Thursday, July 12, 2007

Ryan Adams & The Cardinals (Louisville)


Am I prepared to say last night's Ryan Adams & the Cardinals performance was the best I've seen in 30 years of concertgoing? Hmm...

For 2 1/2 hours, Adams and 5 gifted musicians offered incredible renditions of dozens of songs. I was never bored and even wished it had gone on forever and ever. I loved it.

Here's a photo from a recent show that gives you an idea of how it looked. Instruments from the left: piano, Adams on 6-string acoustic, drums (simple kit), electric bass, a second acoustic and pedal steel. Although Adams dropped his guitar for the first few songs of the second (encore?) set to focus on singing, this lineup and instrumentation remained intact throughout without switching to electric guitars, mandolins, banjos, 12-strings, etc. Yet miraculously, they sounded like a different band on almost every tune.
Note the musicians are in a line, almost like a bluegrass band, where no one is the center of attention.

The backstory for this $20 show is that the mercurial Adams pissed off Louisville in May (when he was part of a public radio benefit) by walking off after 5 songs. This $20 makeup show was sold out. After 30 minutes of scouring the area for one ticket, I got in for $30 minutes before the show started but there were many more lookers than scalpers outside the Brown Theater. I saw one fellow pay $200 for 2 tickets right in front of me as we haggled the same seller. He had traveled from New York to see the band. I had never seen Adams & the Cardinals live but I guess this guy had!

Therefore, Adams might have been in a mood to kiss and make up for a Louisville audience that someone told me was one of his top 6 or 7 markets in the U.S. In any case, the performance was riveting and the crowd attentive and appreciative.

Like a Dylan show, many songs featured rearrangements but unlike a Dylan show the arrangements were tight and well-sung. For example, "This Is It" was completely overhauled from its electric guitar urgency on disc but was magnificent in this new incarnation. Whereas a Dylan show can become a game of "Name that Tune", this band stuck to the originals but offered creative twists in vocals or song form that never diffused the song's identity. In fact, the vocals were stunning with 3 of the sidemen providing harmonies in various combinations. Particularly wonderful is the Cardinal's guitarist who sings beautifully.

Songs like "Magnolia Mountain", "Goodnight Rose" and "Easy Plateau" ventured into acoustic jams that transcended the studio versions by miles. The unexpected twists and turns did not leave the listener behind but instead provided a pied piper path to follow. This path led to bliss. Each song, whether short or a lengthy jam, provided an open-ended listening and communal experience with a perfect blend of the familiar song structure with some appropriate, even comforting, change-ups.

Interestingly, despite the plethora of source material from the prolific Adams, the set did not even include my 3 favorite songs from Jacksonville City Nights nor the two best songs from the new album Easy Tiger. That's not a gripe, it's a testament to the interpretation of the selected material. Thankfully, the band did two of my favorites from 29: "Blue Sky Blues" and "Nightbirds".

A performance is fixed in space and time and therefore it seems futile to convey the ambience. In other words, you had to be there. Take my word for it, this concert was sublime from stem to stern. Given some of the silly banter between songs it was amazing how they refocused all energy in the theater the moment a new song began.

For the record, I was sober (there were merely 4 or 5 molecules of vodka in my one $4.50 cranberry juice). The only influence I was under was the sonic magic of these excellent musicians giving multi-dimensional life to riveting songs in a natural, direct and flowing way that left me enamored with their talent and skill. Every song left me asking "how can the next one top that?". I'm still basking in an afterglow I hope I never forget.

P.S. I'm intentionally not answering my original question. After hundreds of concerts it's impossible to pick a best. Still, the fact I even raised the question indicates something.

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