counting down Cold Roses

The newest release from Ryan Adams, Cold Roses, comes out in 6 DAYS (t-minus):



Consider this countdown week on the Westification, with hype and things to read and things to listen to, to get you ready for Cold Roses. (Or to make you hate me and my Ryan Adams loving ways, forever cementing a rift in our friendship, actual or potential.)

Today, Amazon.com's About the Artist feature, which I'm almost certain was written by Ryan Adams himself:

Ryan Adams has played in some bands and has made some new albums. He enjoys writing lots of music, and from time to time takes it to the jam. He is currently focused on doing things quietly, without much fuss, in his professional life. He hopes for a calm, cool, meaningful ride in his thirties. Ryan loves his dog and his guitar. He digs comics, coffee and cigs. His favorite foods are, whatever the soup of the day is (as long as it’s maybe like a vegetable soup, or some sort of clam chowder), and ham and cheese sandwiches. When he falls asleep next to his dog, he thinks to himself that heaven is probably holding hands with your gal by a beautiful lake and laying in the grass with your dog; dreaming of the sky, clouds and the smell of grass and rain.

Ryan likes to think about the solar system, the dynamics of rotation, its effects on binary star systems and if it has linear or emotional effects. He likes to read Ram Dass and loves Ram Dass' voice. He was very moved by Journey of Awakening. Most of the time Ryan isn’t thinking at all about music, or the ramifications of playing music, or what that means to others. Instead, he thinks about little things like "I wonder if she would like this?" or "Maybe this is tacky, not that tacky is bad, but it just might not go with her other stuff" or "Why did I used to like the Twilight Zone so much? It gives me tremors. I mean, almost panic attacks. Why can’t they just write an episode where everything works out? Where its all okay and people can just sort of be here for a second, breathe and feel some sort of relationship to themselves." You know, normal stuff.

For the most part, Ryan Adams hopes that he can just play some songs and whatever. If that’s not okay with someone, that’s totally fine, He won’t come into their homes and like, jam on top of their TV sets, or in their face wearing nothing but a cowboy belt with gun holsters and women’s underwear while screaming "Listen to me...look, look what I did… LISTEN TO ME OR PERISH!!!" Then, turn into a gigantic metallic spider and wrap whoever up in electric coils and devour them, only after injecting them with poisons so their insides go to mush.

Well, he’s totally not into that at all, and really sort of keeps mostly to himself these days. He knows that everybody thinks that he is some kind of lunatic, and maybe that’s so, but as long as it’s not in someone else’s yard, and yeah that happens to everybody once or twice, but really.

Ryan likes Dokken a lot, unapologetically, not that anyone would have to apologize for that. He is currently looking for the deeper meaning in things, trying to belong to the light and not give into meaningless ego drivel. He really hopes for the best.

The Cardinals are his new band. Cold Roses is his new jam. Laters.