Ashes And Diamonds is the missing link I'd been looking for.

Ashes And Diamonds: Bruce Smith, Daniel Ash, and Paul Spencer Denman
(Photos by Chelsea Miller, Regan Catam, and Stuart Matthewman)

In the ’80s I got into a really heavy Love And Rockets phase. Both the comic book and the band, but for this post I’m talking about the band. My high school girlfriend introduced me to their music and it sent me down a rabbit hole of reading and searching out all things Bauhaus, Tones on Tail, and Bubblemen; import cassette tapes and 12” singles; and an effort to connect the dots between all the varied sounds and trace them back to the three men—Daniel Ash, David J, and Kevin Haskins—who spanned all those different musical outfits various configurations.

 

I saw Love And Rockets play in the late ‘80s as they toured their self-titled 4th album—with The Pixies opening!—and as they teetered on the edge of what appeared to be stardom, I eagerly awaited the next album. 

 

And waited. And waited.

 

And while there was no new Love and Rockets album in sight, when Daniel Ash released a solo album in 1990 I bought it immediately and was let down by its collection of hushed ballads, but since it was a solo album I figured he was just exploring more personal whims while Love And Rockets proper worked on their next masterpiece. And what a masterpiece it might be! Though some rumors claimed the band was exploring a jazz direction (hinted at on recent b-sides from the time) I convinced myself that would be fine as long as the jazzier numbers were nestled alongside louder rockers.

 

And I waited some more. And then some more. And neither jazz nor rock ensued…

 

Then, seemingly suddenly after a 5 year wait, Love And Rockets finally released Hot Trip to Heaven and…it was a disappointing album more interested in half-baked club beats then the waves of melody and guitar I’d been hoping for. I understood the direction, having already been through similarly sounding but more rewarding wild ride with Psychic TV, another fave of mine, but it felt like Love And Rockets was working a sound that had already run it course, an unusual position for 3 guys like that to be in, in my personal opinion.

 

I never stopped being a Love And Rockets fan, and dutifully bought every new release after that, but I had to admit that they seemed more interested in avoiding the sound that I had loved than producing anything along those lines again. And I got it; they’d been around a long time and in quite a few influential groups already and preferred to follow their own interests instead of delivering on fan expectations. It’s the deal you agree to when you become a fan of an artist instead of a fan of a sound.

 

So, imagine my surprise last year when the album Are Forever by Ashes And Diamonds landed in my inbox, a new “supergroup” of sorts led by Ash, and…the “Love And Rockets” album I’d been waiting for since 1989 seemed to have finally burst into existence!

 

Are Forever is the spiritual successor to Love And Rockets, of that I have no doubt. And it somewhat confirms my belief long ago that is was indeed Ash willfully avoiding replicating the sound that had made his old band so popular just prior to the dawn of the ‘90s. But whatever reservations he must’ve had about that sound seem to finally have been shed, and I couldn’t be happier.

 

Well, I might’ve been happier had this come out 35 years ago, but that’s young me griping; old me is happy to have this sonic sequel finally arrive. I would’ve written about this earlier, but I confess I kept waiting for the album to pop up on Bandcamp before doing so, since I’ve grown to believe that’s the superior platform to link reviews to since you can easily test drive the music and then buy it if you dig it. 

 

Today I noticed it is indeed on Bandcamp now! So now you have all the words above to set scene, and the album below to finish the picture for you.

 

Spin it. Dig it. Buy it and have it…for forever!