Ryan Adams
Every time Ryan Adams thinks he’s out, he pulls himself back in. It turns out the follow-up to 2011’s *Ashes & Fire* isn\'t the completed album he made with Glyn Johns but a self-produced collection of songs recorded at Adams’ recording studio, PAX AM. (Some tunes were coproduced with Mike Viola.) The mercurial singer/songwriter who broke up his band (The Cardinals), flirted with retirement, and formed a punk group sounds plenty much like the Ryan Adams we’ve come to expect. The alt-country sounds are scrubbed down for an electric guitar–based heartland rock that gets a touch of Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers, thanks to the involvement of longtime Petty organist Benmont Tench. “Shadows” is the loudest cry in the dark, with Adams’ guitars ringing and clashing over Tal Wilkenfeld’s stalking bassline. “Feels Like Fire” follows up the existential ache, with Johnny Depp playing guitar and adding a backing vocal. “I Just Might” pulses with a hint of Bruce Springsteen’s “State Trooper.”
Ryan Adams' latest pair of releases show off the duality of the artist—the straightforward singer/songwriter, and the rascally punk, that is. His self-titled LP offers a nice, 1980s-imbued twist on the singer/songwriter mode; the 1984 EP plays like a super-obscure hardcore EP that you might find in a crate at the back of an ancient record store.
Ryan Adams is nothing if not consistent. The singer-songwriter has had the same haircut for at least the last 10 years, is still rocks vintage T-shirts and jean jackets, and, while he hasn’t released a record since 2011’s Ashes & Fire, his latest, Ryan Adams, is par for the course. Adams is consummately Adams,…
A paradox, Adams's latest at first blush sounds like little more than an uneven slice of MOR, yet it sports some of his hookiest tunes - and may be the oddest thing he's done yet.
Much has been made of the fact that Ryan Adams last released an album three years ago. While that’s true, the underlying…
Thematically this is the Ryan Adams we have grown to love, all dusty highways, smoky bars and moments of gentle personal introspection.
Somewhere, right now, sitting on a hard drive is a Glyn Johns-produced Ryan Adams record featuring an all-star backing band.
It's impossible for anyone but Ryan Adams to say whether or not his new album is symbolically self-titled. It sure seems that way.
Ryan Adams is a dreary, spineless collection of half-baked songs that float by on the fumes of middle-aged wistfulness.
It may not pay to listen closely to the lyrics, but this self-titled album is monolithic, bombastic and urgent, writes <strong>Maddy Costa</strong>
Sad songs and rockers as alt.country's poster boy returns. Album review by Lisa-Marie Ferla