Album Review: Ryan Adams - Ryan Adams

To put things into perspective, Ryan Adams has been operating as a solo artist for roughly 14 years, and this new, self titled effort is coincidentally his 14^th solo effort. One would think that works out to be one album a year—but that isn’t the case. There was the year he released an album and two EPs (Love is Hell parts 1 and 2, which were later repackaged as a full length in 2004); there was the year he released three albums (2005); and then there were the dormant years from 2008 until 2011, where he had gotten married, sobered up, and “retired,” but opted to dive into the vaults, self-releasing a heavy metal album recorded in 2006 (Orion, pressed on limited edition vinyl) and then unreleased material from sessions with his former band The Cardinals (the uneven III/IV.)

When it comes to Ryan Adams, there is no such thing as a “return to form.” I stop short of saying he becomes uneasy with a specific style, but in looking at his canon as a whole, he’s always looking to move on to something else, and incorporate more of his eclectic influences into his sound. With that being said, Ryan Adams harkens back to a sound he was dabbling in over a decade ago—the slightly Brit-pop leaning, chorus pedal heavy “rock” style of songwriting from the Love is Hell-era. Though now ten years removed from whom he was back then, Ryan Adams, for the most part, shows an incredible amount of focus in its structure, only teetering back into the familiar alt-country vibes within the final two songs, “Tired of Giving Up,” and “Let Go,” which are also two of the album’s finest moments.

With all this being said, Ryan Adams is one of his strongest in nearly a decade—and from start to finish is way more focused and overall more enjoyable of a listen than 2011’s “comeback” Ashes and Fire.

It’s worth noting that in the three years that have passed, Adams recorded an entire follow up with Glynn Johns, but scrapped it completely after deciding that either a) it was too sad, or b) that it was “slow adult shit.” I don’t know which one of these is actually true, and they are both answers he’s given in interviews recently when doing press for Ryan Adams. What he recorded with producer and collaborator Mike Viola is definitely not “slow adult shit,” and while there are the quintessential “emotional Ryan Adams moments,” there is an overall less somber feeling than previous works, with the emphasis more on catchy hooks—e.g. the beginning of the refrain to the album’s first single, “Gimme Something Good,” which, aside from that opening guitar riff and organ drone, is the moment that get stuck in your head the most. Adams has always been a great songwriter, and this album just shows how diverse he is, as far as writing within styles, but never losing a pop sensibility.

Sonically, Adams says he was inspired by both the works of The Velvet Underground and The Smiths, and knowing that going in, you can hear that influence on the production value (lush, rich, and warm sounding) as well as the actual songwriting itself—musically speaking, anyway. Lyrically, however, despite Adams’ awareness that he had recorded entire album that was apparently just too sad, there is a desolate loneliness at times, like on the evocative “Kim,” and the brooding “Shadows.”

For someone as prolific as Adams once was, and for someone who released two 80 minute albums (2001’s Gold and 2005’s Cold Roses) Ryan Adams ends up being a very brief affair—at 11 songs, it clocks in at a little over 40 minutes, and it clips along at a rather fast pace, even on the slower numbers, like the sparse “My Wrecking Ball.” There are no “clunkers” on the record, but there are songs that are more successful than others; but even with this being the case, the record never drags, which was one of the flaws of Ashes and Fire.

One of the fascinating things about Ryan Adams as a performer is his ability to have an incredible sense of humor, but then be deadpan serious; such is the case with Ryan Adams. Of the batch of 11 songs, none of them are “jokey,” but they are found on album with cover art that is a pretty obvious wink to the Bryan Adams album Reckless. And leave it to an artist like Adams, once synonymous with “alternative country” to slide in during the final quarter of 2014 and deliver what I would consider to be the best “rock” record of the year.  

Ryan Adams is out on Tuesday, September 9th, via his own Pax Am label.