A band becoming financially comfortable can do dangerous things to their creativity, with Oasis they became self important coke heads, with Brian Wilson he ate until he nearly exploded, so what of the Super Furries?

Well, their 7th album reaks of a band that finally has cash to make the album they’ve always wanted to make but could never afford to do so. Put in short, they’ve got strings and they‘re gonna use ‘em.

Middle eight? Yeah, put strings on it. Outro? Yeah, loads of strings. Intro? Yep, more strings, fuck it, let’s put strings in-between each tune instead of silence. Of course, this doesn’t happen as that would be stupid but Love Kraft it rality is not that far off.

Right from their itchy scratchy debut ‘Fuzzy Logic ‘ to the pastoral brilliance of ‘Rings around the world’, SFA have been one of the few bands over the past ten Years to throw out the rule book and try different things. Whilst their fellow countrymen the Stereophonics peddled embarrassing karaoke cover versions of 70’s rock, SFA have had celery crunching solos, you so the math (sssssssssss).

‘Love Kraft’ has been described by the group as their most loose and democratic album, unfortunately this leads to a problem that occurred on former albums, the songs not written by Griff are not as good as the rest. A prime example is track two ‘Atomik lust’ which is a desperate attempt at recreating the ethereal ‘Feel flows’ by the Beach Boys. Elsewhere it’s messy, ‘Psyclone’ is an awful attempt at Becks hick-hop and comeback single ‘Lazer Beam’ is a downright mess, the weakest comeback single they have ever released.

 It’s not all bad though, ‘Frequency’ is dizzy psychedelia with gorgeous vocal harmonizing, and the stuff we have become accustomed hearing from them. The summery chilled vibe of ‘Ohio Heat’ just happens to be one of the best songs they’ve put to tape which makes ‘Love Kraft’ even more disappointing as in between moments of a band hitting the top of the game, too many ideas this time ruin what could have been a great musical achievement.

Similar in sprit to Blur’s last album ‘Think Tank’, they’ve tried to change their formula which is commendable but they should have pulled the reigns in a little bit and realise that although it may sound great to them recording it in the studio, other people have to listen to it as well.

• 5/10

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Probably academic now seeing as the tickets were snapped up quicker than guaranteed lottery tickets but if you are prepared to be ripped off by the dodgy ticket touts outside the venue and lets’ face it – it’s gonna be worth it, the legendary Pixies are back in the country accompanied by The Futureheads before going into the studio to record their first album in 14 Years.
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Goldfrapp bring back their visually astounding live show when they tour the UK this Autumn. The tour follows the release of the band’s stunning third album, ‘Supernature’, on August 22nd and the first from that album is single, ‘Ooh La La’ was released on August 8th.
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Having secured a position as one of Britain’s most important new bands of 2005, The Subways are set to break into the US with a special guest appearance on the hottest show on TV, ‘The O.C.’.
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The Foo Fighters come to the UK in December to promote their recent double album ‘In your honour’, you can catch them at;

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To celebrate the 10 Year anniversay of the first Help album…
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