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Ryan Adams Emerges from Self-Imposed Exile, Looks Around Suspiciously, Announces Stuff

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We’re just past the Ides of March and although he has historically exclaimed “Et Tu, Internets?” this month has brought us a bunch of new Ryan Adams news. The last time we heard from our hero, he had fired up his PaxAm imprint and released two albums that had been hiding in his archives– his Metal Space Opera Orion and Cardinals III/IV which was two albums worth of Easy Tiger-Era recordings with The Cardinals.

To accomplish his desired DIY apprach, he assembled a staff to handle the shipping and orders that were done via the PaxAm website. In the case of Orion things went pretty well, but apparently folks were having issues with delivery of the III/IV album that were placed on the PaxAm site and went to the internet boards to bitch about it. The fact of the matter is that there was an accident involving the guy who was handling the orders and things got delayed and people complained loudly and frequently as is the manner of some.

Fed up, Ryan responded on the boards:

All future Pax-Am releases are cancelled and I don’t have any plans to continue anymore merch. Maybe I will sell the rights to someone else and let them make this stuff. All I know is I am not going to do it. I don’t believe we did a bad job…. The truth is both releases cost a boat load to manufacture and so many good people who I enjoy working with are involved in a hands-on way, all the way down to the manufacturing, that I seriously doubt the vinyl made any money back. It was about the tunes and doing it right and making quality vinyl. We took time to do it right.
Clearly I was 100 percent wrong that this was a good idea and I am really glad I tried but am totally done. Sorry if that sounds passive aggressive or something but I am just being real. I over it and over blogging and I had to borrow this very computer to even write this crap. Blah.

And with that he went into radio silence, but clearly this wasn’t the end of the story as we have now heard about a Record Store Day 4-song, 2 colored vinyl 7″ single EP of Cardinology-era previously-unreleased tracks called Class Mythology that will be a limited edition of 2500 copies with a picture sleeve, poster and sticker and will be on PaxAm Records! It is confirmed from his Facebook page with a mock-up of a single. The distributor for this record is going to be Junketboy who has a history of doing small-run releases like this. So, it would appear that he is delivering on the idea of letting someone else press the records. Hopefully he is getting his say on the quality of the records as his desire to get the mastering right had delayed releases in the past. In the same post where he bows out of pressing records, he also comments on the Lost Highway vinyl and in particular the new 10th Anniversary clear vinyl releases:

I was simply signed to Universal/ Lost Highway as an artist and had no say in the quality of the product. I was appalled they ever released ANY of my albums on vinyl since NONE were mastered for vinyl including the clear GOLD thing. I still have the original ones and they sound like ass. THAT is my personal opinion and I don’t care. Sorry. I like mastered vinyl.

I picked up the 2 LP clear vinyl version of Gold recently, and I don’t think it sounds “like ass” but there are a couple of spots where there are some clicks present, so there is a bit of a QC problem. I was particularly interested in this release as it included the “Side 4” bonus tracks that were only available on the first 150,000 CD pressings of Gold. This release fixes that sin.

So, with this RSD release, there is some hope for the future of other archive releases– in particular, folks are really anxious to get to hear Blackhole, which is another release that apparently did not leak to bootlegging. There is photographic evidence around the time he was working on the III/IV ramp-up that it had been mastered to vinyl, so perhaps we are close to this actually coming out if he’s working with a distributor.

On top of this great news, it was announced in an e-mail from the PaxAm site that Ryan is working with legendary producer Glyn Johns on his first album of new material since 2008. Johns is credited with some of Rock’s great albums including Who’s Next, The Stones Sticky Fingers, and Clapton’s Slowhand.  Clearly keeping the trust in the family,  Johns’ son Ethan produced Heartbreaker, Gold and 24 for Adams.

The question would be how he’s going to release this album– he is not on a label at the moment other than PaxAm– and he used TVT/The Orchard to distribute III/IV to stores and online. So, potentially, the new album could still be on PaxAm. Really, the only issues were the orders placed on the PaxAm website, so that is probably solved by not doing preorders by himself.

