Gruff Rhys reveals the Super Furry Animals sold their infamous army tank to The Eagles’ Don Henley
Super Furry Animals have revealed that they sold their trademark tank from the 1990s to Don Henley from The Eagles.
The Welsh band first bought the tank with the promotional budget that they were given in 1996 when they were releasing the single ‘If You Don’t Want Me to Destroy You’, the fourth single from their debut album ‘Fuzzy Logic’.
The band painted the tank blue and generally used it to get to music festivals at the time. The vehicle was also used as the cover art for the single, with the song’s title painted on the gun barrel and the band’s name printed on the side.
But in a new interview in The Guardian, the band’s frontman Gruff Rhys was asked by a fan named qwertychucha, “What happened to the tank?”
“They were confiscating sound systems after the criminal justice bill [became law], so we put ours in a tank,” he replied. “Tanks are illegal on highways, so we had to pull in favours to park it in fields. When we took it to the [1996] Reading Festival on a lorry, we got all these complaints, because it was louder than the second stage.”
“In the end, we sold it to Don Henley from the Eagles, who collects military vehicles. He had no interest in the band and I think had the SFA logo repainted in military colours.”
“We were hoping to have a festival on an aircraft carrier and such, but to do that we needed a platinum-selling album,” he added.
Rhys is set to release his latest solo album ‘Sadness Sets Me Free’ on January 26 via Rough Trade Records, which you can pre-order here.
The album’s first single was ‘Celestial Candyfloss’. Speaking about it, Rhys said it was “an attempted pocket symphony about the cosmic lengths that people will travel in the pursuit of love and acceptance.”
Rhys’ band on the album include Osian Gwynedd (piano), Huw V Williams (double bass) and former Flaming Lips drummer turned Super Furry Animals archivist Kliph Scurlock (drums).
Back in February last year, Rhys also released his soundtrack album for the film The Almond And The Seahorse and shared its lead song, ‘Amen’.
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Max Pilley
NME
