20 years on Ash are set for big party

20 years on Ash are set for big party

13 June 2012 - by BY JOANNE FLEMING

WHILE determinedly fresh faced themselves, Ash are about to make anyone over the age of 30 feel old.

That’s because they are about to celebrate 20 years —yes 20 — as one of Northern Ireland’s most famous musical exports.

“Well, we were only 15 when we started,” says Tim Wheeler, unfazed and looking forward to a weekend of partying back home.

Tim, accompanied by his band mates Mark Hamilton and Rick McMurray, plan

on marking the moment by stopping off from their international tour for an intimate gig at Belfast’s Oh Yeah centre.

The centre is named after the Ash song and tickets for Friday’s event have already sold out. The birthday celebrations continue on Sunday with the #ASH20 Birthday party at the Relentless Garage, London.

The story of their early days is well-known by now. Tim Wheeler (vocals and guitar), Mark Hamilton (bass) and Rick McMurray (drums) met in Down High School, and, no good at football, formed a band, calling it the first name they liked in the dictionary.

Grunge was at its peak and inspired by the likes of Nirvana they funded countless demos with money saved by starving themselves during lunch break and an “infamous tuck shop scam”.

In the days before MySpace and X-Factor, Ash had to do it the traditional, hard slog, demo tape way, eventually making it on to Radio One, impressing influential DJs Steve Lamacq, John Peel and Mark Radcliffe. Months later the 17 year-olds’ fates were sealed, and they signed to Infectious Records.

But looking back on the many people they have to thank for helping them hit the big time, one unexpected name creeps on to the list — former Down High School principal, Jack Ferris.

“We were kids,” reflects Tim. “He let us out of our exams to go on tour for two weeks. It’s true. It was a very important tour as well.

“I think we were in lower sixth. Our manager had to wait outside the headmaster’s office; he said it had been a while since he had had to do that. I think Jack Ferris saw something there in us. So yeah, he was a pretty cool headmaster!”

From their first studio album 1977, Ash would go on to produce a further three studio albums and steal the show at festivals such as Glastonbury in the mid to late 90s.

But it wasn’t all plain sailing. Feeling the pressure, writers’ block ensued after 1998 and some had the band written off.

Asked by Bono to help promote the ‘Yes’ campaign for the Good Friday Agreement, a historic concert at Belfast’s Waterfront Hall helped bring them back to public attention and in January 2001 Ash’s first chart single in almost two years, Shining Light, broke into the UK Top 10. Their new album Free All Angels was also released in May beating Janet Jackson to the coveted Number One spot. The platinum-selling album arrived just in the nick of time, as Ash freely acknowledged to being close to bankruptcy.

“A couple of times things really went down hill,” admits Tim.

“I learnt, however, that if you can stick together you can get through anything, it is never that bad. The answer is work really hard. Come back really strong.

“Taking part in the Good Friday Agreement concert was great — music can provide links in the way other things can’t. Northern Ireland is now quite a hip place to be and it gets better all the time.”

The 20th anniversary of Ash will be marked with the release of a new EP, on both limited edition 12” vinyl and digital download. Full details have yet to be released but it will be called Little Infinity and contain a number of cover tracks.

“It will be nice to release something new,” says Tim, who previously signalled a move away from any more albums. “We may return to albums but we wanted to move away from 26 singles in a year. It was important to break away from that cycle.”

Describing it as an “eclectic” collection, fans can expect covers as varied as the Beach Boys ‘Do you Wanna Dance’ to Carly Simon, transformed from 80s ballad into rock.

“It is nice to get an acknowledgement of the anniversary and have the chance to thank local people for their support,” said Tim, ahead of his return home this weekend.

“We come home lots. Me and Mark live in New York now so we come back down to earth. I don’t think we would have lasted so long if we hadn’t been so grounded.”

Thinking 20 years ahead from now is impossible, but with so many ‘boy bands’ splitting up only to reform in their more mature years, perhaps Ash will break the mould and just keep going?

“We’ll just have to see how it goes,” Tim muses. “We never really had a plan beyond six months.”