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Ash - Manchester Academy 3 - Ash Wednesday 21st February 2007
http://www.ash-official.com/newsimages/MadchesterfirstnightXL.jpg
Wow the academy 3 is small. 3rd floor of a student union bar. Not much bigger than our local live bands rock club. Not many
people waiting at 8pm, we get straight to third row of standing. The width of the room is so small that u get a good central view
wherever u stand. Lots of students, crap music playing over the pa.
Support act V-Formation come out. Pretty good for an unknown support. We had a great view of the drummer, who was placed
at the front of the stage. Noticed the guitarists were using pretty cheap guitars. Some good tunes in their set, and they gradually
got more applause from audience nearer to the end of their set. Early on there was a lot of people shouting for ash songs lol.
Paparatsi push in after their set! The road crew brought out the set lists. Was so tempting to read them but I ended up avoiding
it. Some people were trying to take photos of them round a corner. Pete found a couple of dozen funny names on blue tooth
mobile phones.
Out come Ash! Some crap intro tune, but luckily didnt last long. Then they kicked off their set. Crowd started jumping straight away,
and crowd shuffled up a hellova lot the entire night. I must have been in about 10 different spots over the night. Crowd started to chant
"Ash.... on ash wednesday" which got a few laughs from Tim Wheeler.
Very cool being so close to the stage without a big gap like at the bigger venues. Especially when the bassist and guitarist came to
the edge to do their solos. Burn baby burn was second song in, which really got the crowd going.
They did a bunch of new tracks scattered throughout. All sounded decent. Normally takes me time to get used to songs though to be
able to remember much. The final song of the main set sounded particularly cool, probably my favourite of them on first listed, called In
Hell. A very long epic type of a song. Walking barefoot and Girl from mars probably got the most crowd jumping in the main set.
Renegade Cavalacade was a nice surprise, one of my favs from the Meltdown album and didnt expect to hear it.
Onto the encore which was awesome. Petrol kicked things off, and the awesome Kung Fu finished off the night. The crowd just went
mental in Kung Fu, I was like a human pinball dodging crowd surfers at the same time. Was awesome though.
A great gig and a real treat to be able to see a band as big as Ash in a venue as tiny as this (only like 400-500 people there). The
band and the crowd were both on top form, they certainly attracted a good bunch (never noticed any asses and everyone was lively).
The band seemed to like to crowd too. Looking forward to the new album and a future tour when it's released.
Set List:
Lose Control
Burn Baby Burn
Jesus Says
You Cant Have It All
Orpheus
Goldfinger
Suicide Girl
Renegade Cavalacade
Walking Barefoot
Polaris
A Life Less Ordinary
Oh Yeah
Girl From Mars
In Hell
Petrol
I Started A Fire
Vampire Love
Kung Fu
Ash on Myspace: Madchester... You Rocked! Thanks, It was awesome!
Ash.com: "Ash Wednesday...Last nights gig in Manchester was a storming show, here's a few reviews of Ash on Ash Wednesday!"
Review from MEN:
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Ash @ Academy 3
4star
Steve Baker
21/02/07
CAPABLE of selling out the Apollo - Ash, fresh from recording their sixth studio album Stateside hit the road – opting to
downsize to a modest touring circuit for the first of two nights in Manchester.
Playing to a (no surprise) sold out Academy 3, Loose Control opens tonight’s show, its raw riffing is a scruff of the neck
shakedown, full of perfect impact and sees bassist Mark Hamilton cramming in every rock posture, strut and pose with
his low slung Firebird before the first chorus even completes.
Without much time to pause, Burn Baby Burn is met with a 400-strong roar of approval - Wheeler, who provides ample
chance for the audience to join in - shows just what festival gigging makes of a band - in creating a welcome sense of
interaction from the audience without detracting from delivery, intent or lyrical structure.
Forthcoming single You Can’t Have It All and new material I Started A Fire and Suicide Girls have a cantering pop quality
about them - confirming Ash’s direction to be much of the same: following their proven blueprint for rock-indie pop and
keeping in a territory they know and can execute well.
Energised
Walking Barefoot, Polaris and A Life Less Ordinary are rich and energised - further enhanced by an excellent mix and a
lavish, high spec lighting rig - adding that extra percent to what has become an already perfect gig.
