Ash have today been confirmed as headliners of the 2nd stage at the Splendour Festival at Wollaton Park in Nottingham on July 19th. They will be joined by around eight other bands yet to be confirmed. For the first time Splendour will feature an additional two stages, plus a comedy stage.
The main stage line-up for the event on Sunday July 19 is now complete with Madness, The Pogues, Fun Lovin’ Criminals, Imelda May, The Rifles, Kid British and Dog Is Dead appearing.
Ash have released the music video for their comeback single Return of White Rabbit. Conceived, illustrated and animated in-house at Big Button, Return of White Rabbit is a dark tale of love, jealousy, and revenge set to the band’s bass-heavy, frenetic comeback single. The video was produced by Big Button with director/lead animator Nico Jones, illustrator Shane Holley and 3D modeling by Darren Bowler.
Taking a break from rehearsals recently for last weeks UK shows Ash spoke to The Ultimate Festival Site about the upcoming A-Z singles series, how Return of White Rabbit evolved and their favourite festival experiences.
Ash have been performing two new songs, from their upcoming A-Z singles series on their current mini UK tour. True Love 1980, which will be the first in the singles series in September and Spaceshot, which will follow later, you can see clips of both songs along with an interesting jam of Return of White Rabbit below. These videos come from the Bloomsbury Ballroom show in London on June 6th.
Ash played the first of two show at London’s Bloomsbury Ballroom last night, the set included two new songs True Love 1980 and Spaceshot. The full set ran as follows:
Walking Barefoot
Girl From Mars
A Life Less Ordinary
Goldfinger
Spaceshot
You Cant Have It All
Petrol
Sometimes
Wildsurf
Oh Yeah
Ritual
Kung Fu
True Love 1980
Orpheus
Twilight of The Innocents
Shining Light
Return of White Rabbit
Vampire Love
Jack Names The Planets
Burn Baby Burn
Ash have released the Mark Hamilton penned song Return of White Rabbit as a free download on their official website. The band will also make 1000 limited edition 7" available to buy through mail order and selected independent record shops from June 8.
The bands new single Return of White Rabbit sees the band throwing angular guitars over electro hooks and growling bass, in a febrile departure from their recent output. Created with resident engineer Claudius Mittendorfer, this is an urgent and liberating take on classic heart-tugging Ash, indicative of the darker electronic influence across the forthcoming releases.
The exclusive promo CD’s of Return of White Rabbit have been artworked personally by members of the band: including Rick’s pack of playing cards, Tim’s apocalyptic bunny rabbits and Mark’s day-glo stencils.
The single release of Return of White Rabbit is the starting point for an exciting and ambitious plan from the band. For the past year Ash have been holed up in their New York HQ, Atomic Heart Studios, writing and recording a series of songs, the band have announced that these songs will form the “A-Z series”. From September, each fortnight for the next twelve months, Ash will release a single on limited 7" vinyl and digital download. Commencing with ‘A’ and running through the alphabet, all 26 songs will be released on Ash’s own Atomic Heart Records and will be available through shops and by subscription through the band’s official website.
To warm up for their two dates at the Bloomsbury Ballroom on the 6th and 7th June Ash will be playing two warm up shows:
Weds 3rd June – Concorde 2 Brighton
Thurs 4th June – Wedgewood Rooms Portsmouth
Pre-sale tickets for the warm up shows and Bloomsbury Ballroom tickets are available now. Tickets for the warm up shows go on general sale 9am Tuesday 5th May.
Due to phenomenal demand Ash will follow their show on Saturday 6th June with a second night at the Bloomsbury Ballroom, London on Sunday 7th June 2009.
