It was perhaps unsurprising that we had, on a sleepy Sunday in Cambridge, a quiet Ryan Adams & The Cardinals. Without a support act, the band took to the stage early and played for two hours, but with barely a word from Mr. Adams and co. throughout who stood hidden to the back left of the stage, a heavy fringe covering his face. A muffled intro before they kicked into an aggressive and charged version of ‘Cobwebs’, the sound not actually at its best as Adams’ lyrics appear muted through a wall of guitars. However, a couple of numbers in and they seem to have sorted it all out.
The thing with The Cardinals is that they’re a great live band. There’s no two ways around it, and certainly their recent support slots with Oasis seem to have beefed up the sound a bit, augmenting the ROCK side of their Country Rock sound. It’s nice to get a waltz through the back catalogue with new variations on old favourites. ‘Broadway’ gets a thumping intro and is barely recognisable to the sparse, delicate original whilst ‘Wonderwall’ also gets a steroid injection. It quickly becomes apparent that Adams has decided to rejuvenate his back catalogue in an attempt to fully embrace his new found happiness at being the boy in the band.
And yet, despite all these oddities – the silence from Neal Casal as well as Adams, the oddly aggressive reworking of the back catalogue – I still find I’m enjoying myself. The band are tight, their rolling taking centre stage with ‘Let It Ride’ and ‘Easy Plateau’ from the pinnacle of his career so far, Cold Roses. The only sound of indulgence appears during their Grateful Dead inspired elongated coda’s for some of these songs. Adams and Casal sparing guitar solos, which might come across a touch Eagles in places, but the crowd seemingly in awe enough to let this slip.
This was an oddly disconnected evening that flirted with greatness but, in the end, missing that one crucial level of involvement that would have sent the entire crowd home happy – some words of wisdom, or even an acknowledgment, from Mr. Adams.
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I bow to no one in my admiration of Ryan Adams but last nights show was so disappointing. The Sound was awful. Did they do a sound check? For the first 6 numbers you could hardly hear Ryans voice. Who was on the mixing desk? When the band stopped giving their impression of a 70′s heavy rock outfit and let Ryan sing almost alone then things improved. He’s a wonderful talent but the current onus on being ‘one of the band’ does him no favours.
I was suprised at how the attitude of the band towards the audience really stopped me from enjoying the show (as well as the sound problems and, not sure if anyone else noticed, but the way the drummer kept speeding up throughout most of the set).
Despite the above they still performed really well and Come Pick Me Up was wonderful, but not a particularly memorable gig.
I thought the sound problems were just at the beginning – it sounded ok from where I was.
I actually like their 70′s sound, but that’s just me :-)
I agree with some of the above – the sound wasn’t good to start with and was worried as I took a mate with me to see Ryan for the 1st time – I’d seen his previous 2 shows at Cambridge. However after the first few numbers they did get the sound sorted and the concert was superb after that. The band played very tightly and Igot used to the introversion of Ryan which maybe also impacted on the band. He is clearly incredibly shy and uncomfortable engaging with the audience other than with his singing. He obviously wants to be regarded as just a member of the band – we all know he is a genious, an incredible sonwriter and one who can also interpret others songs and make them his own – Wonderwall was stunning.
Thats the 3rd time I’ve seen him, 3 amazing concerts 3 very different and I loved it last night. I also saw Bob Marley in the 70s and he didn’t speak to us other than in his music! Did anyone take note of the set list?
We know now Ryan will always be unpredictable but we also know we are in the presence of a unique talent when he appears – roll on the next time!
Yeah, the sound problems were only for the first couple of songs, but I was also on the top level, middle right, not the best place for acoustics(!) so my comments are a bit biased.
I probably would have loved it had I been on floor level, but I just felt like I was watching a distant memory from where I was.
Yeah – I don’t like the balcony at the Corn Ex, it’s really distancing and, with Ryan being quieter than normal, it would have been worse.
Likewise Tim, this was the 3rd time I’ve seen him and each time was different. I think I was spoilt seeing him at the Borderline 2 years ago where, in the tiny venue and unplugged, it was truly special.
Wonderwall was beautiful.
I really enjoyed the show, I wasn’t all that bothered about Ryan being quiet as from my experience when he talks the crowd shout back and he does seem to attract a mix of great people and total knob heads to his shows
Last nights show at Birmingham was nothing short of amazing Ryan by the sound of it had a little more interaction with the crowd even Neal Casal came out to the front and chatted with the front row before coming on.
There were a few knob heads in the crowd which were told to “shut the fuck up” by every one else which pleased RA… Ryan gave one of his random Speaches about buying an oversized calculator to go with that massive oversized Fender Amp of his. But dispite all this, the music was un questionably sublime, the vocal harmonies were beautiful and the band just seem to be in a different dimension to where they were 2 years ago shame the new album isn’t.