The Gift That Keeps Giving

Last updated
"The Gift That Keeps Giving"
Sfa-thegiftthatkeepsgiving.jpg
Single by Super Furry Animals
from the album Hey Venus!
Released25 December 2007
RecordedMiraval Studios, France
Genre Experimental rock
Length3:20
Label Rough Trade Records
Songwriter(s) Super Furry Animals
Producer(s) Super Furry Animals with David Newfeld
Super Furry Animals singles chronology
"Run-Away"
(2007)		"The Gift That Keeps Giving"
(2007)		"Inaugural Trams"
(2009)

"The Gift That Keeps Giving" is a song by Super Furry Animals taken from their 2007 album, Hey Venus! . It was given away as a free download single from the band's official website on Christmas Day 2007. [1]

Contents

The song was conceived as a Christmas single [2] as part of the band's plans to make a "pop record" in parent album Hey Venus! [3] The title stems from sessions in 2004 for the extended live version of "The Man Don't Give a Fuck", at which the group's engineer repeatably used the phrase. [3] Critical response to "The Gift That Keeps Giving" was generally positive with the NME claiming it to be one of the best songs on Hey Venus! [4] and BBC Wales describing the track as "brain-bendingly catchy". [5]

A Team D.A.D.D.Y. directed [6] music video was made to accompany the track's release as a single. The video features a spoilt child being showered with Christmas presents while poorer children are shown in tears due to their lack of gifts. Two different endings for the video were produced - in one Santa Claus is shown crucified on a cross while another sees Santa laid on the floor with an arrow through his head.

Origins and recording

In a 2008 interview with Uncut singer Gruff Rhys stated that "The Gift That Keeps Giving" was written as an "AOR Christmas single" following a visit to Japan where "they celebrate Christmas as a commercial holiday with all the decorations .. in one store they had Santa on a cross hanging from the wall ... so the Christmas single was just an excuse to have Santa on a cross on the cover". [2] Although the cover art did not in the end feature this scene, a crucified Santa does appear in the accompanying music video.

Speaking to British music magazine Artrocker Rhys offered another explanation as to the origins of the song:

Geoff Travis asked us for one of our pop records, so we thought a pop record should have a Christmas single. And we'd been playing around with this phrase, because we'd had a Scottish engineer who helped us make the 22 minute version of "The Man Don't Give a Fuck" and er... he always used to say 'it's the gift that keeps giving!' He was just referring to the length of the song... but we found out it's also a popular American shopping phrase. [3]

The track was recorded at Miraval Studios, France along with the rest of Hey Venus! [7]

Musical structure

Gnome-mime-sound-openclipart.svg
Super Furry Animals "The Gift That Keeps Giving" (2007)
Short sample from "The Gift That Keeps Giving" illustrating the track's chorus and outro.
Problems playing this file? See media help.

"The Gift That Keeps Giving" is 3 minutes 20 seconds long [8] and is in the key of D minor. The track begins with a phased guitar melody backed only by synthesizer, hi-hat and occasional guitar chords. Cian Ciaran's piano joins the mix as the song builds up with the introduction of drums at 25 seconds. Gruff Rhys begins singing after 39 seconds and is joined by sleighbells which accompany the lines "all the bells started ringing" shortly before the first chorus which features harmony backing vocals (the first of many in the "falsetto-laden" track [9] ) singing the title phrase. Another verse and chorus follow before an instrumental verse at 1 minute 46 seconds featuring a trumpet solo playing around the vocal melody. The song "crescendos tenderly" [10] with a double chorus before entering the outro which initially includes spoken word backing vocals chanting "giving again" and is "enhanced by a horn section that the Furries seem to be able to utilise more effectively than anyone else". [10]

Critical response

Critical reaction to "The Gift That Keeps Giving" was generally positive with the New Musical Express rating it as one of the best on parent album Hey Venus! ; "[it doesn't so much raise] the bar, as balances it on top of Mount Snowdon" going on to state: "From a foundation of ELO guitar cloud-swells, Gruff's Elvis Costello-in-a-bubblegum-bath voice wraps around tender trombone parps to create the band's most beautiful moment since "Demons". [4] BBC Wales commented on the track's Christmas links, describing "The Gift That Keeps Giving" as a "mellow, mellifluous, slow ode to the joys of the festive season ... lyrically incredibly simple ... brain-bendingly catchy". [5] The Guardian meanwhile, stated that the song "might sound more California than Christmas" but still possesses the "obligatory sleighbells ... shaken throughout". [11] Much was made of the 'retro' nature of the track with Yahoo Music UK claiming that the song is "a pure blue-eyed soul tune, of the sort that Dan Penn and Spooner Oldham used to churn out four decades ago" [12] and The Guardian describing it as a "gorgeous, Bacharach-tinged haze". [11] In contrast the UCSD Guardian described "The Gift That Keeps Giving" as "jazzy" and "lo-fi" and saw it as "a throw-back to 2000's experimental Mwng ". [13]

