Tag Archives: Bucky Baxter

September 25: Ryan Adams released ‘Gold’ in 2001 – 12 years ago

Ryan-Adams-Gold

“All the songs had to work completely and honestly by themselves on acoustic guitar or on piano. If they didn’t, they weren’t worth putting on the record.”
~Ryan Adams (about ‘Gold’)

“[Gold is] me not buying my own bullshit for two seconds.”
~Ryan Adams

New York, New York:

From Wikipedia:

Released September 25, 2001
Recorded The Sound Factory
(Hollywood, California)
Genre Rock, alternative country
Length 70:26
Label Lost Highway
Producer Ethan Johns

Gold is the second studio album by Ryan Adams, released September 25, 2001 on Lost Highway Records. The album remains Adams’ best-selling album, certifying gold in the UK and going on to sell 364,000 copies in the U.S. and 812,000 worldwide. Adams noted that “with Gold, I was trying to prove something to myself. I wanted to invent a modern classic.”

Ryan-Adams-Gold2

Adams intended for the album to be a double album, but his record label, Lost Highway, condensed the album into a single disc. According to Adams, the label “took the last five songs, made it a bonus disc and put it on the first hundred and fifty thousand copies. Fucking my fans over and making them pay extra for a record I wanted to be a double album. They counted that as one record.” This bonus disc is known as Side Four; the disc’s title reflects the fact that the bonus material makes up the fourth side of the double LP edition of the album.

The album includes “When the Stars Go Blue”, which has been covered by artists such as The Corrs and Bono, Tyler Hilton, Bethany Joy Galeotti, and Tim McGraw. “New York, New York” became a notable MTV and VH-1 favorite following the September 11 attacks. “The Rescue Blues” was featured in the end credits of the 2001 film Behind Enemy Lines.

Adams’ friend and former roommate Adam Duritz (lead singer of Counting Crows) lends background vocals to several tracks.

ryan adams gold-back-cover

Adams received three Grammy Award nominations in 2002: Best Rock Album, Best Male Rock Vocal Performance for “New York, New York”, and Best Male Country Vocal Performance for “Lovesick Blues”.

Stephen King’s 2006 book Lisey’s Story includes part of the lyrics to “When the Stars Go Blue”. Also, the song “The Rescue Blues” was featured in an episode of Scrubs. In 2011, “Answering Bell” was featured in the film and on the soundtrack to Bridesmaids.

 

RollingStone.com – David Fricke:…… Gold lacks the concise ache of Adams’ indie solo prize from last year, Heartbreaker, but it is stronger on naked truth. In “Harder Now That It’s Over,” a messy tale of jealousy, gunplay and handcuffs co-written with Chris Stills, Adams sings with the straight, clear sorrow of a fool who beat doing hard time but sentenced himself to life alone. “I’m less than nothing now/I’m the one between the bars,” he admits over whispered accordion and a slender stream of steel-guitar tears — an age-old story told be a young singer-songwriter wise enough to let his heart speak for itself.
read more: rollingstone.com
Andrew Gilstrap @ popmatters.com:…… Overall, though, Gold feels like a record hiding behind masks. Maybe Adams has spent so many years laying his heart out on the line that he’s trying to create a little distance. In some cases, especially on the uptempo numbers, that works just fine. However, the album’s surprisingly minimalist lyrics and derivative arrangements make it stronger on vibe than actual content. Adams recently complained that he’s sick of himself and sick of being deep, and Gold may very well be his respite from that, exercising his inner music geek rather than his soul. Or maybe he’s just trying to say what he needs to say without revealing as much as in the past. Whatever the case, most of Gold lacks the universality and the heart-wrenching beauty of much of Adams’s earlier work.
read more over @ popmatters.som 

 

Track Listing:

All songs written and composed by Ryan Adams unless otherwise stated.

