Good Music That I Have Recently Accquired - Cardinology

The election is over*. The tragicomedy of robo-calls, pallin' around with terrorists, and crazy ladies who don't trust radical Muslim Arab Socialists who belong to radical Christian churches who hate America has come to a close. The curtain is down, and I've got nothin'*2.

So, until I can reliably purchase my comic books and write about them*3, we'll be branching out into another source of entertainment. Music.

Whether by hook or by crook*4, here's some new music I've enjoyed. You should enjoy it too; or don't you like music? If you don't, I can't actually make a case for your humanity, robot.

This time we'll be looking at:

Cardinology - Ryan Adams & The Cardinals

There's an elephant in the room*5 when you talk about Ryan Adams. The haters say two things; "He just makes the same records" and "He jumps around between genres too much". First, shut up. Then, reconcile those two statements. You can't, can you? Know why? Because they are directly at odds with one another. I can see a time twenty years on, after Sarah Palin has plunged us into a nuclear winter during her third administration, when people talk about Ryan Adams like we talk about Neil Young right now. He's got a lot to say, most of it entirely worth your loss of hearing. Some of it needs saying in a honkytonk, some in a sweaty arena, some on your stoop while talking with a pretty lady (or pretty dude), and some on the morning after being in those places, when your brain is still soaked in a cocktail of endorphins, regret and alcohol*6.

With that opening statement out of the way, is it any good? Cardinology is so 'any good' that it's 'any great'. Adams is spot-on lyrically and The Cardinals continue to be the best musicians your hipster friend forgets to name-check when making dream lineups and ordering frilly cocktails*7. By turns hopeful, heartbroken, snide, shit-kicking, whistful and tuneful, there's not a bad song of the lot. And as stated earlier, The Cardinals sound like Music wished it could sound when it was Little Music. This being the last album of their contract with Lost Highway Records, I wouldn't be a bit surprised if all forthcoming releases just came out under the name The Cardinals. Maybe then skeptics could put aside there preconceptions of the front man and enjoy the music and words without the drama and spotlight.

Also, Ryan Adams is a huge Batman fan who admits to using some comic dialogue while writing lyrics*8. Score!



* Except for Georgia and Minnesota; seriously, GA, can you keep yourselves from voting for the man that even John McCain called "worse than disgraceful" and "reprehensible"? And Minnesota, join the progressive midwest; we won't make you gay marry a spotted owl......yet.

*2 The hits to this site plummet when I don't post, and I love anonymous attention too much to let so much time go by between your visits. Get ready for a flurry of small posts to sucker you into coming back and checking if anything consequential is going on. Whorish, to be sure.

*3 Which everyone knows is a vastly underserved corner of 'the internets'.

*4 That is to say by either robbery using a bladed prosthesis or shoplifting.

*5 'The room' meaning the international net we call the interwebs. It's a big room, but there's a funky smell that pervades most of it. Sorry, that was me. Also, the elephant is looking smaller since November 4th.

*6 Endorphins, Regret and Alcohol: The Justin Riley Story

*7 Bar rule: Anything that takes longer than five seconds to order is inefficient and lame.

*8 This is good unless I hear the phrase 'cowardly and superstitious lot' on the next album. Then it's awesome.