no songs that drop 100-odd F-bombs that inexplicably get released as singles, and there are no songs that the band will play while wearing bigfoot costumes or Power Ranger helmets onstage.

Some people may miss the old, fun loving, rocking Super Furry Animals, but I'll never begrudge any band the right to start taking themselves seriously (except maybe Blink 182, who I think should always have to dress and act exactly like they did when they were 14, since they made it to their 30s while doing so), especially when the results are as breathtaking and worthwhile as Love Kraft. For the first time in their career, the Super Furry Animals have created an album that stays consistant in its tone and attitude, and thus sounds like a unified statement instead of a defiant middle-finger to anybody who would dare to slap the name of a genre on them. Who knew they were capable of calming down and still staying unpredictable?

And what's really amazing about their unprecedented coherence is that it's come just as different members of the band are starting to take on writing and singing duties (which may or may not be due to usual front man Gruff Rhys taking time off to make a mediocre solo album late last year). It would seem that spending all that time around Rhys has rubbed off on the remaining Furries, as some of the highlights, such as "Cabin Fever" and "Back on a Roll," are penned by members other than Rhys (although the best of the bunch is still Rhys' stuff).

So as far as I'm concerned, Love Kraft takes everything that made the Super Furry Animals great to begin with, and added to it without detracting anything. And (hyperbole alert!) that just may make them the best band in the world right now.