The House of Love
always Wins
Sharing Chauffers (with Cher)
The House of Love always Wins is an 8 track album by the Northumbrian songwriter and performer Dan Ashton
Songs of love, loss and country life. Some have called the title track a latter day 'classic' but all the songs are highly original and truly inspired. Truly an 'untypical songwriter'.
For the past 5 years Dan has been living in rural Northumberland after moving back to his childhood hunting ground. The songs on the album draw on natural imagery and ruined castles of the wilds of Northumberland. Expect songs about collie dogs and honey bees and maybe an epic relating to the Highland Clearances after being inspired by a tale in a book by Borders writer Alasdair Moffat.
The songs are currently being recorded in a home studio to be mixed and mastered elsewhere. The songs are 'thrashed out' at local open mic nights and folk clubs. The idea is that the songs have to be truly broken in before being recorded. The reaction of an audience can mean songs are enhanced in parts or sometimes completely changed. Then the songs are tested out again to see if the reaction has improved. Open mic nights and folk clubs are thriving in Northumberland and Tyneside. They are the perfect way to try out a song while not worrying too much if mistakes are made. Then once the songs are honed they can be played in more formal settings.
There are no short cuts here. Just one man (and his colie dog) one guitar, one heart, one soul, two hands and one voice. An audience if they'll have him and the rest will be history. Watch this space
Oh let me be your beekeeper
Oh let me be your honey man
I'd give it all to have the hand
Of the sweetest honey bee in Northumberland
Collies on a Quad Bike
You're on the roadside
Thumb it for a hitch hike
And I'll take you for a drive
Then you arrived one day to watch as I played
You slipped into a chair not far from the stage
You in your summer blouse and your golden hair
Bringing more sunshine to the summer fair
You say you come from a land of castles
When i say come see a fort built in the times long gone
You say don't get upstet, when i don't seem too impressed
When i think about the castles in the land where i come from..
They broke the ties of clan
And cleared us from the land
To make way for new flocks of sheep
And game for the sporting man
The day then came to board
We sailed from Stornaway
Bound for Nova Scotia's shores
New Scotland far away
As further out we drew
Up went many a cry
As we beheld in tears
Our final views of the Western isles