His real return bombed in 2020-21 when his redemption didn’t come with Wednesdays, his career didn’t pick up with Big Colors and his distributor quite before releasing the final part of the trilogy. Somehow I think this had to do with him falling off the wagon again before getting sober a year ago. His new management probably thinks this releasing an album every month or so is the way to stay in the eye of his fans. When of if he lands a new record deal, they’ll start anew.
I think him going off the rails on social media threatening to off himself out of his mind on whatever, would scare any business partner away. No one wants to be attached to that financially. It was hard to watch just as a fan, and terrified for his well being. Putting Wednesdays out first would have been like releasing 29 before Cold Roses or JCN in the 2005 trilogy. It’s too dark, sad, no real hits per se, but it is a beautiful record IMO. 29 is respected now too, but certainly on “off” record at the time. record company or no, I’m glad he’s in a good place for his sake. I hope it sticks!
I'm enjoying Devolver and really appreciate that he released it for free (I had bought downloads of the last three albums as well as the FM cassette). Cover art is ace too. My ranking of the 2022 releases would probably be FM > Romeo & Juliet > Devolver > Chris. For reference, I think Wednesdays is better than all of them and Big Colors is on par with FM and Devolver. Obviously DRA has always been prolific but I see this recent flurry of activity as 1). a way of making up for lost time, 2). a way to make a bit of money and 3). a way to clear out the vaults while making a bit of money. It's hard to see even spotty releases hurting him at this point. The old media outlets that used to endlessly cover him are still ignoring his every move so appealing to his most ardent fans seems to be the only way forward. I'd love for him to release a vinyl boxset of the 2022 albums but I'm not holding my breath that something like that will happen...
I know one old time Ryan fan who's essentially given up trying to follow his output. I think for someone in his career situation, less might be more as far as trying to get casual fans to pay attention again. But you're right, only the ubur dye hard fans are following him anymore so there's really no restrictions on him not to put this stuff out there. I also feel he's stuck in the Old School mindset that because you have tour dates, you must have new material out there to warrant it.
I think his ‘career situation’ doesn’t really bother him ( or his fans ) anymore. He seems at peace with himself which is good to see… I think he may as well keep the music coming. The songs seem to pour out of him, and there’s always a handful of really good songs on each release. The 4 albums released in 2022 have yielded at least 20 great songs in my opinion.
I still can't get into FM or Devolver. There's maybe a couple ok tracks for me on both, but I'm not feeling it. No knock on anyone that does. It's just not for me, maybe I'll get into them at a later time. For me Romeo and Juliet is the best of all the 2022 releases. Everything else is pretty subpar. Though I think it's kind of a hodgepodge of sound, not really cohesive, it reminds me a bit of demolition. Just a solid collection of song that don't really belong anywhere else. Wednesdays and Big Colors are great albums to me. But I didn't like Big Colors at first listen either. I think it's gorgeous though now. Wednesdays just came out at the right time for me. I needed that album at the end of 2020. That year was so heavy and hearing Ryan's familiar voice playing acoustic stuff and not 80's rock, was just cathartic for me.
Ya. Even as a diehard, I'm struggling to keep up. I can't digest all this music. So while I'm certainly grabbing them all, it almost makes sense why I'm not into FM or Devolver as it's just too much. It's like eating a whole Pizza and then someone comes in with 2 more boxes of it as you're finishing the last slice of the first one. I love pizza, but I just can't eat 3 pizzas in one sitting. It almost devalues the music. Every song is worth less and less as I know he'll likely just put out 5 more albums in the next 18 months lol.
I don't think he's releasing it for anything other than sharing at this point. Last year when he was hurting I think he needed the money and was doing anything/everything to get some income streams. But since he had a successful little east coast run, I think the money is probably ok now. I mean he probably made 100,000 at least off those shows? And has another $200,000 coming in? $100 bucks a ticket times 1000-2000 plus seats at a venue, times 10 shows right? I think with the inability to release music physically, or just not wanting to deal with the cost/effort of doing it, there's no reason to in 2022. He's not making money off CD sales really. Maybe vinyl a bit, but the cost of producing vinyl is probably a lot higher than it was even 5 years ago. The profit margin on it can't be great for someone putting out a few thousand as opposed to like 20,000. And I'm sure he wants the fans coming to shows to have 50 new songs they kind of know that he might play. I still think he'll lean heavy on what he's already played this year. But would love some stuff from these new albums too.
