So...Ryan Adams...

I feel sorry for Bryan Adams, if he in fact catching flack.
But who the fuck is Ryan Adams anyway?
 
jp_nyc said:
Indie rock heartthrob. Until recently he was very popular with female hipsters.
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That’s generous. I’d say it’s more like former alt-country boy genius gone to seed who tried and failed to become a beloved indie rock entertainer and instead became a dull avatar of “doing music the way it used to be done” for decrepit 40-something music dweebs (mostly dudes).

Mostly he’s been an embarrassing old man enfant terrible who puts out boring records that sound like the Grateful Dead and/or the Band tailored for the West Elm catalog crowd. Occasionally one of his zillion records of the last few years would rise beyond “nice sounding” or “mostly harmless” but pretty much no one has cared about Ryan Adams for a long time. As a result, he frequently Trumped all over himself on Twitter in a bid for attention.
 
His snoozed up 1989 was the last thing I've spent any time with. Think I fell asleep halfway through it.
 
GusChiggins said:
His snoozed up 1989 was the last thing I've spent any time with. Think I fell asleep halfway through it.
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So many guitarists have this same fantasy w/r/t to top 40 pop music it seems. One, that being a guitarist means they are gods. Doing a cover is coming down to the level of mere mortals, it just makes sense for them to grace the world with a cover. Two, that their boring metal chugging or cowboy chord strumming 'improve' upon the layers of synths, vocal harmonies, beats, strings, extremely tight rhythm guitar playing, etc. on a slick pop record.
 
Peen Simmons said:
That’s generous. I’d say it’s more like former alt-country boy genius gone to seed who tried and failed to become a beloved indie rock entertainer and instead became a dull avatar of “doing music the way it used to be done” for decrepit 40-something music dweebs (mostly dudes).

Mostly he’s been an embarrassing old man enfant terrible who puts out boring records that sound like the Grateful Dead and/or the Band tailored for the West Elm catalog crowd. Occasionally one of his zillion records of the last few years would rise beyond “nice sounding” or “mostly harmless” but pretty much no one has cared about Ryan Adams for a long time. As a result, he frequently Trumped all over himself on Twitter in a bid for attention.
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Or, to put it simply:

He was the Jason Isbell of the 00s

Not sure what a good comparison for present day Adams would be. Maybe a very poor man’s version of 90s Wilco.
 
Bones McHorror said:
So many guitarists have this same fantasy w/r/t to top 40 pop music it seems. One, that being a guitarist means they are gods. Doing a cover is coming down to the level of mere mortals, it just makes sense for them to grace the world with a cover. Two, that their boring metal chugging or cowboy chord strumming 'improve' upon the layers of synths, vocal harmonies, beats, strings, extremely tight rhythm guitar playing, etc. on a slick pop record.
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Ever since groups with guitars stopped being at the forefront of popular culture, they have in many cases doubled down on "authenticity" as their unique selling point. (My guess is that since the money fell out of records, it is also a consideration that everything has to be more-or-less playable live.)

It's even infected bass players, who still believed in the possibility of a future after the hair metal scene imploded and a generation of guitarists dumped their super-strats for Fenders.
 
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