Gruff Rhys performing with the Super Furry Animals @ the London Roundhouse (Alberto Pezzali for Live4ever
A new video for Selfies In The Sunset, the closing track of Gruff Rhys‘ Babelsberg album, has been directed and animated by Ewan Jones Morris.
Going into detail about the video and its origins, Rhys says:
“A couple of years ago I noticed some smiling, healthy looking young people taking selfies in front of a particularly spectacular sunset, I turned around to walk away only to see another sunset in front of me.”
“I realised the first sunset was just the glow looming above a chemical plant. Still, the selfies would have looked like they were taken in California. (We weren’t in California). It got me thinking about Armageddon. Maybe people will be taking selfies till the very end. They’ll be pretty spectacular and will feature the golden colours of the Sunset. With the acceleration of climate change maybe it is the end. A slow painful process not an event.”
“My friend Graham from South Shields was working with Lily Cole on some music a while back – there was some talk of me helping out in some way as a musician. Nothing came of it – but I invited her to help me finish this song in any case, as she has a greater insight into the world of imagery. It turns out that her Mother is from Rhydaman and has been taking selfies since the 1960s.”
“This isn’t a judgmental song about Selfies – Selfies aren’t the problem. They bring joy into this precarious life. It’s just a really sad song.”