On another note, I was looking at tickets for the Milwaukee show, which is the night after the bigger Chicago show. I thought it was pretty bold to book a much smaller city within 90 minutes of Chicago, but the Milwaukee show is almost sold out. I just saw The National at the same venue in Milwaukee and in my mind, they are huge. Ryan must be really happy with the way these shows are selling. He may never headline Red Rocks again, but clearly the die-hard fans will show up and its not like these venues he's playing are tiny.
I agree. Boulder is almost sold out both nights here as well. I think if he somehow manufactures another "hit", he could easily move to bigger venues again. Enough time has passed that no one even remembers 2019 now. I think the pandemic, plus him going off the radar, albeit against his will, really helped his image. Give this another year, and I would bet he has a band again with larger rooms on a tour. If he wants to tour like that again that is. I don't know if it's healthy for him to be on the road, but he loves to perform.
just listened to the acoustic Free Yourself on instagram, which sounds lovely. it's a pity he never records his songs like that anymore. just him and a guitar, maybe some slide guitar overdub. yeah he sorta did that with Wednesdays, but 95% of his songs get the "80's pax-am" treatment, which is a shame imo. I was listening to parts of Suicide Handbook the other day, and it's still a great listen. he could easily record all those instagram tunes in a similar fashion and kill it
So apparently I was wrong about this show and the available tickets. They just moved it from the 2500 capacity Riverside to the 1300 capacity Pabst Theater with a lot of tickets showing available. I was worried about this show being the night after a big show in Chicago and only 90 minutes north on a weeknight. Maybe bands who play Chicago skip Milwaukee altogether due to the close proximity.
Setting aside Ryan's the topic of Ryan's baggage, let me ask: Is anyone else overwhelmed by his output? I refuse to complain about an artist being prolific, but this pace of album releases is hard to process. That being said, putting Wednesdays, Big Colors, Romeo&Juliet, Chris, FM, and Devolver together on shuffle creates something really pleasant. It seems like something better than his late 2000s-2010s phase. But there fails to be a unifying feel or concept when listening, and the songs just wash over me as pleasant but unimportant. I'm *sure* there are brilliant moments here, but as there have been on every Ryan Adams album since Gold, but it's just so hard to sift them out and keep track of them. It might be Ryan's worst impulse to produce 100 songs rather than focus on 10.
On his latest social media post he seems to be hinting at a Cardinals reunion in 2023. Seeing is believing, I guess... but hopefully those guys can drag him away from the middle-of-the-road mediocracy of his last albums.
Ryan Adams -- Kanye West -- smart fellows who wrecked their careers. I will add add Sinead O'Connor and Michele Shocked (who I actually have been listening too recently !) to that list.
Brad played with him on stage the other night. But without Neil, it will never be The Cardinals. The Neil talk will overshadow any conversation about this “reunion”. This seems like an odd move for him to pull at this time when people are just starting to hear his name again. Maybe he feels it will take some of the focus off of him in the press?
Unless they get JP back into the fold, since he was the guitarist that played on 29 and the first two Cardinals releases. And honestly, when it comes to the press, I feel like this move is for the opposite reason: people seem to be downloading his new material, his solo tours have been selling well enough to where more and more theaters are booking shows with him, and now he must feel that reuniting with his most successful band who recorded some of his most popular music (outside of Heartbreaker) will keep that upward momentum regarding his career going.
If anything this will draw more attention from the press. There been pretty much nothing written about him since 2019. Positive or Negative. Word is according to Ryan that JP is back on guitar so it could be JCN lineup. I was thinking earlier that it will be good to listen to what the Cards can do with his post 2009 material.
Yeah Neals first album was Easy Tiger (or III/IV if you go off recording date) What’s always puzzled me is that JCN was supposedly recorded a couple of weeks after Cold Roses but in that time Jon Graboff replaced Cindy Cashdollar and I wondered what happened
Ryan has previously dismissed the “later” Cards lineup as not the real Cardinals. But they are to the fans since that’s the only formation we got to see love over that time period.
I read that he played two Uncle Tupelo songs the other night in St. Louis. Cool tribute and I'd love to hear those.
What I heard at the time was that Ryan assumed the Cardinals lineup that made Cold Roses would all be touring the record with him but that when he actually communicated that to them, Cindy Cashdollar told him she was not interested in touring and only wanted to do studio work.
