Gruff Rhys is pleased to share his latest two songs from The Almond & The Seahorse soundtrack (out Feb 24, 2023), lead track “I Want My Old Life Back” & “Liberate Me From the Love Song”. Pre-order the album here. 

Gruff says about the song, “‘I Want My Old Life Back’ is featured in a tense domestic scene in the film as the character’s lives have been turned upside down by the trauma of injury. I actually wrote the song after my van got nearly totalled in early 2020 during a flash flood on the A1 at 3am after a gig. I was stranded in a pub for three days as I waited for it to be fixed, like my own personal lockdown a few weeks before the big one when the song seemed to make even more sense.” It’s a very straight up live band track that features Kliph Scurlock on drums, Osian Gwynedd on piano, Stephen Black on bass, and string arrangements by Gruff ab Arwel – recorded by Ali Chant and mixed by Llion Robertson. 

He continues, “I recorded “Liberate Me From The Love Song” at Kris Jenkins studio Wings For Jesus in Cardiff, with some keyboards and drum machines. I made some more refined versions that were used in the film but this early rough version captures the song better. The song itself is the result of listening to too much (or not enough) Outlaw Country music but doesn’t really sound like it. It’s probably the most noticeable song in the film – a couple are going through an amicable but difficult period of change and this is the soundtrack (whilst they’re eating chips on the beach).”