Ash head into space for their ninth album, picking up Graham Coxon of Blur en-route. Out on the 3rd of October on Fierce Panda.
Somehow, ‘Girl From Mars’ is thirty years old in 2026. It is easy to forget just how young the band were when they released their superb debut album 1977. Tim Wheeler was still sitting his A-Levels when he first heard himself played on the radio. They have a clutch of other classics including ‘Shining Light,’ ‘A Life Less Ordinary’ and by far the greatest of the lot, ‘Burn Baby Burn.’
Having tasted success and flirted with disaster Ash have had something of a realignment over the last ten years. They are one of those rare middle-aged bands who seem somewhat content with their lot, neither burning out nor fully fading away. The headline tours are in smaller venues, the support slots for other bands more frequent. It is abundantly clear though that Ash are just having a huge amount of fun and enjoying every second of being in a band. That sense of fun has very much bled through into the new album ‘Ad Astra.’
There is a degree of playfulness that starts with the cover, the band wearing space suits watching a guitar shaped rocket blast off. Has a Summer of supporting those comedy rockers The Darkness left them wanting to get in on the act? As ‘Zarathustra’ starts you do wonder if this is going to be a full-on space-themed concept album. Thankfully, they haven’t taken leave of their senses completely and the space theming turns out to be fairly minimal beyond the opening and closing tracks. For any classical music fans, or those of acclaimed director Stanley Kubrick, it only takes a few seconds to work out Zarathustra is a guitar led riff on Richard Strauss’ ‘Also sprach Zarathustra.’ First performed in 1895 but intrinsically linked to Kubrick’s seminal ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’ this version shows Ash are quite happy not to take themselves too seriously. If it doesn’t serve as their music to walk out to, on their soon to start tour, they are missing a trick. This gives way to ‘Which One Do You Want?’ which is absolutely classic Ash and one of the high points of the album. Ash are fine musicians and when they fire on all cylinders it is always great to see.
The strong start continues with ‘Fun People’ which is an absolute riot. Graham Coxon keeps delivering the refrain ‘Fun People, f-f-f-f fun people’ and some of the backing vocals, whilst also contributing high powered guitar. This one crunches along in a heavy rock style and the result is spectacular. All parts gel together and Wheeler’s yowling, yelling moments suggests Ash could have a crack at a proper metal album should the mood take them.
Amongst some very solid work there are a few wobbles. ‘My Favourite Ghost’ tops out the lyrical offenders whilst the music is somewhat twee: “You are my favourite ghost, the one who comes around the most. The one who never lets me sleep, the one I always want to keep” is a bit primary school poetry. ‘Hallion’ has a much better tune but raises a few winces in the rhyming as well. In the middle ‘Deadly Love’ starts off with serious Muse stylings until the lead guitar takes it in another direction.
There are some moments that stay with you your whole life. Where were you when Princess Diana died?/When the Twin Towers fell?/When the Covid lockdown was announced? To that list we add, “Where were you when you first saw the video for Ash’s cover of ‘Jump In The Line’? Apparently, they have been using the original as exit music from their live shows for a few years. Those of us who haven’t been to see Ash of late had to firmly pick up our jaws from the floor when this was released. It is not often I am reduced to speechlessness, but it took a good three viewings to start making sense of it all. The song choice seemed crazy, but the infectious energy of Ash makes it work. The Evil Dead inspired video makes more sense when you discover Ash were involved in filming a horror slasher movie back in 2003 in which they had roped in Chris Martin and Jonny Buckland of Coldplay, who they were supporting at the time, as well as other people like Dave Grohl and Moby. It never got finished, though some of the footage ended up in the Ash video for ‘Binary’. It shows they enjoy a horror movie though, leading to this madness below.
‘Keep Dreaming’ is a classic slab of Ash indie-pop before ‘Dehumanised’ nearly steals the whole show. The strong ending is finished off by the return of Coxon, on backing vocals, on final track ‘Ad Astra.’
The album is at times an uneven listen, but overall the quality is far higher than on previous albums Race The Night and Islands. There are a number of fine additions to the Ash canon that will neatly sit alongside their early classics. Ash clearly had a lot of fun making it and that sense of enjoyment carries over to the listener.
Reading Indie Life 
Leave a comment