While we ponder the always-unpredictable career of Ryan Adams, on Monday he announced a tour of Europe starting in June that will be just him with an acoustic guitar playing new songs he wrote over the winter. “I’d like to play them for whoever wants to hear them,” he posted to Facebook, “Please don’t yell at me,” These are the songs that evidently moved his wife Mandy Moore to tweet, “been listening to my hubby write insanely beautiful music over the past few weeks. blows my mind at how easy he makes it look. the nerve! :)”

This will be the first organized tour since Adams announced in early 2009 that he was leaving the Cardinals following a very extensive tour in support of Cardinology. This announcement was for a few reasons, but likely primarily related to his affliction with Ménière’s disease that caused severe vertigo among other afflictions. He’s clearly easing back into touring since this tour will be solo acoustic. I’m not alone in hoping that he brings this tour to the US.

Here are the European tour dates (from his Facebook post):

Friday, June 10, 2011 Stockholm, Sweden Cirkus
Saturday, June 11, 2011 Oslo, Norway Folketeatret
Monday, June 13, 2011 Malmö, Sweden The Consert House
Tuesday, June 14, 2011 Copenhagen, Denmark Koncerhauset
Thursday, June 16, 2011 Lisbon, Portugal Aula Magna
Friday, June 17, 2011 Porto, Portugal Teatro Sa Da Bandeira
Monday, June 20, 2011 London, UK Barbican
Wednesday, June 22, 2011 Brighton, UK Dome
Thursday, June 23, 2011 Manchester, UK Bridgewater Hall
Saturday, June 25, 2011 Glasgow, UK Academy
Sunday, June 26, 2011 Oxford, UK Oxford New Theatre
Tuesday, June 28, 2011 Amsterdam, Holland Concertgebouw

10 Releases I’m Looking Forward to in 2011

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Since I just finished my Top 20 of 2010, it has me looking towards 2011 and the releases that are rumored, speculated or actually announced. Here are some releases I’m looking forward to (in no particular order).

The Second Dawes Album (May 2011) – I wrote an article about this release and speculation about what tracks are going to be on it. The first Dawes album- North Hills was released in 2009 and has had pretty strong legs as far as carrying the band to national recognition. The songs that Dawes is playing on the road are as good as the ones on their debut, in my opinion. The album is already recorded and ready for release, but won’t see release until May of 2011, as it is waiting on…

The Middle Brother Album – (3/1/2011) I wrote about this “supergroup” made up of members of Deer Tick, Delta Spirit and Dawes here. For Christmas, the band made the track “Me Me Me” available as a free download if you signed up for their mailing list. Middle Brother are planning a tour with all three bands in the spring which should be one of the big indie tours of the year. I have already pre-ordered the vinyl, which will come with a bonus 10″ record with four songs from the sessions that didn’t make the final LP.

Chicago Odense Ensemble – (Spring 2011) – Chicago Odense Ensemble is another “supergroup” with members of Tortoise, Chicago Underground Collective and Causa Sui. The basis of this record was recorded when the members of Causa Sui were in Chicago in 2008.  The sessions, which were largely improvisational in nature, were recorded and brought back to Odense by Causa Sui member Jonas Munk and edited into the resulting tracks on the album. I’ve had a chance to listen to a pre-release of this, and agree with the early reviews and press about the album in the references to late-60’s Miles Davis In A Silent Way era work.

Arbouretum – The Gathering – (2/15/2011) – Arbouretum is one of the many projects that David Heumann performs and records under. I’ve mentioned the Thrill Jockey 15th Anniversary Shows from 2007 where I was first exposed to Arbouretum and made me an instant fan. The Gathering is the fifth studio release for Arbouretum (which includes a split LP with labelmates Pontiak). The first track from the album available as free download is “Destroying to Save” which showcases the signature sea of fuzzy distortion that Arbouretum is known for with Heumann’s epic poetry.

