For more than two decades, Rick McMurray has been the rhythmic engine behind Ash — the heartbeat that powered everything from teenage pop‑punk euphoria to widescreen alt‑rock ambition. But in the rare quiet moments between the band’s relentless touring and the twin releases of Race The Night and Ad Astra, something darker began tugging at him. A voice. A riff. A weight.
That voice has now taken shape as Burned As Witches, McMurray’s first-ever solo project — a self‑titled album landing 17 April on all DSPs and black vinyl. It’s heavy, it’s haunted, and it’s absolutely not the day job.
The first single, Hold Your Nerve, arrives like a warning shot: stoner‑rock adjacent, but sharper, leaner, more melodic than the genre’s usual haze. It’s the sound of someone excavating something uncomfortable from deep within.
“This was one of the last songs written for the album,” McMurray says. “It just tumbled out of my subconscious… It’s about innocence in the face of a corrupt and venal world.”
He talks about red pills, blue pills, and the helplessness of seeing the world clearly when you can’t change it. Musically, he calls it “the bastard child of Iommi and Page” — Sabbath doom with Zeppelin swagger, and a sly undercurrent of glam. It’s a combination that shouldn’t work, but absolutely does.
Burned As Witches didn’t begin as a creative detour. It began as grief.
In 2021, Ash’s long‑time live agent and friend Steve Strange passed away — a larger‑than‑life figure whose love of metal was legendary. McMurray found himself writing riffs in the aftermath, dark and heavy, as if the only way to process the loss was to turn the volume up.
“We thought that gig at The Roundhouse would put the COVID years to bed,” he says. “But it turned into a wake for Strangey.”
The early demos were raw, too raw, and he shelved them — “where solo projects go to die.” But they wouldn’t stay buried. Months later, he listened again and felt something shift. An epiphany: It doesn’t have to be about me.
Whether it was Strange whispering from beyond or McMurray’s own subconscious finally unclenching, the message was clear: the tribute didn’t need to be literal. It just needed to exist.
“Steve, I miss you and love you, you mad bastard. We all do.”
If anyone expects power‑punk‑pop, McMurray is quick to shut that down. Burned As Witches is riff‑driven, big‑boned, doom‑tinged rock — the kind of record that feels carved rather than written. He plays every instrument, every note, every crunching chord. It’s intense, cathartic, and deeply personal.
This isn’t a drummer stepping out front for a vanity project. It’s an artist wrestling with loss, legacy, and the strange places the mind goes when the world stops making sense.
Ash will inevitably roar back into motion — they always do — but Burned As Witches exists in that rarest of things: a pause. A breath. A moment where McMurray could follow the riffs wherever they led, even into the darker corners.
The result is an album that feels like a purge. A tribute. A reckoning, and, unexpectedly, a rebirth.
Burned As Witches arrives 17 April. Hold Your Nerve is out now. Turn it up.
