Rock And Pop

Artist Cian Ciaran
Title Outside In
Label Dell'orso Records

* Vinyl strictly limited to 500 copies

* Here he comes. The dark horse. The bloke at the back. The odd one. Cian Ciaran is a founder member of that democratic state of music known as Super Furry Animals.

He’s got this album, right. It’s a real beauty, songs of love and longing; delicate, fragile and understated. People who know about these kind of things have been whispering about it ever since Cian started messing about in the studio. This is a bit special, they said.

Just so you know, Cian is the baby of the SFA bunch. He has a performing history in music stretching back to his early teens. His first love was acid house and he didn’t hear anything by Neil Young until he was 21 years old.

* In our desire to understand one of the most intriguing groups of their time, we gave the Super Furries name tags and job descriptions, praying they wouldn’t move around too much to confuse us.

* That made Cian the one who sat at a keyboard and added vocal harmonies when they played live. On occasion, he released techno tracks of his own making. That was him sorted.

* So it’s no wonder this debut album comes as a surprise, even to those who’ve known Cian for donkeys. It was written entirely on the piano and features contributions from fellow-Furries Dafydd Ieuan and Guto Pryce, as well as regular collaborators Osian and Mei Gwynedd (from Sibrydion) Outside In is an album that asks: ‘What’s it all about, then?’ and is smart enough not to try to answer the question in line twelve of track eight.

And just in case you’re looking for musical signposts, Cian has spent the past year or so listening to hip-hop, r’n’b, experimental electronica and bits of doo-wop. The album sounds nothing like any of it.

- Iestyn George