Eleventh Dream Day – Riot Now – (3/15/2011) – When Doug McCombs played The Blue Moose in March of 2010 with David Daniell, I got a chance to talk to Doug about what was coming up for him. At that time he mentioned that Eleventh Dream Day was going to do a residency at the Hideout in May where the band was going to work out new songs for an upcoming release. Well, they did the residency, and their first new album since 2006 titled Riot Now is coming out on 3/15!

Kelly Pardekooper – untitled as yet – Former Iowan, currently Californian, Kelly has announced that he is going to start working with Bo Ramsey on his next album, which would be his first since 2007’s Brand New Bag, which is still one of my all-time favorite Iowa-related releases.

Ryan Adams – Blackhole – Another album in the extensive archives for Ryan Adams. Blackhole was started before he left Lost Highway (over Christmas 2005) and except for “Tomorrowland” and “Disco Queen” which came out as the third release of his aborted Digital Singles series in 2009, these are all songs that have not been leaked elsewhere. Based on posts on Facebook, Blackhole is actually completed–  he did some recording with Jamie Candiloro earlier this year, and if we are to believe a picture he posted of him holding a record, also mastered for vinyl. Those posts were done before the May release of his metal album Orion. December brought another vault release Cardinals III/IV, which was distributed by Orchard/TVT which gave the release much more widespread availability than his own PaxAm website would. He posted to Facebook that Blackhole is “basically Love is Hell Part 3” with “lots of shimmery guitar love.” Certainly the two tracks already available sound a lot like his Smiths-leanings than his Grateful Dead-leanings and I welcome more rock from Ryan. Posts from this week on the archive have people freaking out that PaxAm’s online store is down and there was a now-deleted comment on Facebook that he was sick of dealing with customer service issues with the online store. I’d say there is a very good chance that we see Blackhole released this year since it seems to be mastered already, and it will probably get the same distribution as III/IV.

DJ Shadow – untitled as yet (Spring 2011?) The long-awaited follow up to DJ Shadow’s 2006 Hyphy-influenced release The Outsider is likely to be completed before Shadow ventures out for another tour in May, per comments made on a video about the “Live from the Shadowsphere” tour. Based on the live performances of “I Gotta Rock” and the blink-and-you’ll-miss-it vinyl single release of “Def Surrounds Us” and “I’ve Been Trying” we see a sort of return to form for Shadow. He stated in an interview that this release would not be as focused on collaborations as The Outsider was.

Lady Gaga – Born This Way – (5/23/2011) – I make it no secret that I’m a fan of Gaga, The Fame and The Fame Monster were both really strong releases. I’m not going to debate that it wasn’t territory that had been covered before in pop music. The leadoff single of “Born This Way” will be released on 2/13. Based on what I’ve seen so far of new songs on her current tour, we’re seeing some of her rock leaning material. The song “You and I” is constantly compared to Elton John and it is clear he is an influence. Notably, the new tour will have The Scissor Sisters as supporting act– they worked with John on a track on their last album.

Bermuda Report – untitled as yet (date TBA) – Bermuda Report is a new band from Abbie Sawyer formerly of The Diplomats of Solid Sound. She and her band jreleased a freely-downloadable EP of songs worth checking out in December– jazzy and bluesy. You can read my review with The Little Village. Abbie says that they will be heading back into the studio soon for a full album release this year.

Ryan Adams News: Pax Am Records Site Update, Cardinals III/IV Details

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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!

Click Here to visit the PaxAm Records website.

Click Here for the Ryan Adams Facebook page.

Ryan Adams Orion Metal Project Is Available For Pre-Order– Ships 5/24

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I get home last from seeing Local Natives at the Mill in Iowa City with Suckers in support, check my e-mail and I see the above ad in my e-mail! Thank goodness I checked my e-mail before I went to bed!