Billboard noted that "the group's penchant for sonic flourishes is used to subtle effect" on "The Gift That Keeps Giving" and went on to suggest that the track is representative of Hey Venus! as a whole. [14] Cokemachineglow, however, thought that the song "will be cast into the void, one daring, lonely piece of the first Super Furry Animals album to not succeed as a thorough unit" [15] and, in their single review of "The Gift That Keeps Giving", the NME suggested that the track wasn't one of the group's best. [16]

The band's decision to employ Japanese surrealist Keiichi Tanaami to produce the cover for Hey Venus! and its singles received some criticism, [4] not least because the artist had already used similar designs. In a 2005 interview with German magazine Komakino, keyboard player Cian Ciaran stated that the artwork for "The Gift..." was unique, however, and praised the artist. [17]

Music video

One ending of the music video features Santa Claus crucified on a cross. Gift-That-Keeps-Giving-SFA-Screenshot.jpg
One ending of the music video features Santa Claus crucified on a cross.

The video for "The Gift That Keeps Giving" was directed by Team D.A.D.D.Y. [6] and revolves around a festive theme in keeping with the track's release date of Christmas day.

The video opens with a spoilt child opening numerous Christmas presents including a toy train, a box full of kittens and a copy of Hey Venus! (which he throws over his shoulder in disgust). Towards the end of the video less privileged children are shown crying at their lack of presents before we cut back to the initial child who is surrounded by gifts while Santa Claus is seen in front of a log fire, crucified on a cross. An alternative ending instead features Santa lying on the floor with an arrow through his head.

Despite the apparently cynical nature of the video, BBC Wales asserts that it is "not meant to be read in any deeper level than 'ain't Christmas brilliant?'" [5]

Track listing

All songs by Super Furry Animals.

Although the track was initially reported to come with an "exclusive b-side" this turned out not to be the case and only "The Gift That Keeps Giving" was made available. [1] [18]

Personnel

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Super Furry Animals</span> Welsh rock band

Super Furry Animals are a Welsh rock band formed in Cardiff in 1993. For the duration of their professional career, the band consisted of Gruff Rhys, Huw Bunford, Guto Pryce, Cian Ciaran, and Dafydd Ieuan. An earlier incarnation of the band featured actor Rhys Ifans on lead vocals. The band are considered to be part of the renaissance of Welsh culture which emerged in the 1990s: other Welsh bands of the time include the Manic Street Preachers, Stereophonics, Catatonia and Gorky's Zygotic Mynci.

<i>Phantom Power</i> (Super Furry Animals album) Album by Super Furry Animals

Phantom Power is the sixth album by Welsh indie rock band Super Furry Animals, released on 21 July 2003 by Epic Records in the United Kingdom. The record was originally conceived as a ten-song concept album using D-A-D-D-A-D guitar tuning, but the band chose to abandon this idea during recording as they didn't want to constrain themselves. The group did attempt to create a "more coherent" album than their past efforts by choosing songs which worked well together. Phantom Power was recorded at the band's own studio, AV Happenings, in Cardiff with the Super Furries producing and engineering themselves for the first time. The album features a range of musical styles, from country rock to techno, although many of the tracks are based around the acoustic guitar. According to chief songwriter and vocalist Gruff Rhys, the album's lyrics deal with "broken relationships and war".

<i>Rings Around the World</i> Album by Super Furry Animals

Rings Around the World is the fifth studio album and the major label debut by Super Furry Animals. Released on 23 July 2001 by Epic Records in the United Kingdom, it was the first album by any artist to be simultaneously released on both audio CD and DVD. The record reached number 3 in the UK Albums Chart and includes the singles "Juxtapozed with U", "(Drawing) Rings Around the World" and "It's Not the End of the World?".

<i>Love Kraft</i> 2005 studio album by Super Furry Animals

Love Kraft is the seventh studio album by Welsh indie rock band Super Furry Animals, released on 22 August 2005 through Epic Records in the United Kingdom. The album was recorded in Spain with producer Mario Caldato Jr and was something of a departure for the band, with all members contributing songs and lead vocals alongside Gruff Rhys who had been main songwriter for the Super Furries until this point. In selecting tracks for Love Kraft a conscious effort was made by the band not to choose songs on their individual merit but rather to pick those which went well together in order to create as cohesive an album as possible. The album's name was taken from a sex shop, Love Craft, near the Cardiff offices of the Super Furries' management team and is also a nod to American horror writer H. P. Lovecraft.

