This week the Ryan Adams fans of the world got some news that has been anticipated since the release of Orion earlier this year. The storefront for Ryan’s vanity record label PaxAm got a serious makeover in the form of some great vintage video arcade-themed navigation as well as a bunch of new places to keep track of the world of Ryan– a video page, a page for mp3 downloads— the first things up are some jams from the beginning of the Easy Tiger sessions, future spot for tour dates, a discography, and News. It’s cool and in the spirit of Ryan’s love of vintage arcade games.
The revamped store was kicked off with some leftover tour merchandise from the Cold Roses, Jacksonville City Nights and 29 era. Mostly teeshirts, but there was a neon rose watch available, too! There was a limited number of the “Oblivion” pink 7″es available as well. Currently on the site is the promised re-press of Orion that is not in the first pressing chrome gatefold sleeve and is probably not clear vinyl. They are promising some new merchandise to come as well!
The other big news is the next release from the archives– a 2 LP release of Ryan Adams and the Cardinals III/IV. The sessions for Easy Tiger in 2007 produced something in the order of 60 tracks recorded over a marathon six months at the infamous Electric Lady Studios in New York City. Easy Tiger was the release that followed the 2005 trifecta of Cold Roses, Jacksonville City Nights and 29.
The reason this release is called III/IV is because it chronologically follows Cold Roses which can be considered I/II. On a Facebook post from 7/15, Ryan said,
“It’s a double and was originally going to be III as in the Cardinals third album. Then we made IV and then lots of things happened and Easy Tiger came out so it got shelved. In the spirit of honoring these albums as they were intended- when looking back on the sessions it was decided in the last few days of them by the band that we were going to release it as a double record. I believe the thinking was ( by the powers that be and by our friends ) that it was too early for another double LP after Cold Roses so we took two songs off of it and put it away for a future day.”
III/IV comes in a number of formats– CD, download and vinyl. You can see what should be the first pressing vinyl and if it is what Ryan initially said about the vinyl those are 180g red and blue transparent LP’s. On a post to the Ryan Adams Archive boards on 6/12 Ryan said that he worked with Andy West on the art. Andy did the Cold Roses artwork. You can see a download card next to the big III/IV poster. Ryan said in the same post that there would be some extras with the “expanded version” and that they might be available with the download card.
Per the Pax Am site, the pre-order information will be coming soon. I’ll update this article as I get more information. Visit the Pax Am Records site and sign up with your e-mail address to be kept up to date, and they are conveniently providing an RSS feed, too!
Here is the tracklist for III/IV with links to content online where it exists.
Side A
Breakdown Into The Resolve (7/22/06 YouTube video of 7/22 Performance)
Dear Candy
Wasteland
Ultraviolet Light (originally part of the “Warren Peace” ryanadams.com songs.
Stop Playing With My Heart
Side B
Lovely And Blue (was up on ryanadams.com as “France” YouTube video)
Happy Birthday (demo version on YouTube)
Kisses Start Wars
The Crystal Skull
Users
Side C
No
Numbers
Gracie (demo was up on ryanadams.com as “Hello Gracie’)
Icebreaker
Sewers at the Bottom of the Wishing Well (up on ryanadams.com as part of Sad Dracula’s Fasterpiece album)
Side D
Typecast (10/15/06)
Star Wars
My Favorite Song
P.S.
Death And Rats
Kill The Lights
CLICK HERE TO PRE-ORDER THE VINYL VERSION OF III/IV. It will ship on 12/14.
UPDATE: Amazon already has the III/IV 2 CD set on their site and it lists the release date as December 14th and lists the label as TVT/The Orchard. Ryan had mentioned that he was working on a distribution deal for this and other releases. Click on the first Amazon link below to listen to :30 second samples of the tracks. The second link is for the vinyl edition!