Track Listing

Disc 1:

1. Burn Baby Burn
2. Envy
3. Girl From Mars
4. Shining Light
5. A Life Less Ordinary
6. Goldfinger
7. Jesus Says
8. Oh Yeah
9. Jack Names the Planets
10. Sometimes
11. Kung Fu
12. Candy
13. Angel Interceptor
14. Uncle Pat
15. Wildsurf
16. Walking Barefoot
17. Petrol
18. There's a Star
19. Numbskull

Disc 2:

1. No Place To Hide
2. Warmer Than Fire
3. Where Is Our Love Going?
4. Taken Out
5. 13th Floor
6. Stormy Waters
7. Message From Oscar Wilder and Patrick The Brewer
8. Who You Drivin Now?
9. Stay In Love Forever
10. The Sweetness of Death by the Obsidian Knife
11. Melon Farmer
12. Nocturne
13. Gabriel
14. Coasting
15. Lose Control
16. I Need Somebody
17. Sneaker
18. Cantina Band
19. Astral Conversations with Toulouse Lautrec
20. Day of the Triffids
21. Halloween
22. Thinking About You

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #10253 in Music
• Released on: 2002-09-09
• Number of discs: 1

Amazon.co.uk Review
Intergalactic Sonic 7"s, which arrives hot on the heels of their blistering "Burn Baby Burn" success, confirms what everyone knew already--Ash are a great singles band. It's amazing how often they pull off a perfect three minutes--even though just teenagers at the time of their debut. Witness the bittersweet memories of "Girl From Mars", the rain-lashed, drunken teenage love of "Goldfinger" through the glorious adolescence of "Oh Yeah" (and who hasn't experienced that hormonal surging as "her hair came undone in my hands"?). Compiling a standard tracklisting would always be a hideous undertaking, hence the proud emergence of this 19 track beast instead.

The Free All Angels singles continue this remarkable tradition, best demonstrated in "Sometimes", a song as close to perfection as possible that--along with "Shining Light", "Burn Baby Burn" and "Walking Barefoot" (not actually a single, but one that should have been)--show the maturity in Wheeler's songwriting and musicianship that resurrected his band from the edge of disaster after the fallout from the non-conforming Nu-Clear Sounds. Token new track "Envy" seems pale in comparison, largely due to the quality of Free All Angels material, but at least the grimy New York gutter riffage of the swaggering "Jesus Says" and summertime exuberance of "Wildsurf" are given the air they need here. Also present is the much-underrated but indispensable "A Life Less Ordinary", finally in a place that it deserves along with some earlier efforts ("Petrol") that perhaps are not. Ash are what teenagers with guitars should sound like, because teenage boys care about girls and getting wasted, not becoming victims of conformity. --Ben Johncock

Customer Reviews

Tonnes of great singles, and from a band so young
Although only in their twenties, Northern Ireland's Ash have been around for many years, and have survived hard times as well as revelling in real success, including this collection of singles. Their tracks vary quite a bit, ranging from the intense shouty Numbskull to the pop-tastic Wildsurf, the beautifully poignant Sometimes and the exhuberantly orchestral Candy. Essentially they hinge around power-pop, with airy riffs and optimistic lyrics, mostly about love and lust. Anyone who likes Weezer or Fountains Of Wayne will love this.

Most of the tracks on here are extremely impressive - both Shining Light (a melancholic ballad which can be seen as being about love, God or drugs, depending on interpretation) and Burn Baby Burn (the ultimate in singalong rock) having won Single Of the Year awards (for the same year). Sometimes is my absolute favourite though, the sheer beauty has to be heard to be believed.

The earlier hits such as Girl From Mars and Oh Yeah have such wistful innocence and joie de vivre that it's hard not to be impressed, especially as the band wrote them while still at school. Although their Nu-Clear Sounds album wasn't as commercially successful, it supplies three great tracks here - Numbskull, Jesus Says and Wildsurf.

The second disk is superb as well, comprising some of their classic bonus tracks. They've clearly taken a lot of pride in many of these, most would be up to album standard, and several (especially The Sweetness Of Death, Nocturne and 13th Floor) could easily be hts in their own right. The Sweetness of Death is almost certainly the only song ever to make a melody out of the word 'melatonin', which has to be worth something in itself.

Nationality doesnt matter with music
In regards to the review below by Edna Sweetlove - your comments make no sense to me. If you want to criticize Ash for their music then fine, but having a go just because they dont sound "Irish" enough is ludricous and unfair. If they were from England would you be saying that they dont sound "English" enough? Ash have never set out to pander to the kind of faux Irishness that rubbish like the Coors do, and instead sound like their influences which is mainly US punk pop and classic rock.
Now whilst I admit that Ash are not one of the worlds greatest bands by any stretch of the imagination, they have nonetheless produced some corking classic singles - Kung Fu, Girl From Mars, Jack Names The Planets, Angel Interceptor, Goldfinger, Walking Barefoot, Burn Baby Burn - and seeing as this collection contains them all I will happily give this 4 stars.

The ultimate Ash collection
Finally – a chance to have Ash’s best all on one CD! As much as I love their music, there is a tendency for Ash albums to contain a couple of dodgy tracks which always result in you pressing the skip button every so often. But a collection of all their best ends all that – there is not a single track on this album deserving of a skip. With a fantastic opening from their more recent “Burn Baby Burn”, through to the heavy “Numbskull”, this singles compilation is proof of Ash’s talent and range of sounds. The classics “Girl from Mars” and “A Life Less Ordinary” (which incidentally doesn’t feature on any other Ash album) both feature, along with a few of their really early tracks like the fantastic “Uncle Pat”, which you may not have heard if you haven’t heard their demo album. This will add to the collection of any fan and also gain them new fans along the way – if you don’t have any of the band’s material, buy this record because it will introduce you to the musical greatness that is ASH!