This, of course, is the promised Metal album from Ryan Adams under the moniker Orion I reported on in March. Orion was recorded in 2006 with the final production completed earlier this year with Jamie Candiloro. It’s being described as a “fully realized Sci-Fi Metal Concept Album.” The track “Electro Snake” has been streaming since March which apparently was supposed to ease us into the idea of a full-on Metal record from Ryan. Looking over the track list I see that a song called “Fire and Ice” is on there. The assumption is that this is the same “Fire and Ice” that Ryan streamed from his website back in 2006 as part of the “fake” Warren Peace album – War and Peace. With lyrics like “Somewhere above the stars/In God’s cities/Reflecting the soul waves/Oh, the angels have mercy” it would seem to fit the SciFi concept, and aside from the mid-tempo piano part the chorus uses some pretty heavy guitars.

Orion will be the first full-length release from Ryan’s vanity record label Pax-Am. Last year he released three digital singles as well as his first venture into custom pressing vinyl with the pink 7″ of “Oblivion” b/w “People Need Sunlight.” Orion is the first of some promised releases from the mythical vaults of the very prolific Ryan Adams. The very limited (no reports on how many were pressed, yet) release is a very well-executed package from a fidelity and collectability standpoint. The artwork was done by “Away” aka Michel Langevin who, in addition to being the drummer for Canadian Thrash Metal band Voivod, is also a graphic artist. The artwork is screened onto a silver mirrored gatefold sleeve. The LP itself is pressed into clear 180g vinyl which is also a nice touch. Included with the LP is a card for a digital download of the album in the form of 320 Kbps mp3’s as well as a 24″ x 24″ double-sided folded poster (you can see it behind the LP in the picture above).

At the time of this writing, there are still copies available to order on the site. There was also a long-sleeve teeshirt available with some of the album art on it and a fake 2006 tour on the back– these are sold out. The album is $24 and for me at least, shipping was $8 which makes it $32 which is a bit on the steep side– but it is a very quality release and well worth it, I think. If Ryan keeps to his plans, there will be a digital-download-only version available eventually for those folks who don’t want the vinyl.

Click Here to Order the Orion vinyl + digital package.

Tracklisting for Orion:

Side One:

  1. Signal Fade
  2. Imminent Galactic War
  3. Disappyramid
  4. Fire Away
  5. Defenders of the Galaxy
  6. Fire and Ice

Side Two:

  1. By Force
  2. Ghorgon, Master of War
  3. Ariel
  4. Electro Snake
  5. Victims of the Ice Brigade
  6. 2,000 Ships
  7. End of Days

(Free Download) Ryan Adams is Back in Black With Metal Album as Orion

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On Friday, March 12th, the long dormant Twitter account for Ryan Adams passed along this missive:

We’re going to begin pressing ORION — my most legit METAL record — on vinyl next week. http://ryanada.ms

At his website over the weekend, he debuted a song called “Electrosnake” from his upcoming album Orion. This song is still available for free download (as a WAV file!). There was also a survey that was shut down yesterday asking whether respondants would buy this album. On his Facebook page later that day, he posted that 69,567 people wanted a copy of Orion! “That is too many,” he said, “but it is cool getting to figure out what the manufacture numbers are before you go to press.”

Last year Ryan re-launched his PaxAm label, which in the past had been used for some rare single releases. He released three digital download singles for a very reasonable $1.49, which included digital art. Two of the releases came in FLAC format and all three had a bonus track. He also stepped into the physical waters with a very limited edition pink 7″ which was available at the Morrison Hotel Gallery in NYC as part of an exhibition of his paintings and very briefly available on his website.

At the time he said that he was planning on releasing more of his archive of recordings and PaxAm was his way to do it. Now that Ryan is no longer tied to Lost Highway records and has disbanded The Cardinals he has time to focus on the new phase of his career and part of this is getting the records that Lost Highway didn’t release out there– and apparently there is an audience hungry for new material!

Which brings us to the new release going to press this week on PaxAm which will be Orion. According to a post by Ryan to the Ryan Adams Archive Boards on Saturday, Orionwas started by Ryan and producer Jamie Candiloro after Easy Tiger and had been in the works for over two years. Ryan says that Orion, “really wasn’t supposed to be anything other than a brutally badass thrash/metal record… Two years is a long time to work on a badass album of riffs and this is the one for me.”

