Description
Gruff Rhys – Sadness Sets Me Free – Vinyl Record
Gruff Rhys’ Sadness Sets Me Free is a beautifully strange, quietly radiant album that turns melancholy into momentum. Recorded live with a band in just a few days, it has that rare “in the room” immediacy—loose enough to breathe, but precise in its melodies and emotional aim. The sound sits in a sweet spot between psychedelic pop warmth and road-worn singer-songwriter intimacy: piano-led songs that drift into glowing harmonies, gentle grooves that feel like they’re rolling forward on their own, and arrangements that slip in subtle strings, horns, and pedal steel like passing weather. It’s unmistakably Gruff—wry, curious, and melodic—but there’s a new openness here, a sense of letting the songs speak plainly even when the thoughts behind them are complicated.
Lyrically, the album carries a bittersweet, observational weight. Rhys writes about personal missteps, uncomfortable memories, and wider unease with a lightness of touch that never feels flippant—more like someone choosing humor, clarity, and craft as a way through the fog. The title isn’t just a mood; it’s a statement of intent. Even when the songs flirt with loneliness, regret, or the feeling that the world has tilted off its axis, the music keeps finding lift: choruses that soften the edges, chord changes that open up the sky, and melodies that linger like a kind of quiet reassurance. Rather than wallowing, Sadness Sets Me Free feels like a record about moving forward with your eyes open—finding beauty in the mess, and a strange hope inside the heaviness.
Brand new, never played and still sealed in the factory plastic
Track Listing
Sadness Sets Me Free
Bad Friend
Celestial Candyfloss
Silver Lining Lead Balloons
On The Far Side Of The Dollar
They Sold My Home To Build A Skyscraper
Peace Signs
Cover Up The Cover Up
I Tendered My Resignation
I’ll Keep Singing
