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the todd harrison rock archive Daniel Ash Burns Down the Bauhaus One morning a couple of years ago, Daniel Ash found a piece of paper on the floor of a cafe in Bristol. The former Bauhaus, Love and Rockets and Tones on Tail guitarist and vocalist picked up the paper and discovered a poem, written in a "little kid's handwriting." He pocketed his find and tried without success to contact the author, a local art school teacher who wrote the poem for her son. Undeterred by trifles like copyright (hey, at least he tried), Ash recorded his eight-year-old nephew Allister reading the lyrics and combined the lad's recitation with an eerie instrumental bed he'd recorded at four in the morning in a Malibu studio a few months earlier. The finished product, "Kid 2000," is one of the best tracks on Ash's new self-titled album, which hits stores on Feb. 5. To casual fans of Bauhaus or Love and Rockets, all 14 tracks (counting the obligatory "hidden" song at the end) on Daniel Ash will probably sound as though Ash found them on the floor of a cafe -- they're nothing like "Bela Lugosi's Dead" or "So Alive." As you can imagine, though, that's the whole idea. "I could never go back to just doing a band thing -- like bass, drums and guitar and that's it," Ash says. He's been feeding his ears "mostly a strict diet of dance music" lately, and he figures that a fusion between synth loops and snare drums is his next logical creative step. "Otherwise," he says, "what are you going to do? Are you going to sound like, I don't know, some band from 20 years ago? I mean, there's no point in that for me. This is just what's happening now. It just feels right." Hmm, sounds familiar. See, the forty-four year-old Ash represents a classic case of Artist, Renowned For Work In A Specific Genre, Gets A Little Sick Of Being Pigeonholed Into Said Genre And Tries Something New. But Ash is smart: he's branched off into a genre he's been flirting with for years (Tones on Tail even scored a dance club hit in 1984 with "Go"). So the album shouldn't come as a huge shock, though it's bound to make a few classicist goth kids even more depressed then they already are. Ash formed Bauhaus in Northampton, England in 1978 with Daniel Haskins (drums), Haskins' brother David J (bass) and Peter Murphy (vocals). The band's debut single, "Bela Lugosi's Dead," was released in Aug., 1979 and is now generally regarded as one of the founding elements of "goth-rock." The band released four albums and several singles and EPs before breaking up in 1983. Ash then turned his attention to Tones on Tail, a side project he'd formed in 1981 with Bauhaus roadie Glen Campling. Tones on Tail -- with Haskins on drums -- released the eclectic album Pop in 1984, and disbanded when Ash, Haskins and J formed Love and Rockets after a failed Bauhaus reunion. Love and Rockets produced four albums and scored a top-ten hit with "So Alive" in 1989. The band then went on hiatus as its members concentrated on solo projects. Ash recorded two albums in the early '90s before Love and Rockets reformed and released three more records before folding in 1999 after a Bauhaus reunion tour and a jaunt in support of the last Love and Rockets record, Lift. Since then, Ash has been relatively quiet. He hired Portishead's Adrian Utley to work his trip-hop mojo on the song "Trouble" for the soundtrack to the film American Psycho, and he released a three-song EP in 2000 featuring the track "Mastermind." Both of these tunes appear on Daniel Ash, though the album version of "Trouble" is the original, pre-Utley mix. Ash says this was merely a "legal issue," but he thinks his original version "works well in the context of this album." He's right; "Trouble" is a highlight. Live drums and an industrialish loop set a midtempo groove, and Ash's earthy doubletracked vocals, sometimes slightly out-of-sync, give the song an unprocessed, organic feel. In addition, "Mastermind" features the best (if only) guitar lick on the record, and "Burning Man" proves Ash has done his dance music homework. "Spooky," the first single, is a cover of the 1968 hit by Company IV, but Ash says he was more inspired by Dusty Springfield's cover of the song than by the original version. Either way, it's the most straight-ahead song on Daniel Ash, and it sounds kind of tossed-off. Ditto for the leadoff track, "Hollywood Fix," which features Ash repeating the mantra "Jesus flies when you're having fun" about a dozen times too many. All the songs, though, strongly hint at the fact that Ash is feeling none too pleased about the trappings of the 21st-century rock machine. It's not that he's hopping mad -- his telephone manner when discussing the subject is the approximate halfway point between the diplomatic cooing of Tony Blair and the disaffected mumble David St. Hubbins -- but he's certainly sick of the game. It's a good thing, then, that he's hooked up with Psychobaby records. "I've gone with a record company that have branched off from the corporate rock format," Ash says. "These two guys that have formed this company that I'm with, they have reacted against [the] blatant commercial side of things. Because it shows in the end: you make generic rock, or generic techno. These guys aren't like that -- they recognise the real stuff. I'm lucky I hooked up with them." There's one trapping, though, that Ash can't avoid: touring. The songs on Daniel Ash will, of course, feature prominently in the set list, but Ash is preparing a few treats for longtime fans. "I'm gonna do 'Go' from Tones on Tail," he says. "In fact, that was the first thing we rehearsed. It worked out great. And then we'll probably be doing a couple of things from Love and Rockets, and something from Bauhaus: 'Slice of Life.'" And don't worry, Ash promises he won't mess with his back catalogue. "I'm gonna do them exactly as they were originally," he says. "I don’t believe in fucking around with tracks like that. They are what they are. It always sounds a bit pseudo to me if you try and jazz them up and make them sound contemporary—they either work in their own way or they don’t." He's assembled a band featuring some collaborators on his record: John De Salvo will play drums and Patina Creme will handle the bass, with Ash on guitar and vocals. The fourth member of his touring outfit, however, is a bit of an enigma: Curious? Thought so. More dates will be announced soon, but here's what's confirmed at the moment:
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