Of course, this lit the boards up with contraversy– Ryan never made his love of metal a secret, and from time-to-time would post about metal  bands on his various Internet accounts and would even share some of his metal noodling on his collection of vintage BC Rich guitars, still his ardent fans of his more accessible country- and folk-influenced music were torn about whether this was a good thing. Ryan was taking this furor with a certain aplomb joking about it in the thread about the album. The track “Electrosnake” is apparently the most accessible of the tracks with a discernable melody and slower tempo. “Electro Snake may have been the wrong FREE track now that I think of it,” said Ryan in a post,  “but I wanted to try and find something more contemporary because I predicted no matter what track some folks were gonna be all WTF…. the rest of the record is pretty fast and pretty basic thrash. There are some poppier elements via VoiVod/Crumbsuckers but mainly it’s just sci-fi metal stuff. A few tracks, like two tracks in the middle of the record, get pretty heavy and slow and Vol 4 Sabbath-inspired kind of, but you know… I kind of handled all the guitars and bass on this so there is that. I left the drumming to the pro’s.”

So, what else do we know? I think that it will likely be released as a gatefold. He mentions that while there will be a release for people who don’t collect vinyl, the vinyl release will have some impressive art “inside.” I would take “inside” to mean gatefold. So, that is something to look forward to.

I’ve been really anxious for this post-Lost Highway period to start for Ryan. He’s been itching to get some releases out of his back catalog and he’s apparently working on new material with Candiloro this week as well. Without the restrictions of a record label, there is no telling what we will get from Ryan.

Click Here for Ryan Adams’s website where you can download or stream “Electrosnake” from the upcoming Orion album. This will be where the album will be offered for sale.
ORION . ELECTROSNAKE by ryanadams

Ryan Adams – Pax-Am Digital Single No. 2 “Allumette” b/w “What Color Is Rain” (Review)

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It’s week #2 of the Pax-Am reboot and we are treated with another digital single from Ryan Adams’s archives. This time we get a track that was dropped from early consideration for Cardinology and another track that surfaced a bit as a “foggy” video. The third track is another demo from Cardinology.

Side A is the track “Allumette” clocking in at 1:43 and according to the Ryan Adams scholars on the ryanadamsarchive.com site was listed on an early proposed tracklisting for Cardinology.

Apparently the song is in reference to the 1974 book by Tomi Ungerer titled Allumette; A Fable, with Due Respect to Hans Christian Andersen, the Grimm Brothers, and the Honorable Ambrose Bierce. The Ungerer book is a re-imagining of the Hans Christian Andersen story “The Little Match Girl” where the girl this time lives and carries out her wish.

Side B is the track “What Color Is Rain” which  showed up as a video on the old version of Ryan’s video blog, affectionately called “Foggy.”

Again we are treated to a home demo of Cardinology– this time “Go Easy.”

All three songs are 160Kbps mp3’s and there aren’t any FLAC’s or cover art.

As you might imagine this caused quite a stir on the boards since this release differred in content from the first single’s inclusion of FLAC’s. Another point that upset some was that these songs weren’t the same quality as the songs on the first single, which were ostensibly multitrack recordings that were mixed for release and these songs were sketches. But for $1.49 who should complain? All of these songs are unreleased and we’re lucky that these songs are seeing the light of day– AND Ryan is excited to release them!

Both “Allumette” and “What Color Is Rain” are relatvely short songs but sound like they might have been written about the same time– both using multitracked guitar picking and utilizing a similar drum track. According to Ryan’s retorts to the complaints he used GarageBand to record them.

Both songs are very pretty songs with Ryan singing in a soft but urgent voice. These are songs that would have fit comfortably on Easy Tiger.

Click Here to purchase Pax-Am Digital Single No. 2

Click Here to read my review of Pax-Am Digital Single No. 1

Ryan Adams – Pax-Am Digital Single No. 1 “Lost and Found” b/w “Go Ahead and Rain” (Review)

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This week had the ‘Net a flutter with news of Ryan Adams’s re-launching his website and re-launching his Pax Americana (PaxAm) record label with a downloadable “Digital Single.” Pre-orders went up mid-week with a promise of the songs shipping on Friday, September 11th.