<i>Radiator</i> (album) 1997 studio album by Super Furry Animals

Radiator is the second studio album by Welsh alternative rock band Super Furry Animals. It was released in August 1997 by Creation Records, and later the same year in the United States under Flydaddy Records. It peaked at number eight on the UK Albums Chart. In 2005, it was reissued with a bonus disc of other tracks from the time.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">The Man Don't Give a Fuck</span> 1996 single by Super Furry Animals

"The Man Don't Give a Fuck" is a song by Super Furry Animals, twice released as a single by the group.

<i>Hey Venus!</i> 2007 studio album by Super Furry Animals

Hey Venus! is the eighth album by Welsh band Super Furry Animals. It was released on 27 August 2007 in the United Kingdom. Hey Venus! is the band's first full-length release on current label Rough Trade Records and, at just over 36 minutes, is also their shortest-running studio release. The title is taken from the first line of the song "Into the Night".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">If You Don't Want Me to Destroy You</span> 1996 single by Super Furry Animals

"If You Don't Want Me to Destroy You" is the fourth single, and the last to be taken from the album Fuzzy Logic, by Super Furry Animals. It reached #18 on the UK Singles Chart on its release in September 1996.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Northern Lites</span> 1999 single by Super Furry Animals

"Northern Lites" is the ninth single by Super Furry Animals. It was the first single to be taken from the Guerrilla album and reached number 11 in the UK Singles Chart after its release on 10 May 1999. The song was written by singer Gruff Rhys and was inspired by the El Niño phenomenon. The track's title refers to the Aurora Borealis, a natural light display which the band were convinced they had seen prior to the song being written. Rhys wrote the melody for "Northern Lites" several years before it was completed but only decided on a calypso style after he wrote the lyrics. The steel drums on the track are played by keyboardist Cian Ciaran and were added on the spur of the moment after the group saw them "lying around" Real World Studios during recording.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fire in My Heart</span> 1999 single by Super Furry Animals

"Fire in My Heart" is the tenth single by Welsh rock band the Super Furry Animals. It was the second single to be taken from the group's 1999 album Guerrilla, and reached number 25 in the UK Singles Chart after its release on 9 August 1999. The track, originally titled "Heartburn", has been described by the band's singer Gruff Rhys as a country and western song with lyrics that offer "soul advice".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Juxtapozed with U</span> 2001 single by Super Furry Animals

"Juxtapozed with U" is the thirteenth single by Super Furry Animals. It was the first single to be taken from the Rings Around the World album and reached number 14 on the UK Singles Chart on its release in July 2001. The song was initially conceived as a duet but, after both Brian Harvey and Bobby Brown turned the band down, lead singer Gruff Rhys sang the entire track, using a vocoder on the verses to imitate another person. Musically "Juxtapozed with U" has echoes of Philadelphia soul and the "plastic soul" of David Bowie's album Young Americans and was inspired by the Paul McCartney and Stevie Wonder track "Ebony and Ivory". Rhys has claimed that he sees "Juxtapozed with U" as "fairly subversive" because its polished pop style was in stark contrast to the "macho" guitar music the band felt was prevalent in 2001.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">(Drawing) Rings Around the World</span> Single by Super Furry Animals

"(Drawing) Rings Around the World" is a song by Super Furry Animals and was the second single taken from the band's fifth album, Rings Around the World. The track reached number 28 on the UK Singles Chart on release in October 2001. Singer Gruff Rhys has described the song as being about "rings of communication around the world. All the rings of pollution".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">It's Not the End of the World?</span> 2002 single by Super Furry Animals

"It's Not the End of the World?" is a song by Welsh band Super Furry Animals. It was the last single to be released from the Rings Around the World album and reached number 30 on the UK Singles Chart on its release in January 2002. Singer Gruff Rhys has variously described the track as being about the extinction of mankind and as "a romantic song about growing old".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Golden Retriever (song)</span> 2003 single by Super Furry Animals

"Golden Retriever" is a song by Super Furry Animals. It was the first single to be issued from the album Phantom Power and reached number 13 on the UK Singles Chart on its release in July 2003. The song is about the relationship between singer Gruff Rhys's girlfriend's two dogs and was written in the same key, with the same guitar tuning and around the same time as several other songs from Phantom Power.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lazer Beam</span> 2005 single by Super Furry Animals

"Lazer Beam" is a single by Super Furry Animals. It was the only single to be released from the Love Kraft album and reached #28 in the UK Singles Chart, and as of 2023, remains their last UK Top 40 hit. The song is "about making your own reality" and tells the story of aliens coming down to earth to shoot humans with laser beams which "make them intelligent rather than being jerks". Some of singer Gruff Rhys's lyrics were lifted from a speech made by Tony Blair at the Labour Party Conference in 2004.

