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Following is an archive of news collected until August 2006, when oneeyedbear.com went off line. See Myspace/oneeyedbear for news from then until now. We're working now on bringing an RSS feed from the MySpace blog to here.

18-20 August : Gruff Rhys ~ Green Man Festival
Q Magazine tips Gruff Rhys playing solo at the Green Man Festival in the Brecon Mountains. Ticket sales and announcements start on 3 March.

Update: Now confirmed at a new venue, Glanusk Park Estate in the Brecon Beacons National Park, the festival will run over the third weekend ~ 18th, 19th and 20th of August. Tickets on sale 3 March. Euros Childs of Gorky's Zygotic Mynci will also perform, plus James Yorkston, Bert Jansch, organizers It's Jo and Danny, and many more. It sounds so lovely! Your webmaster wishes to much she could go. Update:Their website is overwhelmed by ticket orders ~ try Ticketline UK: 08700 667799.
Update: The festival is sold out now, but they are still looking for bartending staff. ~ thanks to Morph, James Moore

1 September : SFA ~ Festival Fra, Alaquas, Spain
Super Furry Animals play the Festival Fra in Alaquas, Spain on 1 September. The festival website has launched and should not be missed ~ lovely graphics.

2 September ~ SFA ~ Electric Picnic, Ireland
SFA will play the Electric Picnic festival, at Stradbally Estate, County Laois, Ireland (about an hour from Dublin), on the weekend of 1-3 September. SFA play on Saturday, 2 September. Tickets are 175 euros plus fees, which includes three days plus camping, from Ticketmaster Ireland and 0818 719300. There are no day tickets available. Update: The festival sold out in early July.

Update: According to the festival website, there will be an SFA Acoustic Bingo set, as seen back in Furrymania. ~ thanks to Jems

What's to Come
Gruff Rhys will be releasing second solo album this autumn. We've heard he's working with producer Mario Caldato Jr.. SFA have an album ready to record, probably to be released around the beginning of 2007. The much-anticipated album from The Peth [My Space] should be revealing itself sometime soon. Chris Shaw (SFA, Bob Dylan, Nada Surf, Ween) is working some engineering magic, we hear. We've got a new page brewing on Recordings : The Peth. See the Acid Casuals newsletter for all their projects ~ music, fashion, art and cafe. They have some unreleased tracks up there ~ thanks to Moocher, Peth people, eavesdroppers everywhere

On The Side
Tracks featuring SFA members are on two new compilations. As detailed by Beat Factor, Gruff Rhys' collaboration with Boom Bip, Do's and Don'ts features on a DualDisc CD/DVD. "The Other Side, a joint venture between Time Out and Resist Music is an interactive guide to the bleeding edge of the world's great cities. Utilizing the Dual-Disc format, each edition of The Other Side is comprised of two key elements: a mixed CD compiled by a native audio pioneer and a DVD guide to the "other side" of the city ~ a visual handbook for both the frequent flyer and the armchair traveller." The London edition was compiled by DJ Damian Lazarus.

The Acid Casuals track Bowl Me Over makes an unlikely appearance on Folk Off, a double CD from label Sunday Best focusing on modern folk music. ~13 July

From Formoz Festival, Taiwan
~ thanks to Les, Squirms, Muzicbee, Volcanic

Ice Hockey Hair

Receptacle for the Respectible

Fuji Rock
Read a report from Fuji Rock Festival in Japan on Fuji Rockers. Gruff and Cian also joined Mogwai for Dial: Revenge. ~ thanks to Hiromi

Cerys Matthews with Gruff Rhys
Cerys Matthews, formerly of Catatonia, is releasing her second solo album Never Said Goodbye on Rough Trade UK on 21 August. The album features two songs written with Gruff Rhys, Elen and Morning Sunshine (which you download for free from www.7digital.com/cerys). Cerys has moved back to Wales from Nashville, Tennesee, and is touring the UK (but we hope she'll come back to the States to tour). See cerysmatthews.co.uk and myspace.com/cerysmatthewsofficial for details.

Some quotes from the album notes and interviews with Cerys about the songs written with Gruff:
Elen:
"'It's a song inspired by a lady who had a piano in a parlor that became a hangout for people in a small village in north Wales," Matthews said. "We turned it into a song about yearning for a sort of home, as in a place near the fire. As soon as the sun goes down, you can turn your horse's head for home and follow the direction the horseshoes are lining up in the path in front of you. 'Give us a song, Elen. Weve been working long and hard.'"

