Playlist: The Big Welsh Playlist

Cardiff's Guide Dog

Info: When it comes to indigenous music from fair Cymru, I've always been intrigued by the duality of the Welsh and English languages in their independent music, something we don't see much of here in Ireland. For a country that has two-thirds of the population of our own, a quarter of Welsh people are fully fluent in their written and spoken language versus only 1% in Ireland. 

HMS Morris - Morbid Mind

This is only relevant to this playlist and post because there is a significant number of tracks present on it in the Welsh (and English) language, and my earliest introduction to Welsh music was via bands who were also bi-lingual such as Super Furry Animals and Gorky's Zygotic Mynci. It's an interesting difference in circumstances between Irish and Welsh music, particularly for me as a non-practicising fluent Irish-speaker, but that curio will require an academic investigation by some poor student down the road, and is not for here!

Before the Internets and at the early dawn of mobile phones, I had seen Super Furry Animals every time they came to Dublin, hell, when Guerilla came out in 1999, they even had a mental crowd favourite of a track, 'Wherever I Lay My Phone (That's My Home)', whose lyrics didn't need to over-arch in any way; "I've got a mobile phone, I've got a mobile phone. Wherever I lay my phone that's my home, I've got a mobile phone. OK. (Tumor on the brain, tumor on the brain, status symbol disease says, "I've got a mobile phone". Tumor on the brain, tumor on the brain)".

Twelve months later The Furries would release their entirely Welsh album MWNG, after the relative commercial success of Fuzzy Logic, Radiator and Guerilla it was a gamble, but it paid off. One of my all time favourite SFA songs is 'Ysbeidiau Heulog', which translates to 'Mostly Sunny', of course we always sang it as "Speedy-eyed Halo". 

Now that my nostalgia indulgence is over, what about the Playlist of current independent Welsh music? Well, I'm going to let the tunes speak for themselves. I've been very lucky to have had some incredible singles, EP's and albums sent to me over the last few years from independent Welsh record labels and artists off their own back, they've been amazing. I would love to see some kind of tour exchange where Irish bands hooked up with their Welsh brethern and did a circuit of the best music venues in both countries together at some point.

Massive shout outs to fellow Irish blogger (with the suspiciously Welsh-sounding name!) Barry Gruff who has had his finger on the pulse of all things independent Welsh music long before I ever did and put me in touch with Dan Amor from the bottomless pit of psychedelic indie that is Recordiau Cae Gwyn. Classy and generous gentleman Aled Thomas of Beast PR who has been promoting independent Irish music on his own music blog and has had a bit of a thing for our very own Thumper! Recordiau I KA Ching for sending us some big hitters, and finally, Wrexham's Kidsmoke who have brought constant joy to us with every single they've released. 

Diolch ffrindiau!

We will be featuring more music from Cae Gwyn Records and Beast PR very soon....