Be the first to order the brand new Super Furry Animals album. We're making it available digitally first and the CD and vinyl will be out early next year. The downloads are high quality, 256kbps MP3 which will play on just about anything.

For music lovers around the globe, the announcement of a new Super Furry Animals album after a two-year hiatus is reason enough to celebrate. That the album is their finest, most cohesive to date is simply the icing on the cake. Super Furry Animals, now in their 11th year of artfully beguiling recordings, have remained one of the most consistently creative, endlessly intriguing, boundlessly inventive and most fiercely loved bands on the planet. And that’s a fact.

Hey Venus, their 8th studio album, is the latest addition to their canon of abundant accomplishments. Described by the band as “a collection of 12 autonomous songs ranging in styles from country and contemporary rock music to orchestral psychedelic pop” Hey Venus is far more than the sum of its parts. A gloriously intricate album jam-packed with the sorts of sunny melodies and melancholy arrangements that make every SFA release a symphonic and smart slice of songcraft, this record is even more of a rewarding sonic experience. Lyrically the band are at their finest; from the opening bars of “The Gateway Song” to the closing slo-mo honky-tonk tinged “Let The Wolves Howl At The Moon”, singer Gruff Rhys rolls out tales of heartache, disillusionment, compulsive consumerism, wolves, eight balls and the Milkyway with delicious ease. Heartbreaker “Run-Away” is introduced with a gentle declaration “This song is based on a true story, which would be fine if it wasn’t autobiographical” before continuing to recall that “We may have fought with teeth and nails :I still recall your banking details.”

Sensibly, for something as unique and special as Hey Venus, the album has two release dates: first available to the very modern and the very old fashioned (ie: digitally and on vinyl) on August 28th 2007, the CD won’t hit stores until January 22nd, 2008 to coincide with the band’s US tour. The CD release also features bonus material.