ASTON RIVER

Singer. Songwriter. Aston River.

Life happens.
I write songs.

Love, distance, and starting over.
I’ve lived it. These are the songs I wrote along the way.

Meet Aston
Start with Still Not Me
Listen first. Read the story when you’re ready.
Still Not Me artworkPick a cover. Press play. Aston RiverStill Not Me Carousel of Depth artwork Aston RiverCarousel of Depth JESSE artwork Aston RiverJESSE
Made from real life.88 songs to make your own.Explore the collection

The archive · 88 songs

Find your next favorite.

Tap a cover to listen. The lyrics and story are one tap away.

A preview is just the beginning. 88 songs shown

Words you might recognize

A song for that feeling.

Some things are easier to put in a song.
Here’s what I was trying to say.

A phone left on the floor of a quiet room at night UnsentFor the words you wrote and could not send. A lived in room carrying the weight of a long rainy evening Quiet RoomFor the days when even small things feel heavy. A younger self arriving in the future and meeting the person he became We GoldFor the younger you who needs to see what came next. A man waiting calmly at an outdoor cafe table Street Side TableFor waiting without losing yourself. A person standing in warm morning light beside an open window Time to Time Part 2For the moment staying becomes a choice again. A child at a window looking toward an unexplained light Since I Was TenFor the feeling that has followed you since childhood.

The person in the songs

Yeah, that’s me.

Aston River, then and imagined.
Aston River with his younger self
A real childhood photograph. A future imagined with AI.

I am real.

That’s me at ten, from a real photograph. The grown-up is an AI version of me in the future. Between that photograph and today came love, distance, poetry and songs that stayed with me. That story became Aston River.

Read my story

Personal charts

Aston's Top 22.

Aston River's current top 22, alongside selections from his daughter, best friend and the curator.

Beyond the music

Step into my world.

Take your time here.
The music can wait a moment.

From the original pages

Paper first.
Songs ever since.

I’ve kept the pages these songs began on. Some became music years later. Others are still waiting for me to finish them.

How it all began
Original handwritten lyrics and drafts by Aston River

For film, TV and artists

A song can begin a new life on screen.

Producers, directors, music supervisors and streaming teams are invited to explore the catalog for film, television, series, trailers and campaigns. Artists who want to record an Aston River song can get in touch as well. If a song fits your project, ask about licensing, recording permission, stems and availability.

Explore the catalog Discuss a song
ASTON RIVER

About Aston River

I have been searching since I was ten.

The life, memories and unfinished work that became Aston River.

A boy at a window, looking toward an unexplained brightness in the night sky

I was ten when I woke and found myself standing at a window, looking across a valley filled with a brightness I could not explain. I still do not know how long I stood there or how I returned to bed. What stayed with me was the certainty that ordinary life was only part of what I was feeling.

Around the same time, I met the girl who would shape more of my songwriting than anyone else. We were children, yet our families and much of our town already saw us as a pair. War separated us and placed us in different countries. Contact disappeared, but the connection never did. I began turning separation, memory and everything left unsaid into poems and songs.

Years later we found each other again. We became parents to a daughter, shared a life and eventually ended our relationship while keeping the human bond between us. Love, separation and reunion did not become one chapter that simply closed. They kept changing as life changed, and they continue to run through the music.

Music came first

Long before I understood songwriting, music could reach emotions I rarely showed anywhere else. By my early teens I knew that a particular melody or performance could unlock something immediate in me. It gave me a direct way into feelings that conversation could not always reach.

In 1996, when boy bands were everywhere, I formed one of my own. We began with five or six members. Over the years the group became five, then four, then three, and eventually two. I wrote most of our material, and we spent years rehearsing, recording demos, visiting studios and learning how songs change once musicians, equipment and production enter the room.

The band continued until 2002. That year, Summertime reached second place on an early online chart. It was a modest result in a very different era of the internet, but it proved that a song we had made could travel beyond the people around us.

Finding the right collaborator

After the band, I kept writing and carried the strongest material with me. I met producers, watched different studio methods and kept looking for a collaborator who could understand the music as I heard it.

Around 2007 or 2008, I met producer Ralf Elas. We understood each other quickly. He could play almost every part himself, and together we returned to older songs, rebuilt arrangements and created new work. For about two years, I experienced how close a production could come to the idea in my head when the right person was in the room.

Then life changed direction. Marriage, children and family needed my full attention. Music moved away from the center for years, but the writing did not disappear. Old pages stayed with me, new ideas kept arriving, and many unfinished songs waited for a practical way forward.

The return

Music technology eventually gave me that way forward. For the first time, I could test a lyric, melody or arrangement without the cost and scheduling of a full studio session. It gave me the freedom to compare many approaches and keep working until each song carried the emotion and structure I wanted.

The work remains personal. I write the lyrics, shape the stories and decide the musical direction. Many melodies began in my earlier demos; others arrived during the new process. I revise lines, rebuild sections, compare versions and listen again until the result feels honest.

This method does not replace musicians or producers. Their ability, instinct and human experience can transform a recording. My goal is to bring the strongest Aston River songs back into a studio with people such as Ralf and develop them further together.

Aston River now

Nearly a hundred songs are complete, with several hundred more ideas, drafts and early versions still waiting. Some come directly from my own life. Some began with people close to me. Others grew from real situations that stayed with me long enough to become a song.

The styles can change, but the purpose stays consistent. I want each song to meet someone at the right moment: during love, separation, grief, hope or a decision they have been avoiding. If one person stops, listens and sees part of their own life differently, the song has already done meaningful work.

Aston River brings together the child at the window, the young songwriter learning in a band, the years devoted to family and the person returning with more life to write from. I am still searching. Now the search has a home in the songs.

The original pages

Aston River lyric sheets, handwritten drafts, notebooks and printed songs spread across a wooden table.

For film, TV and artists

A song can begin a new life on screen.

Producers, directors, music supervisors and streaming teams are invited to explore the catalog for film, television, series, trailers and campaigns. Artists who want to record an Aston River song can get in touch as well. If a song fits your project, ask about licensing, recording permission, stems and availability.

Explore the catalog Discuss a song