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Ryan Adams
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Mixing the heartfelt angst of a singer/songwriter with the cocky brashness of a garage rocker,
Ryan Adams
is at once one of the few artists to emerge from the alt-country scene to achieve mainstream commercial success
and
the one who most strongly refused to be defined by the genre, leaping from one spot to another stylistically while following his increasingly prolific muse.
Adams
was born in Jacksonville, North Carolina in 1974. While country music was a major part of his family's musical diet when he was young (he's cited
Loretta Lynn
,
George Jones
,
Merle Haggard
, and
Johnny Cash
as particular favorites), in his early teens
Adams
developed a taste for punk rock and began playing electric guitar.
At 15,
Adams
started writing songs, and a year later he formed a band called
the Patty Duke Syndrome
;
Adams
once described
PDS
as "an arty noise punk band," with
Hüsker Dü
frequently cited as a key influence and reference point.
The Patty Duke Syndrome
developed a following in Jacksonville, and when
Adams
was 19 the band relocated to the larger town of Raleigh, North Carolina in hopes of expanding its following. However,
Adams
became eager to do something more melodic that would give him a platform for his country and pop influences. In 1994,
Adams
left
the Patty Duke Syndrome
and formed
Whiskeytown
with guitarist
Phil Wandscher
and violinist
Caitlin Cary
. With bassist
Steve Grothman
and drummer
Eric "Skillet" Gilmore
completing the lineup,
Whiskeytown
(the name came from regional slang for getting drunk) released their first album,
Faithless Street
, on the local Mood Food label.
The album won reams of critical praise in the music press, and more than one writer suggested that
Whiskeytown
could do for the alt-country or No Depression scene what
Nirvana
had done for grunge. But by the time
Whiskeytown
had signed to a major label -- the Geffen-distributed imprint Outpost Records -- the band had undergone the first in a series of major personal shakeups, and in the summer of 1997, when
Whiskeytown
's Outpost debut,
Stranger's Almanac
, was ready for release,
Adams
and
Wandscher
were the only official members of the group left.
Cary
soon returned, but
Wandscher
left shortly afterward, and
Whiskeytown
had a revolving-door lineup for much of the next two years, with the band's live shows become increasingly erratic, as solid performances were often followed by noisy, audience-baiting disasters. Consequently, as strong as
Stranger's Almanac
was,
Whiskeytown
never fulfilled the commercial expectations created for them by others. In 1999, the band -- which was down to
Adams
,
Cary
, and a handful of session musicians -- recorded its third and final album,
Pneumonia
, but when Geffen was absorbed in a merger between PolyGram and Universal, Outpost was phased out, and the album was shelved; shortly afterward,
Whiskeytown
quietly called it quits.
Following
Whiskeytown
's collapse,
Adams
wasted no time launching a career apart from the band, and after a few solo acoustic tours,
Adams
went into a Nashville studio with songwriters
Gillian Welch
and
David Rawlings
and cut his first album under his own name,
Heartbreaker
, which was released by pioneering "insurgent country" label Bloodshot Records in 2000. The album received critical raves, respectable sales, and a high-profile endorsement from
Elton John
, and
Adams
was signed by Universal's new Americana imprint, Lost Highway Records. Lost Highway gave
Whiskeytown
's
Pneumonia
a belated release in early 2001, and later that same year the label released his second solo set,
Gold
, which displayed less of a country influence in favor of classic pop and rock styles of the 1970s. In the wake of the September 11 terrorist attacks, the album's opening track, "New York, New York," was embraced by radio as an anthem of resilience (though it actually concerned a busted romance), and
Adams
once again found himself touted as "the next big thing."
Always a prolific songwriter, in a bit more than a year following
Gold
's release,
Adams
had written and recorded enough material for four albums. He opted to whittle the 60 tunes down to a 13-song collection called
Demolition
, which was released in 2002 as he went into the studio to record his official follow-up to
Gold
. A year later,
Adams
' concept album
Rock n Roll
was released alongside the double-EP collection
Love Is Hell
. Tours around the globe kept
Adams
busy into the next year as he maintained momentum writing songs and keeping his ever-changing presence in the music press. In May 2005,
Adams
released his first of three albums for Lost Highway, the melancholic double-disc
Cold Roses
.
Jacksonville City Nights
, a more classic-sounding honky tonk effort, followed in September, and
29
appeared in late December. Always prolific, in the interim period before his next album was released
Adams
posted a large selection of tracks -- including several hip-hop tunes -- on his website, but fans were greeted with more straightforward material on 2007's
Easy Tiger
and 2008's
Cardinology
with
the Cardinals
.
Adams
decided to disband
the Cardinals
in 2009, precipitating an unusual period of quiet from the prolific singer/songwriter. He slowly returned to active duty in 2010, releasing the heavy metal Orion on vinyl-only in the summer and then issuing III/IV -- a double album recorded with
the Cardinals
during the
Easy Tiger
sessions -- in November. For his 13th solo album, 2011's Ashes and Fire, the singer/songwriter recruited Norah Jones and Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers' keyboard player Benmont Tench, as well as legendary producer Glyn Johns, who helmed the Who classic Who’s Next.
–
Mark Deming, Rovi
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More Ryan Adams
Discography
iTunes Session
Live After Deaf
Ashes & Fire
Do I Wait/Darkness
III/IV
2012
Heartbreak a Stranger
2011
Cold Roses
2008
Cardinology
2007
Easy Tiger
2007
Two
2007
Follow the Lights [EP]
2007
Everybody Knows
2006
29
2005
Let It Ride, Pt. 2
2005
If I Am a Stranger
2005
Easy Plateau, Pt. 2
2005
The Hardest Part
2005
Always on My Mind
2005
Cold Roses
2005
Let It Ride, Pt. 1
2005
Easy Plateau, Vol. 1 [Germany CD]
2005
Jacksonville City Nights
2005
A Kiss Before I Go
2005
Jeane
2004
Now That You're Gone
►
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