Dark Days/Light Years

Super Furry Animals began their tenure at Rough Trade Records with 2007's vaguely disappointing Hey Venus!, a deliberate move into a more traditional guitar-pop direction after the increasing experimentalism of their previous several releases. Dark Days/Light Years is of a piece with its immediate predecessor -- they even retained Japanese visual artist Keiichi Tanaami to create another retina-searing cartoon/hallucination for the sleeve -- but it's far more musically successful. Although the word "psychedelic" has been much used in descriptions of the Furries' sound, this is the first SFA album with a pointedly retro feel. Specifically, the Welsh Rare Beat series of vintage '60s and '70s singles that lead singer-songwriter Gruff Rhys helped compile a while back seem to have percolated into the band's collective unconscious: glam-rocking guitars, burbly vintage synths and groovy freakbeat rhythms underpin the solidly upbeat songs. Several tracks are as concise and poppy as anything on Hey Venus!, but the album really finds its footing on more expansive tunes like the internationalist anthem "Inaugural Trams" (featuring Franz Ferdinand's Nick McCarthy delivering a largely-gibberish proclamation in German) and the hypnotic centerpiece "Cardiff in the Sun."