First of all, this might come across very rantish but this is something that has been bugging me for a while. Second of all, I love Ash pretty much from Trailer to Darkest Hour of the night (the latter being absolutely brillant), so please dont take this post in a negative way.

I am still at loss how Ash went from a number one album in FAA in 2001 to "also rans" in 2007 (Twilight of the Innocents charting in 32 ). Sure the music industry changed but at the same time that wouldnt entirely explain peaking at 32 since all album sales must have been plummeted and not just TOTI.

After the release of Free all angels Ash had an astounding back catalogue with at least 15 hits and some other decent tunes. Why could they not built on that? What did go wrong? Did something go wrong in your perception?

My take:

1) Meltdown while not necessarily a bad album and having some good songs on it(Evil Eye) is imho the only Ash album where they try hard to sound like somebody else. I don't think the purposely heavy sound on the record was necessary.

2) I thought both "I started a fire" and "You can't have it all" were not great choices for online prerelease/single, so I wasnt that excited for the new album in the first place. It is still a somewhat decent album but I never got the hype for the TOTI (the song) and only Polaris would crack my Ash top 30.

3) Maybe they also lost part of their audience when they split with Charlotte?

When asked about ranking his favorite Ash albums, Tim ranked Meltdown and TOTI pretty low, so maybe he agrees somewhat:

https://www.vice.com/en/article/6x8yvj/rank-your-records-ash

I also saw a recent interview with Charlotte where she says that she could barely relate to Meltdown so she found recording and touring it difficult.

I actually think that it wasnt until the A-Z series, that Tim hit his former songwriting heights again (Arcadia e.g. is magnificent) but maybe it was too late?

Don't get me wrong, Ash still have a loyal following and I cannot wait to see them live again but I cant feel helping that with their back catalogue they should be a lot bigger nowadays.

I think it's just a matter of the band members growing up and having different influences and life experiences now than they were in their teens and 20s.  Also, the instruments they use and the way they record has changed a lot -- the music doesn't sound as raw anymore and is way more over polished which I think contributes to a different sound.  They still put out great tracks, but it's not the same as their 90s and early 00s stuff for sure.  

Also, I sometimes get the inkling that they may be trying too hard to put out a certain sound rather than just releasing any shit they have fun making.  Personally, I'd love to see more of their obscure, experimental tracks put on albums rather than thought of as "b-sides".  Many of their extra tracks from Islands and Kablammo! have never even seen the light of the day -- and some of them are really good.  I personally wish Ash would stop conforming to this certain format of a "11 or 12 track album" and just put out a great record with like 16 tracks and stop holding off songs as "b-sides".  I think as the band has grown, they've become more perfectionist with their songs, possibly overproducing and overthinking them.

The best songs often come from just putting the shit out and not overthinking.

I think Free All Angels caught the tail end of britpop and guitar music was still strong in the charts. Meltdown was definitely heavier, guitar music was still popular but not doing as well in the charts, music downloads had started to have an impact ... just a lot of factors, I think. Overall it wasn't as a commercial record as Free All Angels. But personally I much prefer Meltdown.

As for what you say FireSka, it's disppointing how little they put out these days. I have all their b-sides from the A-Z era as an album on my ipod and it would almost be one of my most played releases by them! So much variety, different sounds and experimentation. And A-Z itself is amazing of course. It's definitely time for a new album ...

They've been working on a lot of new material, and there is a LOT of unreleased material from Islands and Kablammo! era, but I'm not too sure why they are holding onto tracks and not putting anything out.  Especially when there so many of the completed recordings they have not released were so good.  There's also an old FAA-era song called Rope Dancer which is really really good that I don't understand why they don't release in some form.  My guess is that a lot of it has to do with them not releasing stuff on their own label anymore?  Maybe the label they are on doesn't want them releasing random tracks?  Just my guess, but it's a damn shame.