  1. “New York, New York” 3:46
  2. “Firecracker” 2:51
  3. “Answering Bell” 3:05
  4. “La Cienega Just Smiled” 5:03
  5. “The Rescue Blues” 3:38
  6. “Somehow, Someday” 4:24
  7. “When the Stars Go Blue” 3:31
  8. “Nobody Girl” (Adams/Ethan Johns) 9:40
  9. “Sylvia Plath” (Adams/Richard Causon) 4:10
  10. “Enemy Fire” (Adams/Gillian Welch) 4:09
  11. “Gonna Make You Love Me” 2:36
  12. “Wild Flowers” 4:59
  13. “Harder Now That It’s Over” (Adams/Chris Stills) 4:32
  14. “Touch, Feel and Lose” (Adams/David Rawlings) 4:15
  15. “Tina Toledo’s Street Walkin’ Blues” (Adams/Johns) 6:10
  16. “Goodnight, Hollywood Blvd.” (Adams/Causon) 3:25

Bonus disc: “Side Four”

  1. “Rosalie Come and Go” 3:54
  2. “The Fools We Are As Men” 4:01
  3. “Sweet Black Magic” (Adams/Johns) 2:35
  4. “The Bar Is a Beautiful Place” 5:58
  5. “Cannonball Days”
Personnel:
  • Ryan Adams – Vocals, acoustic guitar, electric guitar, banjo, piano
  • Bucky Baxter – Steel guitar
  • Andre Carter – Trumpet
  • Richard Causon – Piano
  • Jennifer Condos – Bass
  • Milo De Cruz – Bass
  • Adam Duritz – Choir, background vocals
  • Keith Hunter – Choir
  • Rami Jaffi – Accordion
  • Ethan Johns – Drums, electric guitar, chamberlain strings, lead guitar, hammond B-3, background vocals, acoustic guitar, 12-string guitar, mando-cello, vibes, string arrangement, guitar, slide guitar, mandolin, bass, electric piano, celeste, harmonium, congas
  • Rob McDonald – Choir
  • Sid Paige – Concert master
  • Julianna Raye – Background vocals, choir
  • Chris Stills – Background vocals, electric guitar, bass, acoustic guitar, acoustic 12-string guitar
  • Benmont Tench – Hammond B-3, piano
  • Kamasi Washington – Saxophone
  • C.C. White – Background vocals, choir, solo vocals

Firecracker – live:

When The Stars go blue – Live:

gold_cd

Album of the day – Gold (2001):

Other September 25:

Continue reading September 25: Ryan Adams released ‘Gold’ in 2001 – 12 years ago

Unreleased – Cracks in a photograph by Ryan Adams

suicide handbook

The Unreleased series

“If you run into my sister tell her Elvis is cool
but the Rolling Stones will sweep her away”

Cracks in a photograph is from the unreleased album that was supposed to be the follow-up to Adams’ solo debut Heartbreaker. We can only speculate why the album was shelved, but it is a bleak affair and the title was/is Suicide Handbook. I’m guessing the record company wasn’t too thrilled by what they got served.

The song is the 4th song on the second disc and I will describe it as a hidden gem or a buried treasure, to my knowledge it has never been performed live. It is one of his finest compositions, but maybe it is too close and too true to those bad feelings from before,  even for Ryan Adams. The song could be interpreted as part of a suicide note, or at least the notes from a man making amends and leaving “the old life”.

Cracks in a photograph:

Continue reading Unreleased – Cracks in a photograph by Ryan Adams

Today: Steve Earle released the album Guitar Town in 1986 – 27 years ago

Steve-Earle-Guitar-Town

The first two things I wrote were Guitar Town and Down the Road, because I was looking for an opening and an ending.  So I wrote ’em like bookends, and then filled in the spaces in the middle.  And the album’s kind of about me.  It’s kind of personal.
~Steve Earle (to Alanna Nash – May 1986)

Guitar Town was his first shot at showing a major audience what he could do, and he hit a bull’s-eye — it’s perhaps the strongest and most confident debut album any country act released in the 1980s.
~Mark Deming (allmusic)

Guitar Town:

Wikipedia:

Released March 5, 1986
Recorded Sound Stage Studio, Nashville, Tennessee
Genre Country rock, Americana, Texas Country, heartland rock, rockabilly
Length 34:35
Label MCA
Producer Emory Gordy, Jr., Tony Brown
Associate Producer: Richard Bennett

Guitar Town is the debut album from singer-songwriter Steve Earle, released on March 5, 1986. It topped the Billboard country album charts, and the title song reached #7 on the country singles charts. Earle was also nominated for two 1987 Grammy Awards, Best Male Country Vocalist and Best Country Song, for the title track.

steve earle guitar town

 

Goodbye’s All We’ve Got Left on Austin City Limits September 12 1986:

The album was recorded in late 1985 and early 1986 in Nashville, Tennessee, at Sound Stage Studio. Overdubs were later recorded at Nashville’s Emerald Studios. It was one of the first country music albums to be recorded digitally, utilizing the state-of-the-art Mitsubishi X-800. Each of the album’s ten tracks was either written or co-written by Earle.

