Background information
Origin	Northern Ireland
Genre(s)	Alternative Rock, Punk Rock, Britpop, Pop punk
Years active	1992–present
Label(s)	Infectious (UK), Warner Bros. Records (USA)
Website	Official website
Members
Tim Wheeler Mark Hamilton Rick McMurray
Former members
Charlotte Hatherley (1997-2006)

Ash are an alternative rock band that formed in Downpatrick, Northern Ireland in 1992. The media originally pegged Ash's music as Britpop when the band first found mainstream success, but the band's musical style in fact spans a number of genres including punk, power pop, grunge and hard rock.

Contents 1 Lineup 1.1 Band Members 1.2 Former members 2 History 2.1 Early 1990s 2.2 Late 1990s 2.3 Early 2000s 2.4 Late 2000s 3 Discography 3.1 Studio albums 4 References 5 External links

Lineup

The original band members were Tim Wheeler (vocals and guitar), Mark Hamilton (bass guitar) and Rick McMurray (drums).

Initially inspired by Twisted Sister and Iron Maiden in the early 1990s, Tim and Mark formed a heavy metal band called Vietnam with a few school friends. After barely two gigs, they were left stranded when their bandmates left. Requiring a drummer, they had a few drinks with Rick who was a year ahead of them in school and had switched from playing the guitar to drums. With Rick on board, they ambitiously set out to develop a new style of music inspired by grunge bands such as Nirvana, Mudhoney and the Pixies.

Band Members

• Tim Wheeler — Guitar/Piano/Lead Vocals
• Mark Hamilton — Bass
• Rick McMurray — Drums

Former members

• Charlotte Hatherley — Guitar/Piano/Backing Vocals (1997-2006)

History

Early 1990s

Ash officially formed in 1992. They created three demo tapes this year, Solar Happy in June, Shed in September, and the Home Demo in November. These tapes featured their earliest material and the first recordings of some songs that would later be on their 1995 release, Trailer, including "Intense Thing", "Get Out", "Obscure Thing," and their future single, "Jack Names the Planets".

In 1993, Ash made the demo tape,and with new member and explosive guitarist Sharon 'Stone cold' Stapleton launched themselves onto the charts. Garage Girl, which featured "Jack Names the Planets" and "Intense Thing" taken from Shed, as well as some new tracks including "Petrol". They released their compilation demo tape, Pipe Smokin' Brick later this year, which featured an assortment of their best demo songs from the other 4 demo tapes. Downpatrick Musician Ray Valentine recorded Ash's demo's at his studio, Cosmic Rays. Ash's moniker at the time was "Genuine Real Teenagers" due to the fact that they were so young when recording their early material.

The demo tapes had not gained much attention yet and Ash was still playing small shows at local clubs, however, in early 1994, Stephen Taverner came across the Garage Girl demo tape. Suitably impressed Stephen put up the money so that they could press 1000 7″ copies of "Jack Names the Planets" on Stephen's own LaLaLand record label. The band was on its way and Stephen became their full-time manager.

Ash released their mini album, Trailer, in October 1994, which only included seven songs. They received some airplay from DJ Steve Lamacq on BBC Radio 1 and so followed up their debut single with "Petrol", and "Uncle Pat" on their new label Infectious Records.

In 1995, Ash left school and released their breakthrough singles "Kung Fu", "Girl From Mars" and "Angel Interceptor".

Late 1990s

1996 saw them release the singles "Goldfinger" and "Oh Yeah" either side of their album 1977, which saw considerable success. On 17 February 1997, Ash released Live at the Wireless, a live album, recorded at the Triple J Studios in Australia. The UK fans could buy a limited edition CD of it on the band's own Deathstar label.

During their time touring with Weezer, Ash felt the limitation of a three-piece band. As a result they recruited Charlotte Hatherley who had previously been with the band Nightnurse and she made her gig debut at a few small gigs a week before appearing at the V festival in 1997. The first single that she appeared on, "A Life Less Ordinary", featured on the soundtrack to the Ewan McGregor / Cameron Diaz film of the same name.

In September 1998, Ash released "Jesus Says" the following month the second album proper, Nu-Clear Sounds, and in November "Wildsurf". The stress of near non-stop touring of 1977 and Nu-Clear sounds began to affect the band's mentality.

Early 2000s

In 2000, Tim Wheeler disappeared for a short while following the commercial and critical failure of Nu-Clear Sounds. He eventually emerged in New York making the self-deprecating, blood, drug and sex fueled video for Numbskull. A note for Stephen Taverner attached to the video said, "I've killed Bambi".

Ash nearly became bankrupt as they prepared to release possibly their last album. Luckily, this was not to be the case. The band retreated to Wheeler's parents' house, to play and write songs in the same garage where the band began.

The single "Shining Light" was released in January 2001, followed by the number one album Free All Angels in April. Subsequent singles released from Free All Angels were "Burn Baby Burn", "Sometimes", "Candy", and "There's a Star" . The single "Shining Light" won the "Best Contemporary Song" award at the 2002 Ivor Novello awards. A new single "Envy" was released, followed shortly afterwards by the singles collection Intergalactic Sonic 7″s with the bonus disk entitled Cosmic Debris. Q magazine named Ash as #2 of its "50 Bands To See Before You Die".

