Album Title
Ash
Artist Icon 1977 (1996)
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First Released

Calendar Icon 1996

Genre

Genre Icon Alternative Rock

Mood

Mood Icon Reflective

Style

Style Icon Rock/Pop

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Release Format Icon Album

Record Label Release

Speed Icon Infectious Records

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Album Description
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1977 is the first official album by Ash, released in May 1996 in the United Kingdom and Ireland, and the following month in the US. The punk rock influenced album proved popular in the UK and Ireland, and to a lesser degree elsewhere, where Britpop was a smaller cult phenomenon.

The title refers to a year of three events that shaped the band: the births of two of the band-members; the year the first punk albums were released; and the release of Star Wars. The album opens with the sound of a TIE Fighter, and ends with the track "Darkside Lightside", the title of which is a Star Wars reference, and which climaxes with a choral version of the Star Wars theme. The band also covered "Cantina Band", as the b-side to the "Girl From Mars" single.

Jackie Chan is celebrated in the lyrics of "Kung Fu", and used the song for the end credits of his movie Rumble in the Bronx. The song "Lose Control" was featured in the game Gran Turismo: the first time one of the band's songs was used in a videogame (it was later followed by "Burn Baby Burn" from the album Free All Angels, featured in Tiger Woods PGA Tour 2003, and by "Orpheus" from the album Meltdown, featured in Burnout 3: Takedown).

The first 50,000 pressings of the CD feature the original version of "Jack Names the Planets" and its b-side "Don't Know" (February 1994), hidden in the album's pregap: they are accessed by 'rewinding' from track one. There is also a hidden track of band members vomiting in a non-musical tape recording named, "Sick Party", which appears after "Darkside Lightside" on all versions.

Several music magazines placed the album in their end-of-year lists for 1996, including NME, Melody Maker, Q, Select and Kerrang. It is also included in the book 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die. The album is currently certified Platinum by the BPI and, according to the biography on the official site, has sold over two million copies around the world.

Ash played the album in its entirety at London Roundhouse on September 5, 2008. Following the huge demand and speed of which the Roundhouse show sold out, they also added a show at London Astoria for the following day, Saturday 6 September, 2008. A three-disc collector's edition of the album was released on November 3, 2008.

In June 2013, Ash announced a three date tour of Australia, playing 1977 in its entirety, followed by a set of greatest hits.
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User Album Review
If ever a band was the sound of fruity alcopops, Ash might well have been it on 1977.

There are albums that define generations, and then there are those that will forever soundtrack a flash rather than a lingering resonance heard across the years. Ash’s debut LP, named in honour of the year Star Wars hit cinema screens and "opened" by the scream of a TIE Fighter (unless you had a CD copy with two hidden tracks at the beginning – this writer did), falls face-first into the latter category, sauce from last night’s takeaway still sticky on its chin and with a less-than-faint whiff of booze about it.

1977 is perhaps best remembered by those who shared in its sentiments – written by a trio of teenagers, for an audience of the same, it preoccupied itself with chugging alcohol, chasing after girls and messing about with martial arts. Frontman Tim Wheeler was just 19 at the time of its release and, like most 19-year-olds, was likely enjoying legal drinking age status; but his songs recall a time just previous to chucking away the fake ID, where park benches were bar stools and a bottle of flavoured wine drink was the choice of the get-drunk-quick teen on their way to a parents-away party.

For this writer, who sold a games console to pick up this record (amongst others, in a since-closed-down-local-indie-shop binge), singles like Angel Interceptor, Girl From Mars and Kung Fu will forever soundtrack foggy memories of spilling out of houses that weren’t home, at a time when bed should have been reached some hours earlier. And this writer is certain he’s not alone in feeling that way.

But listening today, almost 16 years after its release, 1977 isn’t all pop-punk knock-abouts in the vein of its mini-LP predecessor Trailer (one of its tracks, Jack Names the Planets, is one of the pre-Lose Control hidden gems). Goldfinger has stood up to the test of time mightily well, roaring into life with a maturity that wouldn’t fully compose itself until Ash’s third album, 2001’s Free All Angels. Here, bespectacled drummer Rick McMurray sounds as if he’s pounding mountains while lanky bassist Mark Hamilton’s pulling off Jedi mind tracks with his four-string; at the time of writing, the toes can’t help but tap along to something of a Britpop-period classic.

Hamilton’s sole solo composition, Innocent Smile, is amongst the simpler arrangements, in debt to stateside grunge bands and replete with delinquent lyrics – but its raw energy remains as infectious in 2012 as it’s ever been. Best-known cut Oh Yeah helped shift its share of albums, peaking at 6 on the singles chart in the June of 1996, and Wheeler’s imperfect vocal makes its tale of teenage infatuation all the more believable. He’d become a better singer, but has never quite conveyed emotion as perfectly as he did so here. And to the ears of a 16-year-old, his words were gospel: this was the way to rule.

And rule Ash certainly did: every single from 1977, 95's Girl From Mars onwards, went top 20, and their between-LPs effort A Life Less Ordinary (from the film of the same name) was also a top 10 hit. Their stock may have fallen in recent years, but to listeners of a certain vintage Ash will forever be summer holidays and half-inched hooch, stained into the grey like a spilled alcopop.


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