What you got for $1.49 was a .zip file with the advertised two songs “Lost and Found” and “Go Ahead and Rain” (which is mislabeled “Sunflower Rain”) in both FLAC (YAY!) and 128Kbps mp3’s plus a so-called “Free Jam” of the demo to the Cardinology song “Sink Ships” in 160Kbps mp3 format. Plus “cover art” (shown above) and what appears to be considered the label art.

“Lost and Found” is an official release of what had surfaced in November 2006 along with 11 albums of other unreleased songs under a bunch of pseudonyms including DJ Reggie, The Shit, WereWolph, Warren Peace, Rhoda Ro, Ghetto Birds and Sad Dracula. Most of the albums seemed like Ryan recording every possible inspiration– listenable or not. However, the most compelling of these releases seemed to fall under Sad Dracula and Warren Peace. “Lost and Found” was a song on Fasterpiece. The version released as part of this single doesn’t seem very much different from that track which would lead me to believe that this song was actually recorded for release.

According to threads on the ryanadamsarchive.com boards “Go Ahead and Rain” surfaced as a demo and video a while back. Ryan (posting as Wolfhunter) said that he had recorded four versions of “Go Ahead and Rain” including one which was considered for the Cardinology album. He says that Jamie (Candiloro?) plays drums on this take. Jamie Candiloro worked on the hotly-debated Rock N Roll album. He says that “Johnny T. (Yerington) played drums on ‘Oblivion’ and I played drums on the rest. ” Oblivion” is a track on Fasterpiece as well. So, probably we will see some kind of Sad Dracula release in the near future!

Ryan also says this:

Thanks for supporting Pax-Am. Though I know many of you have lot’s of tracks from over the years many don’t. The glitches and kinks are being figured out and soon enough it will be time for some bigger projects. Also with new work there will be a whole new slab of folks trying to tear down the whole thing but, fuck em- this is gonna be great, I am excited for all this shit yall never heard to come around AND I am happy to get some really badass stuff out there once and for all.

The plans for Pax-Am at the moment is to continue to release some of these “lost” albums and songs in digital and vinyl formats! There will also be other things for purchase like t-shirts. I think if any artist can make a go of this, it would be Ryan as he has the right formula– a rabid fanbase who will purchase just about anything and the fact that he’s very prolific would provide a lot of material to choose from.

I became a fan of Ryan’s because of Rock N Roll and the two Love is Hell EP’s. Rock N Roll was very much a departure from the Americana-leanings of his other releases and really the one that my wife prefers out of his catalog. I hadn’t really gotten into the three Cardinals releases from 2006 until I heard about the eleven albums he posted to his site. I found a suitable bit torrent from someone who snagged the tracks and made mp3’s of them. When I heard the Sad Dracula tracks, I was hooked– where had these songs been? These were more songs in the vein of Rock N Roll. Was this the Rock N Roll 2 that was rumored? Certainly based on what Ryan said on the board, these were the same session players.

Both tracks are of the same kind of guitar rock established on Rock N Roll. Kind of the slighty ramshackle, slightly unpolished guitar pop established by bands like The Replacements and their predecessor Big Star. I welcome more of these releases for sure!

I guess I prefer this approach of pumping stuff out on a number of releases– digital or vinyl rather than going the Neil Young Archives approach. Well, for a number of reasons– I would hate to wait 20 years for a compilation to come out of this stuff for one thing. But, also not making this a $300 purchase by releasing this a decade at a time makes it easier to budget.

Click Here to get you some rawk Ryan Adams.

Here is Ryan at the record mastering plant:

Record Testing Day from Ryan Adams on Vimeo.

Ryan Adams Delivers Hot, Steamy Love Note for V-D

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With characteristic flair, Ryan Adams delivered an iTunes-Exclusive EP entitled Extra Cheese today– in time for your Valentine’s Day soundtrack.

The EP is a collection of seven songs for a measly $3.99. Six of the songs are previously released with “Hey There, Mrs. Lovely” mostly unreleased.