In 2003, the album was ranked number 489 on Rolling Stone magazine’s list of the 500 greatest albums of all time. In 2012, the album ranked at #482 on a revised list. In 2006, it ranked 27th on CMT’s 40 Greatest Albums in Country Music.

steve earle guitar town 2

Someday (Live on New Music Awards 1986):

Track listing:

All songs written by Steve Earle unless otherwise noted

  1. “Guitar Town” – 2:33
  2. “Goodbye’s All We’ve Got Left” – 3:16
  3. “Hillbilly Highway” (Earle, Jimbeau Hinson) – 3:36
  4. “Good Ol’ Boy (Gettin’ Tough)” (Earle, Richard Bennett) – 3:58
  5. “My Old Friend the Blues” – 3:07
  6. “Someday” – 3:46
  7. “Think It Over” (Bennett, Earle) – 2:13
  8. “Fearless Heart” – 4:04
  9. “Little Rock ‘n’ Roller” – 4:49
  10. “Down the Road” (Tony Brown, Earle, Hinson) – 2:37

My Old Friend The Blues – Live 1987:

Personnel:

  • Steve Earle – guitar, vocals

The Dukes

  • Bucky Baxter – pedal steel guitar
  • Richard Bennett – guitars, 6-string bass, slap bass, associate producer
  • Ken Moore – organ, synthesizer, keyboards on “State Trooper”
  • Emory Gordy, Jr. – bass, mandolin, producer
  • Harry Stinson – drums, vocals

Additional musicians

  • Paul Franklin – pedal steel guitar on “Fearless Heart” and “Someday”
  • John Jarvis – synthesizer, piano
  • Steve Nathan – synthesizer

From Spotify:

Other March 05:

Continue reading Today: Steve Earle released the album Guitar Town in 1986 – 27 years ago

Bob Dylan’s best songs – Lenny Bruce – #148

Lenny Bruce 2

 Maybe he had some problems, maybe some things that he couldn’t work out
But he sure was funny and he sure told the truth and he knew what he was talkin’ about
~Bob Dylan (From the lyrics of “Lenny Bruce”)

Here’s a song I wrote a while back about a guy who died pretty miserably  actually. I figured I didn’t write this song, nobody would so, somebody had to write it. There’s a great American playwright named Tennessee Williams. He said, “I’m not looking for your pity, I just want your understanding. No, not even that, but just your recognition of me and you and time, the enemy in us all.” Anyway, he died pretty miserably too. So this is a man who got no recognition really during his lifetime. But he laid down a lot of road for a lot of people to walk on. People still walking on that road, making lots of money, living in fine houses. Have plenty of women and eating good food. And he didn’t have none of them things.
~Bob Dylan (before “Lenny Bruce”  @ Nippon Budokan Hall – Tokyo, Japan – 10 March 1986)

@ #148 on my list of Dylan’s 200 best songs. A song about the great stand-up comedian Lenny Bruce.

shot of love

spotify:

The original version from “Shot Of Love” is a very good song.. but there are many live versions that are superior…

Here is a great example:

Live @ Kooyong Stadium – Melbourne, Victoria, Australia – Feb 1986

Musicians playing on this video:

  • Bob Dylan (vocal & guitar)
  • Tom Petty (guitar)
  • Mike Campbell (guitar)
  • Benmont Tench (keyboards)
  • Howie Epstein (bass)
  • Stan Lynch (drums)

  • The Queens Of Rhythm:
  • Debra Byrd
  • Queen Esther Marrow
  • Madelyn Quebec
  • Elisecia Wright (backing vocals)

bob-dylan 1986 live

Continue reading Bob Dylan’s best songs – Lenny Bruce – #148