Both Wheeler and Hamilton seem content with the intimacy and reception the venue affords.
In between song chants from the Academy of “Ash Wednesday… Ash Wednesday” causes Wheeler some amusement.
And despite a steady line of crowd surfers finding their way over the monitors andonto the stage, Wheeler seems non
deterred – his nifty footwork ensures vocal presence is maintained throughout - never dropping a line away from the mic
or interrupting the job in hand.
With a few crowd pleasers missing – rested off to make way for newer material (Shining Light, Angel Interceptor,
Sometimes) the set still maintains good energy and does not feel undercooked in any part, laboured nor dull.
Encore Petrol sounds beefier than ever. Vampire Love leads into tonight’s superb closer Kung Fu - ensuring a final rush
of last minute crowd surfers make it onstage to join Ash before the evening closes.
With You Can’t Have It All due for release in April and a large gigging festival calendar needing filling - undoubtedly Ash
will return to 60,000 top billing slots, but for those present for tonight’s intimate gig, Manchester’s Ash Wednesday has been
one to remember.
http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/entertainment/music/livereviews/s/236/236881_ash__academy_3.html
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Review from XFM:
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Ash, Manchester Academy, February 21 2007
Three years on from the lukewarm response to the band’s last album and following the departure of guitarist Charlotte
Hatherley, Ash are back as a three-piece with new songs and, thankfully, a new fire.
Despite being one of the biggest Brit-rock bands of the nineties, the Ash of late didn’t quite seem to be functioning on all
cylinders. Sure, they had the extra power and glamour that came with the addition of second guitarist Hatherley and the
Stateside sound of the band’s last album ‘Meltdown’ drew from the same raw materials that make the Foo Fighters such
an appealing prospect, but still something was missing.
Fast-forward to 2007’s pair of tiny Manchester Academy 3 dates and the band that first hit the headlines before they’d even
left school are back as a three-piece. Collectively older and wiser, frontman Tim Wheeler looks to have barely aged and still
bounds around the stage like a teenager.
To his right, bass player Mark Hamilton still towers over him and drummer Rick McMurray still drums with the look in his eye
of a man who, were he not behind the kit, would probably be out on a killing spree armed only with a pair of drumsticks and a
manic stare.
And best of all Ash still sound great. With a setlist designed specifically to remind audiences just how many amazing songs
they have, the band are now following their 90s peers Supergrass into the “I didn’t realise they had that many tunes” bracket.
But first the new material: Ash may have lured the 400 sweating bodies to the Academy with the promise of ‘Girl From Mars’
but they want them to stay for the band’s forthcoming, currently-untitled album.
So we get come-back single ‘You Can’t Have It All’ and ‘I Started A Fire’ (the band are giving it away free here - go now!)
which bristle with Ash’s trademark pop-punk energy, and upbeat rocker ‘Suicide Girls’, but more interesting is set closer ‘In
Hell’ which finds Wheeler screaming like Pixies frontman Frank Black over sheets of distortion and marks something of a
departure from the band’s standard template.
But as promising as the new tracks are it’s the classics which really show off just how good Ash are, and how, in the main,
they’re coping sonically as a three piece. ‘Burn Baby Burn’ and ‘Orpheus’ shine, ‘A Life Less Ordinary’ rolls along at pace,
while ‘Jesus Says’, ‘Walking Barefoot’, ‘Goldfinger’, ‘Oh Yeah’, ‘Girl From Mars’ and a final explosive ‘Kung Fu’ hammer
home how strong the band’s back catalogue is.
Played to perfection, the future of Ash now lies in the recordings of their next album. An interesting prospect that will show
whether Wheeler and co can bounce-back into the nation's hearts.
I Started A Fire? Actually it never went out, it just needs that little extra bit of Petrol to get the flames roaring again
Jon Ford http://www.xfmmanchester.co.uk/Article.asp?b=reviews&id=355634 |
Pictures from XFM.co.uk (unfortunately XFM has disabled the ability to directly link to these and therefore post in here, but you can
click the link below to view them):
http://www.xfmmanchester.co.uk/photowall.asp?id=27034&view=scheduled
small gigs rock
only 500 people
great venue
good sound
couldnt get much closer to the band
mainly student lads but some pretty girls, not many tho
very lucky to get to see this band at such a small venue and especially for the price |
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