<i>Slow Life</i> 2004 EP by Super Furry Animals

Slow Life is an EP by the Welsh alternative rock band Super Furry Animals, released in 2004. The EP was made available as a free download and also saw a limited CD release, bundled with remix album Phantom Phorce. Lead track "Slow Life" appeared on the 2003 album Phantom Power and was originally composed as a purely electronic song by keyboardist Cian Ciaran several years earlier. The band were keen to finish the track and Ciaran encouraged them to jam over his original version—this jam was then edited and made into the finished song. The track "Motherfokker" is a collaboration between the Super Furry Animals and rap group Goldie Lookin Chain.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Show Your Hand</span> 2007 single by Super Furry Animals

"Show Your Hand" is a song by Welsh rock band Super Furry Animals and was the first single from their 2007 album, Hey Venus!. The single was made available for download on 16 July 2007 as an iTunes exclusive and was later released in physical formats on 13 August in the UK. The track failed to penetrate the UK singles chart's Top 40, peaking at #46.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Run-Away (Super Furry Animals song)</span> 2007 single by Super Furry Animals

"Run-Away" is a song by Super Furry Animals and the second single taken from their 2007 album, Hey Venus!. The song is an homage to the 'Wall of Sound' production made famous by Phil Spector, particularly in his work with 1960s girl groups.

<i>Dark Days/Light Years</i> 2009 studio album by Super Furry Animals

Dark Days/Light Years is the ninth studio album by Super Furry Animals, released digitally on 16 March 2009 via the band's website, with a physical release following on 21 April on Rough Trade Records. The album's title is taken from a lyric in the song "Moped Eyes".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Super Furry Animals discography</span> Music discography

The discography of Super Furry Animals, a Welsh indie rock band, consists of nine studio albums, four extended plays, twenty three singles and three video albums. Super Furry Animals were formed in 1993 in Cardiff, Wales by Gruff Rhys, Huw Bunford, Guto Pryce, Cian Ciaran and Dafydd Ieuan.

References

  1. 1 2 "Super Furry Animals to give away Christmas MP3". NME . 2007-11-30. Retrieved 2008-04-10.
  2. 1 2 Martin, Piers (April 2008). "Album by album: Super Furry Animals". Uncut . 131: 70–72.
  3. 1 2 3 Rawlins, Ric (2007). "Super Furry Animals interview". Artrocker . Archived from the original on April 20, 2008. Retrieved 2008-04-10.
  4. 1 2 3 "Hey Venus!". NME . 2007-08-29. Retrieved 2008-04-10.
  5. 1 2 3 McLaren, James (2007). "The Gift That Keeps Giving". BBC Wales . Retrieved 2008-04-10.[ dead link ]
  6. 1 2 "Super Furry Animals: The Gift That Keeps Giving". MilkandCookies. 2007-12-17. Retrieved 2008-04-10.
  7. ↑ Hey Venus! (CD booklet). Super Furry Animals. London: Rough Trade Records. 2007. p. 6.{{cite AV media notes}}: CS1 maint: others in cite AV media (notes) (link)
  8. ↑ Erlewine, Stephen Thomas (c. 2007). "Hey Venus!". Allmusic . Retrieved 2008-04-10.
  9. ↑ Hogan, Marc (2007-09-04). "Hey Venus!". Pitchfork Media . Archived from the original on 2008-04-14. Retrieved 2008-04-17.
  10. 1 2 Dobson, Gareth (2007-08-27). "Super Furry Animals: Hey Venus!". Drowned in Sound . Archived from the original on 2008-01-26. Retrieved 2008-04-10.
  11. 1 2 Salmon, Chris (2007-12-21). "A season for giving". The Guardian . Retrieved 2008-04-10.
  12. ↑ Webb, Adam (2007-08-31). "Hey Venus". Yahoo! . Archived from the original on 2011-07-22. Retrieved 2008-04-17.
  13. ↑ Minden, Sonia (2008-01-24). "Hey Venus!". UCSD Guardian . Retrieved 2008-04-10.[ dead link ]
  14. ↑ Carpenter, Troy (2007). "Hey Venus!". Billboard . Archived from the original on May 22, 2008. Retrieved 2008-04-10.
  15. ↑ Sinacola, Dom (2007-08-31). "Hey Venus!". Cokemachineglow. Archived from the original on 2008-04-23. Retrieved 2008-04-17.
  16. ↑ "The Gift That Keeps Giving". NME . 2008-01-14. Retrieved 2008-07-07.
  17. ↑ Jeganathan, Robin (c. 2007). "Hey Cian!". Komakino. Retrieved 2008-04-10.
  18. ↑ "Albums, Hey Venus!". Super Furry Animals official website, discography page. c. 2007. Archived from the original on 2008-01-25. Retrieved 2008-07-04.

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.