Album Reviews

Being out of the record-biz hype loop has certain benefits. Until I bought this album I knew nothing about Ryan Adams other than the name and a vague notion that he was an extremely talented kid who used to front an alterna-country band called Whiskeytown. I\\'m willing to admit to being two years behind the hype curve. So be it. That Gold was issued on a nicely packaged two-LP set (as are many Lost Highway releases) put me in a positive frame of mind. I wanted to like this record and Ryan Adams both.Being out of the record-biz hype loop has certain benefits. Until I bought this album I knew nothing about Ryan Adams other than the name and a vague notion that he was an extremely talented kid who used to front an alterna-country band called Whiskeytown. I'm willing to admit to being two years behind the hype curve. So be it. That Gold was issued on a nicely packaged two-LP set (as are many Lost Highway releases) put me in a positive frame of mind. I wanted to like this record and Ryan Adams both. But when I saw the American-flag-draped cover and Adams' contrived pose, my bullshit detector went off and it didn't stop ringing throughout the four sides of this set of well-recorded musical comfort food.

As the needle hit the grooves on the opening "New York, New York," an involuntary voice inside my head spit out, "Don't be angry, don't be sad," along with the rest of Stephen Stills' "Love the One You're With." The tune is catchier than a case of SARS and I listened repeatedly, knowing the experience was empty and void of musical nourishment. "Answering Bell" is Van Morrison's "Tupelo Honey" by way of The Band's "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down." Just about every one of the 21 songs has an easily identifiable antecedent which you're sure to recognize--assuming you're old enough.

The playing is studio-session-man perfect--but as contrived as the cover art. Adams' voice goes down smoothly, like Springsteen on

Valium, and it's almost impossible not to like a mellow, beautifully turned tune like "La Cienega Just Smiled," with its gorgeous, guitar-driven, string-laden hook.

But the sound and feel of this countrified rock record, with its background choruses and twangy lead lines, is about the past--about nostalgia--not the present, and certainly not the future of music. It's hard not to enjoy a song like "Somehow, Someday," especially if you're inured to The Eagles, Poco, and the other big '70s and '80s country/pop bands (not to mention Dylan's John Wesley Harding/Nashville Skyline/Blood on the Tracks period). The rhythms are like the clickety-clack of a freight train riding down too-familiar rails.

Overall, the effort is a too-familiar, artificial, empty exercise that runs out of gas as it proceeds. But it sure is beautifully produced and well engineered.