Welsh language dream pop dream from 1991! This album finds the group experimenting with recording techniques, samplers and genres.

Ffa Coffi Pawb were formed in Bethesda in 1986 by sixteen year old friends Gruff Rhys and Rhodri Puw (later to be joined by Gruff’s Super Furry Animals’ bandmate Dafydd Ieuan and Dewi Emlyn). Over eight years, the band played experimental gigs and released gloriously psychedelic pop music before bowing out in 1993 at a gig at Builth Wells Memorial Hall in August 1993 (supported by a young Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci).

Now, thirty plus years after that final curtain, Ffa Coffi Pawb’s story is due be told through a specially made S4C documentary. broadcast on December 22nd at 9pm. The show - directed by Dylan Goch (Separado/American Interior) - features brand new band interviews and previously unseen footage captured all across Wales. Ffa Coffi Pawb will be available on the BBC iPlayer and streamable via www.s4c.cymru after broadcast.

TRACK LISTING

1. Ms Cornflakes '91
2. Breichiau Hir
3. Pen Yn Y Gwynt
4. Chwaer Yr Haul
5. Hunlle Yn Nunlle
6. Cwsg, Cwsg, Cwsg
7. Galw Arno Ti
8. Allan O'i Phen
9. Nol I'r Ogofau
10. Hydref Yn Sacramento
11. Cuddiwn Dan Y Bwrdd
12. Gweld Dim Byd

Revolutionary DIY Cymraeg pop band Ffa Coffi Pawb release limited edition vinyl and CD of Dalec Pelion via their own Ara Deg label. 

Obsessed with power pop, Krautrock, death rock and glam rock, Ffa Coffi Pawb were one of Wales’ most far out bands back in the day. Although loved by all who heard them, their music seemed to fall between the cracks due to both rudimentary distribution methods and crazed deals with music industry bods who quickly disappeared off the face of the Earth. Now, in the white heat of the 21st century and following the critically acclaimed 2023 rerelease of their third and final album Hei Vidal!, Ffa Coffi Pawb have dusted down and cleaned up their two other albums - Dalec Pelion (their first album, originally released in 1988) and Clymhalio (their second LP from 1991).

Recorded by experimental electronic producer Gorwel Owen in a flat above a Post Office in Rhosneigr and initially released on cassette by Bangor label Casetiau Huw, Dalec Pelion finally gets a vinyl (as well as CD and digital) release for the first time. The album has been remastered by Super Furry Animals’ archivist Kliph Scurlock and features brand new artwork by H Hawkline. Hear Valium from Dalec Pelion here.

Of that period, singer and guitarist Gruff Rhys says: “we’d released 50 copies of a home made cassette of songs, jams and cut-up audio collages that were recorded on a cassette recorder microphone and sold at record fairs and pubs from a Kwik Save carrier bag, Then the band saw the inclusion of the track ‘Octapws’ on a Pop Positif compilation vinyl EP, which was followed by a meeting with experimental electronic producer Gorwel Owen who, in 1987 invited Ffa Coffi Pawb to record at his home studio in near by Ynys Môn. The recordings were made in dribs and drabs over a few months in a flat above Gorwel’s parent’s Post Office in Rhosneigr and became our first studio album Dalec Peilon - released on the Bangor cassette label Casetiau Huw in 1988.” 

TRACK LISTING

1. Mynd I Lawr
2. Nyth
3. Valium
4. Telyn Wedi Trwsio
5. V-Yw
6. Octapws
7. Gwres
8. Pendramwng
9. Mae'n Gwneud Fy Mhen I Mewn
10. Dalec Peilon 

Originally released in 1992, Hei Vidal! is the third album by revolutionary DIY Cymraeg pop band Ffa Coffi Pawb. Formed in Bethesda in 1986 by sixteen year old friends Gruff Rhys and Rhodri Puw (later joined by Gruff’s Super Furry Animals’ bandmate Dafydd Ieuan and Dewi Emlyn).

Made by a bunch of 21 and 22 year olds, Hei Vidal! is an album that distills the band’s obsessions with early ’70s power-pop (all the B’s from Bowie, Bolan and Big Star) as well as Neu! and My Bloody Valentine into a sound that predates the fuzzed out return to glam heralded by Oasis a few years later. It merges motorik grooves over saturated shoe gazing fuzz with impressionistic studio manipulation, orchestral synthesiser arrangements and brutal yet surreal imagery and word play in the Welsh language.

Having signed their songs over to a local publisher who eventually disappeared off the face of the Earth, Ffa Coffi Pawb’s music has been out of print for decades (with the exception of the 2004 compilation album Am Byth, released on the SFA associated Placid Casual label). After untangling a complicated web of time, Hei Vidal! is available on vinyl for the first time having only been on cassette and very few CD copies on its original release on Ankst in 1992. The reissue marks the 30th anniversary of the band’s final show at Builth Wells Memorial Hall in August 1993 (supported by a young Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci).

Gruff Rhys on Hei Vidal! “We made the record in our early 20s and it was a dream-pop distillation of our early 1970’s Glam, power-pop & Motorik obsessions - combined no doubt by our devotion to shoe gazing contemporaries from the Creation label, American college rock and our heroes of the Welsh language underground like Datblygu, John Cale and Y Cyrff. The nonsensical album title is a quote from the song Colli’r Goriad and the Vidal in question perhaps a hallucinated amalgamation of Gore Vidal and Vidal Sassoon; both of which were omnipresent personalities on early 90’s TV, one as a pundit the other a seemingly rolling TV shampoo advert.”

TRACK LISTING

1. Clymhalio
2. Ffarout
3. Profion Moddion
4. Wyneb I Waered
5. Dilyn Fy Nhrwyn
6. Colli'r Goriad
7. Arwynebol Melyn
8. Sega Segur
9. Helo Traeth
10. Pelydr Secs
11. Ofn:Cwn
12. Lluchia Dy Fflachlwch Drosda I