Guardian:
Of the song Elen,
"It's a song inspired by a lady who had a piano in a parlor that became a hangout for people in a small village in north Wales. "We turned it into a song about yearning for a sort of home, as in a place near the fire. As soon as the sun goes down, you can turn your horse's head for home and follow the direction the horseshoes are lining up in the path in front of you. 'Give us a song, Elen. Weve been working long and hard.'"

The Herald:
The new album Never Said Goodbye closes with a tender and haunting duet with the Super Furry Animals singer and songwriter Gruff Rhys, and Cerys gives the impression that despite her impressive array of past vocal sparring partners, this was the duet she savoured the most. "I've been a fan and friends with Super Furry Animals since I was 17, watching each other's bands grow and supporting one another while watching each other develop. "It was a pure pleasure to have him come over to Nashville to work with me because I believe he is one of the most talented and consistent writers of the past 10 years. "He harks back to the old Celtic poets, and that song is like a paen to the medieval knights being called in. One of the lines is about following the direction of horseshoes to find a way back home."

Daily Post:
"One of the songs, Elen, she describes as "like an opium trip back home", adding: "It makes the album around. It starts off in this song about New York, goes south, and then there's this trip back down memory lane, about old horsemen being drawn back home by an old lady playing the piano, going 'Come home for rest and respite'.

South Wales Echo:
"'THE darkest hour comes before the sunrise,' sings Cerys Matthews on her upcoming album Never Said Goodbye and her music has never felt so honest. 'That's definitely the way I feel right now,' she said when I queried that lyric. 'That song (Morning Sunshine) was actually written with Gruff Rhys from the Super Furry Animals. 'I had the song Elen, which is the last one on the album, milling around for too long and I wasn't able to finish it well enough. So we decided to ask Gruff if he could get the song finished, which he did by coming over to Nashville and afterwards we wrote Morning Sunshine together which just summed up the album so beautifully. I really love that song.'

Western Mail:
"Morning Sunshine:
Gruff Rhys from the Super Furry Animals came out to America to help me on one song. It's about the dark hour before the sunrise. It's a lot about the boy gardener figure and his way with the earth.
Elen:
I had this song for a long while but I couldn't finish it. So I asked Gruff to help me on this one too. It's in Welsh and after being through all kinds of different places on the album this is like coming back to Wales. It's actually inspired by a lady in North Wales who plays the piano.
~ 20, 22 July, thanks to Ant

Columbia
Gruff's diary from his trip to Columbia, Fizzy pop and music is on Red Pepper. The trip was also the subject of a feature in Q Magazine. (If anyone has a scan, kindly email it to your webmaster who couldn't buy the issue.) ~ thanks to Gaz

21 October ~ Gruff Rhys guest of Jean-Claude Vannier
"Histoire de Melody Nelson & L'Enfants Assassin Des Mouches with special guests Jarvis Cocker, Badly Drawn Boy, Mick Harvey & Gruff Rhys on 21 October 2006 at 7.30pm, at Barbican Hall, London. Tickets are £20/£25/£30 from The Barbican.

Only Connect and Finders Keepers presents the first ever live performances of two cult classic albums Histoire De Melody Nelson and L'Enfants Assassin Des Mouches from 1971 and 1972 respectively. Produced by long-time collaborator of randy iconoclast Serge Gainsbourg, composer/arranger Jean-Claude Vannier's otherworldly string and choral arrangements are iconic of the era, and the rediscovery by a whole new generation has won him renewed acclaim.

A World Premier event, Vannier conducts the BBC Concert Orchestra, Crouch End Festival Chorus, a children's string quintet plus the inimitable musicians Dougie Wright, Big Jim Sullivan, and Herbie Flowers from the original recordings.

Jarvis Cocker, Damon Gough (Badly Drawn Boy), The Bad Seeds' Mick Harvey and The Super Furries' Gruff Rhys take it in turns to sing Serge for the performance of L'Histoire De Melody Nelson and L'Enfant Assassin des Mouches features live sound effects - including ringing bells, ticking clocks, a model helicopter, flies and even a billiards table. Produced by the Barbican in association with Finders Keepers."
There's information on the albums and soundclips on Finders Keepers. ~ 22 June, thanks to Rob

Beyond...
Broken Leaf has some new tracks. Kliph, touring drummer for The Flaming Lips, mentioned in his blog that Pete Fowler may create action figures of them. Richard Hawley is making the radio rounds. Some fantastic tracks on XFM.

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