Ash and Kestrels at Lee's Palace

After a 7 year absence, Ash returned to Toronto for an fantastic 20th anniversary show at Lee's Palace. They stormed through highlights from across their history - from their very first single "Jack Names the Planets" all the way to their recent song-a-fortnight project The A-Z Series, which has just been released on vinyl.

Tim Wheeler cranked the guitars with the awesome-sounding combination of Gibson guitars - Flying V and Les Paul - through his Mesa half-stack. Bassist Mark Hamilton filled the stage with rawk poses and drummer Rick McMurray kept it all tight.

It was a great show with plenty of enthusiasm from both the band and the crowd.

 I put up a ton of Ash tunes prior to the show, so I'll limit myself here.

"Arcadia"

"Jack Names the Planets"

"Burn Baby Burn"

"Joy Kicks Darkness"

"Binary"

"Kung Fu"

"Oh Yeah"

Check out their Best of album that was recently released if you're new to this great band.

Kestrels, from Halifax, opened the show. It looked like a dream come true for them since singer/guitarist Chad Peck told us he's a long-time Ash fanatic and Ash singer/guitarist Tim Wheeler even played on their album. Although the mix was not always in their favour, their Dinosaur Jr. / 90s influenced energy came across well.

Here's "The Past Rests" and "There All The Time Without You" from A Ghost History.

The photos in this post are original pics by me, not the usual professional pics stolen from some other web site. You can tell the difference original art makes. Meanwhile, Chromewaves has some great pics from the gig.