I say mostly, because “Hey There Mrs. Lovely” which was recorded in 2000 for the infamous unreleased Destroyer sessions. “Hey There, Mrs. Lovely” would eventually become “These Girls” with a slight lyric rewrite on Easy Tiger.

It’s a bit curious why this song was chosen and effectively released this way. It will certainly spark anew the speculation about the Lost Highway boxset that was announced in 2007 which includes the Destroyer sessions along with 48 Hours, and The Suicide Handbook. It’s cool to get an unreleased song as part of this, but since it became another song, I would think there would be other interesting choices– but whatever.

Here is the tracklist with the album the song comes from:

  1. “Two” from Easy Tiger
  2. “Blossom” from Cold Roses
  3. “Answering Bell” from Gold
  4. “Evergreen” from Cardinology
  5. “My Love for You Is Real” from Follow the Lights
  6. “Desire” from Demolition
  7. “Hey There, Mrs. Lovely”

Some mp3’s from the Destroyer sessions at An Aquarium Drunkard Here (doesn’t include “Mrs. Lovely”).

Ryan Adams - Extra Cheese - EP Click Here to buy Extra Cheese at iTunes

B-Sides in the Bins #36 – Cedar Rapids, Half-Price Books 11/7/08

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I needed to hit GNC for the last night of Gold Card Days for Sherry, so I stopped in at Half-Price Books. A fairly productive stop– found some essentials.

Bruce Springsteen – Darkness on the Edge of Town (LP, Columbia JC 35318, 1978) ($2.98) Cool! Decent copies of the Springsteen catalog are tough to find. Next to The River, this is my favorite Springsteen record. slight cover wear, sleeve in tact as well as the lyric sheet. Vinyl impressively minty. I got into Springsteen pretty heavily after Born in the USA. I bought everything on cassette. Never bought any Springsteen on CD. So, it’s a bit strange to be picking this up on vinyl. I suppose Sony/BMG has already started pressing Bruce’s catalog in 180g vinyl. (apparently not?)

Bruce Springsteen – The River (2 LP, Columbia PC2 36854, 1980) ($3.98) My other big favorite from The Boss. I think The River is the blueprint for what would be the most-identifiable Springsteen sound with the hard-working E Street Band on board.  The River shows all the different sides to Springsteen from the out-and-out rocker of “Cadillac Ranch”  to the FM-ready “Hungry Heart” and the melancholy of “The River.” (I always wondered if the couple in the song “The River” actually drowned themselves?) Dad bought this on cassette back when it was new and I remember that we went through a couple of copies of it. It’s a little-known fact that 60-minute cassette and 90-minute cassettes use the same amount of tape. The 90’s are just stretched thinner than the 60’s. This needed to be done because otherwise the tape wouldn’t fit in the shell and be too heavy for most cassette decks. Unfortunately, this caused the double-length cassette to be prone to breaking. The River was a double-length album on cassette since it was 2 LP’s. The cover of this copy has some edge wear and sleeve wear which is very typical of copies of this album. Unfortunately, this wasn’t pressed as a gatefold, so both records are sandwiched precariously into one sleeve. The inside record sleeves which serve as the inside art are in tact as well as a slightly tear-stained lyric sheet. The vinyl is in great shape. I’ve seen some sealed copies of this show up on eBay, so this will be one I’ll want to upgrade.

Mickey Jupp – “Old Rock ‘N’ Roller” b/w “S.P.Y.” (7″ Stiff Records BUY-36, 1978)($0.98) I didn’t know who Mickey Jupp was before I picked this up. This single was notable in that it is on Stiff Records– one time home of British notables as Elvis Costello and Nick Lowe among others. Also it has the paper sleeve intact (“If it means Everything to Everyone… It Must be a Stiff” “Today’s Sound Today”). In addition to that, the A side was produced by Nick Lowe. I’m considering putting this out on eBay, but it is a pretty cool piece, so I may just keep it. I haven’t had a chance to listen to it, but it would appear to be from his Wiki article that his signing to Stiff Records was as a result of a resurgence of interest in “Pub Rock” in the 70’s.

