You may not be aware of the C2 programme tucked away in the night-time hours of the BBC Radio Cymru schedules, but each show is a charming and warm celebration of Welsh indie and alternative bands. The number of unknown gems uncovered for me by C2 runs into double figures, and for that, I truly say diolch am fawr.

It was thanks to C2 one iPlayer’d morning that I was introduced to the enigmatic and elusive W H Dyfodol. He has been part of the Welsh underground for years, and may have hit peoples collective radar under the guise of Land of Bingo, from whom ‘Lufthansa’ is a beautiful highlight. Now working under the name Y Pencadlys (Welsh for ‘The Headquarters’), he is perfectly cast as the lo-fi electronica champ hidden behind shadows in publicity photographs.

The new single, released through the highly enthusiastic Peski Records, combines masked lyrics over discordant echoes and bubbling beats, as the melancholia of the title makes way for a lingering sense of release and relief. That often repeated title, Mae Pawb Yn Haeddu Glaw Yn Waeth Na Fi, is perhaps the least expected earworm of the winter, the distinctive Welsh language working well against the occasionally harsh cuts of the music below. A new album, as yet untitled, is expected in the Spring.

Liam Pennington

Photograph by Natalie Curtis