After going to concerts in his teenage years, Ash decided to perform on a stage in some way. He started playing guitar around the age of 15, but confessed to having been very lazy and learning only three chords, and nothing more, for about three years. He began playing in cover bands, often together with future band mates David J and Kevin Haskins, whom he had known since nursery school. His first gig was in the Glasgow Rangers Workman's Club.[citation needed]
Daniel Ash in 1986, while in Love and Rockets
Ash had become friends with Peter Murphy during his teenage years. Ash went to art school and Murphy went to work in a printing factory. They met up again five years later and Ash suggested forming a band. Rigging up a makeshift rehearsal space, Ash played an Echo 12 – bar blues, while Murphy sang a series of newspaper articles. Four weeks later, they formed Bauhaus and recorded "Bela Lugosi's Dead".
That song, released in 1979, became one of the most influential songs in gothic rock music, even though they saw themselves as a "dark glam" band and have always distanced themselves from the gothic label. From early on, he was intent on sounding original, and often tried to "make the guitar not sound like a guitar". He worked to develop a guitar style that included other-worldly and atmospheric sounds. In an interview with John Robb, he said that he first bought an EBow in 1981.[9] He typically has used a Telecaster[10] guitar, HH amplifiers and Marshall 4x12 cabinets for his stage gear. Later in his career, he relied heavily on the Fernandes Sustainer system to achieve sounds similar to the EBow.
After nearly five years of recording and performing, Bauhaus broke up and Ash put together Tones on Tail with Bauhaus drummer Kevin Haskins. As Ash described them: "We were a motley crew of individuals who essentially wanted to sound like a band from Venus or Mars!"[citation needed] In 1984, Tones on Tail was disbanded; Ash founded Love and Rockets in 1985 with Haskins and David J, also of Bauhaus. In an interview in June 2009, Ash emphatically stated that he had no further plans to play with Love and Rockets.[10]
Ash has stated that guitar solos do not interest him much, since they rely on a musician's ego. He cares much more for the craft of songwriting and the overall production of a song rather than a focus on guitar or any other single instrument.[11] During the last ten years, he has been experimenting more with electronic music, both with Love and Rockets and solo, limiting the use of guitar as an extra element to the songs. Since the last reformation of Bauhaus, however, he has been returning to a more guitar-based rock sound.[citation needed]
In 2008, Bauhaus released Go Away White, (their first studio album in 25 years) which was followed by a world tour.
Love and Rockets played at Coachella Music and Arts Festival and Lollapalooza in 2008.
In June 2009, Ash released a cover of the David Essex song "Rock On", featuring singer Zak Ambrose on vocals.[10] Recorded at the Swing House rehearsal and recording complex in Hollywood, the track is on the Swing House Sessions Vol 1 EP. Later in 2009, Ash released a four-song EP exclusively through iTunes, entitled "It's A Burn Out".[citation needed]
In 2020, during the Covid pandemic, Ash created a new band, Ashes and Diamonds, comprising Paul Denman on bass, formerly of Sade, and Bruce Smith the former drummer with The Pop Group, Rip Rig + Panic and Public Image Ltd. An album was recorded but has yet to be released due to conflicting schedules between the members.
Love and Rockets reunited in 2023 for a short reunion tour of the United States between May and June 2023, making their first performance since 2008 at Pasadena's annual Cruel World Festival at the Rose Bowl.[14]
Ash reunited with Kevin Haskins and Diva Dompe under the Tones on Tail moniker at Cruel World in May 2024.[15]
Poptone (Daniel Ash, Kevin Haskins, Diva Dompé) performing at the Regency Ballroom in San Francisco.
Contained his two albums for Beggars Banquet with B-sides and a bonus disc of collaborations, compilations tracks and more.
Other
1991 – "Heaven Is Waiting", a B-side from the "This Love" and "Walk This Way" singles, was included on the Beggars Banquet Recordscompilation albumMoney Is Not the Answer
^Greg Prato (11 May 2022). "Kim Thayil names 11 guitar players who shaped his sound". Guitar World. Future plc, Future Publishing Limited Quay House. Retrieved 4 August 2022. "In between the late '70s punk rock/new wave explosion and 1984/SST, there was a British post-punk thing, and I picked up on the style and elements of Daniel Ash. Once again, specifically the use of feedback, slashing, and pick scrapes and finger squeaks on the strings." "All these elements that were incidental, producers and recording engineers often tried to keep off the tape. It's also stuff that guitarists tried to avoid doing because they thought it was incidental, noise and unintended. "Ash embraced that as all part of the depth of the music and created that sort of 'cinematic depth' – kind of in the way that Pere Ubu had this weird literary dynamic to the way they did things. So, they weren't afraid of the picks scrapes, the squeaks, and the use of space. It was just amazing. "And on some level, it's fun and wild, but it's also courageous and arty. It inspired me not to be afraid of these components of playing guitar. I didn't have to work my way out of them – I could incorporate them into the songs."
