Gruff Rhys will release his beloved album American Interior  for the first time via Rough Trade Records on May 16, 2025. The reissue comes complete with bonus tracks which have long been out of print, with the song “Y Gwenan Gorn” today for the first time on streaming services, previously it was only available on a vinyl EP. The track is accompanied by a visualizer using clips from the original American Interior full length film. Rhys will play a number of North American dates, which kicks off April 9 in New York City. All upcoming dates can be seen below and tickets for all shows are on-sale now.

In 2012 Gruff Rhys embarked on a solo ‘investigative concert tour’ through the heart of America following the route taken by his distant relative John Evans. Every night he presented songs augmented by a power point presentation that detailed his relative’s unbelievable history, along with any new piece of information that had come his way during the day. He was ultimately looking for Evans’s lost unmarked grave. Along with many major cities, the tour took him to play shows at the Mandan and Omaha tribe reservations, a Missouri vineyard, villages that no longer exist and lay at the bottom the Mississippi river and a New Orleans bordello.

What transpired from that ‘investigative concert tour’ was a 2014 album, American Interior, plus a book, film and exhaustive tour of the same name. With the aid of the dusted-off power point presentation, Gruff Rhys and a full band revisits the project in 2025 to perform the songs that formed both the album, and the soundtrack to the film.

Rhys says of the reissue, “Revisiting American Interior 11 years later feels very prescient. In following the unusual story of explorer John Evans (1770-1799) it becomes clear that faked narratives can have profound and unpredictable consequences in real life. His barely believable journey of verification in searching through continental scale wilderness for a [fictitious] Welsh speaking tribe believed to be living on the Great Plains of North America (an ancient folk tale perpetuated by the Elizabethan court following the subjugation of Wales, to make colonial claims on behalf of the British on the Americas) had a dramatic political effect on the fledgling USA and a devastating impact on himself and some of those who helped him on his way.

I wrote an album of songs inspired by his life; American Interior, which also served as a soundtrack to a documentary film based on a book that detailed his journey, intertwined with my own investigative concert tour, all three of which I worked on simultaneously during a 2-year fever from 2012-14. It was by far the most ambitious undertaking I’ve ever attempted. Living with one foot in the 18th century, wearing the same clothes (for cinematic continuity) for that entire period, left me pretty exhausted. (Imagine a cold extra from The Revenant movie).

It took me a while to process the whole experience and its lessons and feel I owe it to my former self to take these songs back on the road for a couple of months and re-tell the story for a new decade.”

Whales 2025 Tour Dates

March 21st Tenby, UK – Y Lle Da festival
March 24th, 25th, 26th, 27th – Cardiff, UK – Sustainable Studios – American Interior performances
Apr 9, 2025 – New York, NY @ Le Poisson Rouge
Apr 11, 2025 – Philadelphia, PA @ World Cafe Live
Apr 12, 2025 – Washington, DC @ DC9 Nightclub
Apr 15, 2025 – Ann Arbor, MI @ The Ark
Apr 16, 2025 – Chicago, IL @ The Empty Bottle
Apr 18, 2025 – Los Angeles, CA @ The Masonic Lodge at Hollywood Forever
Apr 19, 2025 – San Francisco, CA @ Swedish American Hall
Apr 21, 2025 – Portland, OR @ Polaris Hall
Apr 22, 2025 – Seattle, WA @ Here – After
May 7th Belfast, UK – Black Box – American Interior Screening + Q&A
May 9th Stockport, UK – Savoy Theatre – American Interior Screening + Q&A
May 10th Wrexham, UK – Focus Wales
May 15th London, UK – Rich Mix – American Interior full band performance
May 16th Leeds, UK – The Wardrobe – American Interior full band performance
June 7th Swansea, UK, Gwyl Tawe Festival
June 11th Guildford, UK – The Boileroom
June 12th Tunbridge Wells, UK – The Forum
June 14th Ipswich, UK – Brighten The Corners festival
August 29th Brighton, UK – Psych Fest

Order “Y Gwenan Gorn” by Gruff Rhys HERE