Stroll On

Nice clean vinyl with a very good cover. Includes lyric sheet.

Steve Frank Ashley (born 9 March 1946 in Perivale, London) is a British singer-songwriter, recording artist, multi-instrumentalist, writer and graphic designer. Ashley is best known as a song writer and first gained public recognition for his work with his debut solo album, Stroll On (Gull, 1974). Taking his inspiration from English traditional songs, Ashley has developed a song writing style, which is contemporary in content whilst reflecting traditional influences in his melodies, poetry and vocal delivery.

Stroll On was met with widespread critical acclaim in the UK. In The Daily Telegraph, Maurice Rosenbaum declared: “Ashley’s own songs are the product of an extraordinary gift for creating material of true folk quality”^[7] and in Melody Maker, Karl Dallas hailed it as “the finest album since folk became contemporary”. By the year’s end it was awarded “Contemporary Folk album of the Year” in the leading monthly folk magazine, Folk Review.^[8]

During this period, Karl Dallas frequently linked Ashley’s name with Richard Thompson, as being in the vanguard of a new approach to folk song writing.^[9]

In 1975, Gull Records licensed the album to Motown in the United States and Ashley’s first American tour was underwritten by that company. In spring 1975 Ashley undertook a six-week solo tour of the USA and Canada, he opened shows for many artists including Leon Redbone, Tracy Nelson, Gene Clark, Chris Hillman and Jonathan Edwards. In a review of his performance in New York’s Greenwich Village, Variety magazine said: “Steve Ashley of London is a delightful surprise, his originals are good, his vocals are sensitive, Ashley can hold an audience.”^[10]

Back in the UK he recorded the follow-up, Speedy Return, and undertook a series of solo tour supports for a variety of headline bands, including Supertramp, Planxty, Isotope, Gong and Fruup.

But by the end of 1975, Gull’s deal with Motown fell through and Ashley was without a record company. His planned third album, Rare Old Men, was never released and it was not until 1979 that Fairport’s Dave Pegg recorded, produced and eventually released what was his third album, Steve Ashley’s Family Album, on his own Woodworm label. In 1978 Ashley formed the electric folk "Steve Ashley Band" and this band performed sporadically for 12 years, including appearances at Rotterdam Folk Festival (1978), Glastonbury Festival (1985) and Cambridge Folk Festival (1990).

In 1978 at the Rotterdam Folk Festival, Ashley met the Australian folk-rock band, The Bushwackers, whose leader, Dobe Newton, asked Ashley to write some musical settings of poems by the deceased bush poet, Henry Lawson. As a result, The Bushwackers recorded three of Ashley’s settings, and published four in their Australian Song Books.^[11]

In 1981 Ashley became active in CND’s campaign to ban Trident and remove US Cruise missiles from the UK.^[12] He recorded and released two cassette albums of peace songs. Around this time he began a part-time involvement in Oxfam’s publicity and campaigning work as a graphic designer and copywriter. During the CND campaign of the 1980s he performed from the main stage at Glastonbury Festival (with Bruce Rowland and Chris Leslie) and also solo to 250,000 peace protesters in Hyde Park, London. He recorded a single with CND’s Bruce Kent and the Labour peer, Lord Noel-Baker. Later, he took part in the blockade of the nuclear weapons factory at Burghfield and was eventually arrested for obstruction in the mass sit-in at the USAF base at Upper Heyford, Oxfordshire. This event was recorded in the song "Sweet Affinity" on his next studio release Mysterious Ways (Line Records, 1990). In 1992, Ashley retired from the music industry to concentrate on his design and copywriting work for various UK charities.