Daniel Ash “This Love” 1991. 12″ single from the album Coming Down, Beggars Banquet records. This upcoming Sunday July 31st is Daniel Ash’s birthday (b. 1957). Ash has released several solo albums since his first, Coming Down, but is probably better known for his work with Bauhaus, Tones on Tail and Love and Rockets.

The songs on the 12″ single are, not surprisingly given Ash’s style, sinister waves riding on dark romanticism. “This Love” has an industrial flavor that is punctuated with a locomotive rhythm and Ash’s “dry Bolanesque purr.” “Heaven is Waiting,” the second song on Side A, is a shoe-gazing swaying instrumental. Side B has just one track, “Coming Down (slow version)” which differs from the album version, “Coming Down Fast.” It is beautiful, sultry yet vampire-cold, using guitar effects that evoke flickering candles in a dark gothic cathedral.