Pieta Brown – Remember the Sun (CD, One Little Indian OLI782, 2007) ($5.98) I had this in mp3 but I wanted to own this on CD. This is a fantastic album, and certainly Pieta’s best so far in my opinion. Produced by Bo Ramsey and has that signature sound. I listen to this album quite a bit and is a good companion to Bo’s new album Fragile.

Ryan Adams – Easy Tiger (CD, Lost Highway B0009130-02, 2007) ($6.98) I have this on vinyl and mp3, but I couldn’t pass this up. Apparently Half-Price got in a bunch of sealed, new copies of Easy Tiger and are selling them for– wait for it– HALF PRICE! 😉 This is my favorite Ryan Adams album, but Cardinology is catching up quickly.

B-Sides in the Bins #35 – My 40th Birthday Party 11/1/08

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I turned forty this year and Sherry wanted to throw a big party for me that included family and friends. My family wanted to know what to get me so I advised Sherry to tell them “vinyl.” What I meant was “go to a record store that has used vinyl and pick something out– even if I might already have it.” What I got for vinyl was all new vinyl, but some very cool stuff nonetheless!

Black Mountain – In The Future (2 LP, Jagjaguwar JAG90, 2008) (gift) This one was a complete surprise! While I was familiar with Jagjaguwar (home of blog-friendly bands like Okkervil River, Oakley Hall, Bon Iver, and Sunset Rubdown) but not Black Mountain. I’m floored by this album! Psych/Folk/Metal– would be a good companion to Thrill Jockey bands Arbouretum or Pontiak. 180g in a sweet gatefold. Also comes with 192Kbps mp3 download. I’ve listened to this album 5 or 6 times already on the iPhone, but I need to spend some time with the vinyl, for sure. The song “Wucan” was included in the Spiderman III soundtrack.

Beck – Modern Guilt (LP, DGC Records B0011630-01, 2008) (gift) Right now this is my favorite Beck album EVER. Produced by Dangermouse of Gnarls Barkley fame. Just brilliant, whatever. Comes with nifty 320Kbps mp3 download that they claim was ripped from the vinyl master, but I have my doubts. They could have added the needle drop and pickup noises afterwords. Still, way cool. 180g

The Traveling Wilburys – The Traveling Wilburys Collection (3 LP, Rhino R2 167868, 2007) (gift) Sheesh, this is the motherlode! This is the 180g vinyl boxset version of the much-awaited re-release of the Traveling Wilburys catalog. Most folks know the story: Petty and Jeff Lynne were working together around the same time George Harrison was working on Cloud 9 and ended up working together with Dylan on “Handle With Care.” This spawnned the most unlikely supergroup ever when they included Roy Orbison. The first album took off with two huge singles. Orbison passes away but the group decides to carry on and record the sarcastically-named Traveling Wilburys III. Time passes, the catalog goes out-of-print, Harrison passes and Petty feels like he shouldn’t perform any of the material until Harrison’s widow requests it. This starts the ball rolling to get the albums back in print. Thankfully, too, as the eBay prices for the album were approaching $50, not to mention all of the bootlegging that was happening. This box includes both of the albums plus an LP of bonus material from the singles and b-sides. The box includes a booklet of history and non-history of the band. The LP’s are in their original sleeves, and the box includes a set of postcards that must have been used to promote the records when they first came out.

Ryan Adams and the Cardinals – Cardinology (LP, Lost Highway B0012195-01, 2008) ($17.95) I’ve written about this on the blog before. This is the very limited pressing of Cardinology that comes with special artwork done by Leah Hayes. It is pressed in Red, clear vinyl and came with a special 7″ and a comic that illustrates the lyrics of the album. Amazing version of this album and completely blows-away the likely “robot cardinal” black-and-blue cover of the future pressings. Comes with the same 320Kbps “vinyl rip” mp3 download. According to posts Ryan has made to his blog, he is considering making his next release a vinyl-only release, which would be interesting.