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Ryan Adams & the Cardinals - Cold Roses
CD DetailsArtist: Ryan Adams & the Cardinals Edition: Music CD Published: 2005 CD Release Date: 2005-05-03 Music Label: Lost Highway Soundtracks: Music CD 1- Magnolia Mountain
- Sweet Illusions
- Meadowlake Street
- When Will You Come Back Home?
- Beautiful Sorta
- Now That You're Gone
- Cherry Lane
- Mockingbirdsing
- How Do You Keep Love Alive
Music CD 2- Easy Plateau
- Let It Ride
- Rosebud
- Cold Roses
- If I Am A Stranger
- Dance All Night
- Blossom
- Life Is Beautiful
- Friends
Music reviews of Cold RosesMusic Review: Not a masterpiece, but his first great country album since Whiskeytown Rating: 4 StarsFor all the tens of people yearning for Ryan Adams to reform Whiskeytown, this is probably the closest you'll ever get. His most country-tinged album since the breakup of that band, Ryan returns to his musical roots on this double album (which really could have been just one long disc, a la Gold).
Ryan pulls a Neil Young and credits the album to "Ryan Adams and the Cardinals," a band formed for the purposes of recording it. Despite its obvious country tilt, this album will have something for all Ryan's differing fans, the country - "Magnolia Mountain," "Let It Ride," the rockers - "Cold Roses," "Beautiful Sorta," and the ballads - "Now That You're Gone," "How Do You Keep Love Alive." The latter song is one of his loveliest and would not be out of place on Heartbreaker or Love Is Hell, I wouldn't doubt if it was recorded during the sessions for LIH.
Ryan explores his relationship with God and nature in detail on this album. He starts by talking about "the rocks of the mountain my saviour made" in the opener, "Magnolia Mountain." The album is peppered with these sort of references. "Close my eyes, see the glorious sunset/Through the windows of a store and I want it/Anyway, if I ever felt haunted/You were there for me..." "Hear all them bells ringing out in the street/Oh, hammer strikes the metal and it makes me believe/'Cause if I don't believe in love/Then I don't believe in you/And I do"
Church bells? There are numerous references to God, angels, and souls, for example, in "Let It Ride" - "Let it ride/Let it take away all of this darkness/Let it ride/Let it rock me in the arms of stranger's angels until it brings me home..." He's not being preachy to any extent, but I get the sense that this album is Ryan's declaration of his faith. It's not the only theme, but it is a theme.
This is not Ryan's best work, but that is Heartbreaker, and few have reached the greatness of that album. It is, however, stronger than its most obvious comparison for length and variety of songs, Gold. With two more albums released in 2005, it was a fine year for Ryan Adams fans.
Description of Cold RosesCold Roses is the first of three Ryan Adams releases this year on Lost Highway Records. September to hit this summer and 29 to hit this fall. The new release, a double CD, features Ryan's new band The Cardinals and was produced by Tom Schick. Ryan & The Cardinals recorded Cold Roses in two different sessions at Loho Studios. Ryan will be touring in the Spring, Summer and Fall. "Let It Ride" is the first single going to AAA in early April. Sent reeling by the one-two punch Conor Oberst's Bright Eyes delivered with I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning and Digital Ash In A Digital Urn, Ryan Adams vowed to strike back in 2005 with three of his own releases. The first--a double album, no less--sees the attention-seeking former Whiskeytown singer casting off both the raucous guitars of 2003's Rock N Roll and the rainy-day ballads of the same year's Love Is Hell in favor of the more introspective moments and rustic textures of 2000's Heartbreaker. He's snuck in at least one epic with "Meadowlake Street" and one potential radio hit with the twangy "Let It Ride," while the rest of the set is mostly packed with bleary-eyed laments that feel all too mannered after spending the last few years revealing his naked pop ambition in full. No doubt Adams will make up for it with the next one. --Aidin Vaziri Recommended Ryan Adams Discography  Heartbreaker |  Gold |  Love Is Hell |  Whiskeytown, Pneumonia |  Whiskeytown, Stranger's Almanac |  Whiskeytown, Faithless Street | Here is the album that many fans have been hoping Ryan Adams would make since his much heralded emergence with Whiskeytown. Though Adams has been as eclectic (and erratic) as prolific over his solo career, this double-disc gem delineates the possibilities of alt-country in 2005 while transcending the limitations typically associated with the genre. The organic arrangements of his new band, the Cardinals, blend acoustic and electric strains, sparked by the interplay between J.P. Bowersock on guitar and Asleep at the Wheel alumna Cindy Cashdollar on pedal and lap steel. With the set-opening "Magnolia Mountain," Adams and band draw inspiration beyond the title from the era of Neil Young's "Sugar Mountain" and the Grateful Dead's "Sugar Magnolia," though much of what follows shares as much in spirit with Bright Eyes (or even the poppier side of Prince) as it does with retro country-rock. On "Mockingbird Street," Adams builds from the stripped-down intimacy of a heartbeat toward the majesty of an anthem. Except for the rock and roll swagger of "Beautiful Sorta," the material exposes an open-hearted vulnerability, emotions that range from the rapturously romantic ("Cherry Lane") to the tremulously tender ("Mockingbird") to the broodingly bittersweet ("Rosebud"). On the engagingly uptemo "Let It Ride," Adams confesses to "27 years of nothing but failure and promises that I couldn't keep." This release represents promise fulfilled. --Don McLeese
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