In 2003, it was leaked to the music and tabloid press that Ash were working on a horror film described as a 'teen slasher'. The film called 'Slashed' was shot while the band were on tour in America but some scenes were also shot in the UK. The screenplay, written by Jed Shepherd and directed by Alexander Marks included star roles by Chris Martin (Sherbet Bones) and Jonny Buckland (Agent Ford) of Coldplay as a pair of FBI agents hired to track down a supernatural serial killer. Other star performances include that of Moby, James Nesbitt, Dave Grohl and Ash themselves. The film was much hyped due to the celebrity performances but it was never generally released to the public and is now currently being held in storage. Rumours circulated that certain scenes were too gory and would not be suitable for Ash's audience, but it was also said that Chris Martin vetoed its release due to scenes of him running around in his boxer shorts, covered in blood, fighting demons which may have been detrimental to his new celebrity status.

On 29 June 2004, Ash released Meltdown. It reached number five in the UK. The band teamed up with Lucasarts for a new Star Wars game entitled Republic Commando. "Clones", taken from the album Meltdown is the first licensed music to be used in anything Star Wars-related. "Meltdown" and "Orpheus" are featured on the popular British movie, Shaun of the Dead as well as appearing on the ingame soundtrack for the video game Burnout 3: Takedown. Also featured is their cover of the Buzzcocks song "Everybody's Happy Nowadays" featuring Chris Martin on backing vocals. "Starcrossed" and "Renegade Cavalcade" were later released as singles from the album. Meltdown gets a US release date of 8 March, through Warner Bros. Records imprint Record Collection. Also in 2005, Tim Wheeler received a companionship (a honorary degree) from LIPA (Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts).

During the recording of Meltdown, Charlotte Hatherley also wrote and recorded her solo side project album Grey Will Fade, which included hit single "Bastardo".

Late 2000s

On 20 January 2006, Charlotte Hatherley left the band after nine years leaving only the original members remaining. An official statement reads: "After 9 years Ash and Charlotte Hatherley have mutually agreed to part company. The decision is completely amicable and they wish each other the very best for the future". In an interview in July 2007, the other band members suggested they asked Hatherley to leave as they "wanted to be a three-piece." On 6 June 2006, NME reported that Ash were in a New York recording studio and had twenty seven "rough" songs. Wheeler hinted that the eventual album is likely to be more retro sounding than any of their previous material. No shows were planned for the remainder of 2006, but Wheeler says Ash are hoping to test out their new songs "in tiny New York bars" once the album is completed.

Early in 2007, Ash announced a full-length UK tour for February and March 2007. The tour is a warm-up for their album release in June and summer festival appearances, including the Isle of Wight Festival on 9 June 2007. The tour is of small clubs nationwide and calls at Preston, Newcastle, Glasgow, Norwich, Liverpool, Sheffield and Southampton amongst others. Named "The Higher Education Tour", Ash are to work closely with the National Union of Students (NUS), including student pre-sale, which explains their gigs at universities in Southampton, Keele, Sheffield, Exeter, Warwick and Kings College London amongst others. Support will be the indie-rock band, V//Formation.

On the 19 February 2007 Ash released the first song from their new album, which was announced as being called "Twilight of the Innocents". This new material was a download only sneak-preview track called "I Started A Fire". The first physical single "You Can't Have It All" was released on 16 April 2007. The release of YCHIA coincided with an in-store gig and signing in Virgin Megastore, Belfast. The music video for "You Can't Have It All" debuted on MTV Two on 11 March 2007.

On 12 June 2007 Ash revealed that Twilight of the Innocents would be their last album. They however denied that they were splitting and instead stated they would only release singles from now on as "The way people listen to music has changed, with the advent of the download the emphasis has reverted to single tracks".

Discography

See main article Ash discography

Studio albums

Album Cover	Date of Release	Title	Label	UK Chart Peak
	October, 1994	Trailer	Infectious	#143 UK
	6 May 1996	1977	Infectious	#1 UK
	5 October 1998	Nu-Clear Sounds	Infectious	#7 UK
	23 April 2001	Free All Angels	Infectious	#1 UK
	17 May 2004	Meltdown	Infectious	#5 UK
	2 July 2007	Twilight of the Innocents	Infectious	#32 UK

References

1. Ash: We are way better than The Beatles (thelondonpaper)
2. "You Can't Have It All" Release Date BBC
3. http://www.nme.com/news/ash/28918
4. External links
   Ash noquotend -->

   • Official Ash Site
   • Walking Barefoot - An extensive fan site
   • The Ash Files - The ultimate Ash live recordings resource, moderated by the band themselves
   • Official Ash Myspace - Frequently updated by the band, contains videos as well as news

   
   

   v • d • e Ash
   Tim Wheeler | Mark Hamilton | Rick McMurray
   Charlotte Hatherley
   Ash discography
   Albums: Trailer | 1977 | Nu-Clear Sounds | Free All Angels | Meltdown | Twilight of the Innocents
   Live albums and compilations: Live at the Wireless |Tokyo Blitz | Intergalactic Sonic 7″s
   Singles: "Jack Names the Planets" | "Petrol" | "Uncle Pat" | "Kung Fu" | "Girl From Mars" | "Angel Interceptor" | "Goldfinger" | "Oh Yeah" | "A Life Less Ordinary" | "Jesus Says" | "Wildsurf" | "Shining Light" | "Burn Baby Burn" | "Sometimes" | "Candy" | "There's a Star" | "Envy" | "Clones" | "Orpheus" | "Starcrossed" | "Renegade Cavalcade" | "You Can't Have It All" | "Polaris"
   EPs and fan club releases: Get Ready | Barbie | Got a Beautiful Face... Got a Fucked Up Inside | Numbskull | I'm on Drugs | Satellite Transmissions Volume 1 | Commando
   Demo tapes: Solar Happy | Shed | Home Demo | Garage Girl | Pipe Smokin' Brick