Ryan Adams

David Ryan Adams (born November 5, 1974) is an American alt-country and rock singer-songwriter.

Ryan Adams performing live, September 2006.

Sourced

• It's not very fashionable nowadays to have a philosophy that demands a lot of life. I tend to be drawn to people who are emotional - now they'd be called 'crazy'. Pollock, Jasper Johns, Toulouse-Lautrec. People said, 'They're off their nut!' Was Faulkner off his nut because he stayed in his house for eight months at a time writing books, and then you'd find him drunk up in a tree, making out with some old black woman? I think that's fuckin' great!
  • Blender (August/September 2001)

• I want to make sure I'm with a girl that's a good kisser, and that when I wake up, I have coffee and a cigarette. That's all I really want out of life. That, and world domination.
  • Rolling Stone (February 14, 2002)

• My lifestyle changed when this wonderful person came into my life. I couldn't sleep for years. All of a sudden, I don't know why or how, but I slept.
  • Spin (December 2003)

• I quit drinking every night, at 1:30 A.M.
  • Spin (February 2006)

• I'm sort of planting Post-It notes all over my psyche. Do not skateboard wasted. Do not buy $10,000 rugs. Be careful what you say to journalists. You don't have to stay up until 7 A.M. - tomorrow is a new day.
  • Blender (December 2003)

• I've got maybe five or ten jean jackets with jeans. I can pack three to four pairs of denim jeans, five T-shirts, ten Western-style shirts, and two ties and just buy socks when I get there. That, a Walkman, two books, and some records, and I'm out the door for a year. Not a problem. Doesn't freak me out at all. Usually, if you're thinking about your clothes too much, you're probably not high enough.
  • GQ (April 2002)

• What happens is, people get a little taste of fame, and they get used to having things go that way, and the ego really kicks in. They'll do whatever it takes to stay there. They get addicted, and they make decisions that don't have anything to do with music. You get big like that, and people will maybe come and see you once. It never lasts. It's not real. I'll tell you this - it's fucking real behind a guitar.
  • Harp (July/August 2005)

• It’s like—I don’t know, sometimes it’s like chasing a pretty girl on the beach. And things I never thought I could do…I can do.
  • MySpace - Easy, Tiger description/interview by Stephen King (May 2007)

• I was doing soundcheck, and Rancid was playing over there. That's some good shit. Actually, it wasn't Rancid, it was the opening band, the Distillers. I was like, screaming and shit. Running around. I had no one to slam dance with. I was very lonesome. It was very singer-songwriter.
  • Live performance^{[citation needed]}

• If I had a reed made of lightning I could blow the sax all night... I don't know where one would acquire a reed made of lightning but I would imagine that Bill Clinton has one.
  • Live performance 9/29/07- Chicago Theater^{[specific citation needed]}

• "Most of my songs are about ladies. This one's about ladies metaphorically. There are some of my songs that are about the power of lightning.
  • Songwriters' Circle, 2012^{[specific citation needed]}

Song Lyrics

• When you get the time
  Sit down and write me a letter
  When you're feeling better
  Drop me a line

  I wanna know how it all works out
  I had a feeling we were fading out
  I didn't know that people faded out
  That people faded out so fast
  I wanna show you all the things I got inside
  But you know those parts of me died
  Just like us they faded out
  They faded out so fast
  When there was love enough left to fix it
  
  But there it is

  • Sun Also Sets

Love Is Hell pt. 2 (2003)

• And I'm tired of living here in this hotel,
  Snow and the rain falling through the sheets.
  In fact, I'm tired of 23rd Street.
  Strung out like some Christmas lights
  Out there in the Chelsea night.
  • Hotel Chelsea Nights

29 (2005)

• I should've died a hundred thousand times,
  Teetering stoned off the side of a building.
  Nobody loved me and nobody even tried
  You can't hang on to something that won't stop moving.
  Singing and dancing to them nighttime songs.
  • 29

• She's got the brown eyes, yeah, and they're pretty as hell,
  And they'll burn through your shirt if you're holding her still.
  She's got a lighter, and a lit cigarette,
  And if you're making her smile, that's just as high as you can get.
  • Miss Sunflower

• Real. Real like a plastic bouquet
  That thrives on the smoke from an old fireplace
  And dies every night with her face on the news.
  Nobody cries, they just smoke and stare and their shoes.
  The only difference is,
  The only difference is,
  Nobody can cry -
  It's hard to do
  For most folks, without a reason why.
  • Cry on Demand

• There's something in the way she eases my mind
  And lays me across the bed till I close my eyes.
  Stirs me in the morning till I can't ever be satisfied.
  I leave Carolina every night in my dreams,
  Like the girls that try to love me that I only leave.
  Rock me like a baby doll and hold me to your chest,
  But I'm always moving too fast.
  • When Will You Come Back Home?

• As a man I ain’t never been much for sunny days.
  I’m as calm as a fruit stand in New York and maybe as strange.
  But when the color goes out of my eyes, it’s usually the change.
  But damn, Sam, I love a woman that rains.
  • Damn Sam

• I would've held your mother's hand on the day you was born.
  She runs through my veins like a long black river and rattles my cage like a thunderstorm.
  • How Do You Keep Love Alive?

• See her smiling at him? That used to be me, and I could find her in a thunderstorm just by the way that the rain would fall.
  • Hard Way To Fall

• Just a nobody girl
  With a radar to the scene.
  When the emptiness finds you
  You find all the numbers you need.
  You say you follow your heart
  Well, honey, you're just being lost.
  You could you follow your gut
  But how much would it cost?
  • Nobody Girl

• They carved your name into a stone and then they put it in the ground.
  I run my fingers through the grooves when no one's around,
  Drink till I'm sick and I talk to myself in the dog days of the summer.
  Then I feel you coming but I don't know how...
  • September

• One night at the diner over eggs,
  Over easy she showed me the length of her legs,
  But that gold plated cross on her neck, it was real
  And you don't get that kind of money from pushing a meal.
  • Carolina Rain

• I feel just like a map
  Without a single place to go of interest
  And I'm further north than south
  If I could shut my mouth
  She'd probably like this.
  • My Winding Wheel

• These things inside me, they repeat like broken records
  Spinning pretty things behind my eyes
  And when I can't look at you
  I can paint your picture perfectly in my mind
  And when I get old
  I'm gonna miss you all the time.
  • Friends

• All the sweetest winds they blow across the south
  • Oh My Sweet Carolina

• While the things I do kill me, they just tell me to relax
  • To Be the One

• Words may move but they’re never moving fast enough
  • English Girls Approximately

• Bring you down, can't bring you down
  Bring you down, can't hear the sound
  Run through the river and head to town
  Pretty little moon with it's head hung down
  Chin up. Cheer up.
  • Chin Up, Cheer Up

• Do you remember stormy winter?
  Well button up your coat, one's comin' soon
  • The Last Dance

• Well we can't be strong
  

When we don't belong
So I'm saving up my energy for you
Well we can't go on
Well we don't belong
So I'm saving up this last dance just for you

• • The Last Dance

• You didn't see us, nothing can free us
  

We're just trapped inside the lens without a smile
Wanna get to you, nothing can get through
Lookin' back's a real fine time to say goodbye

• • The Last Dance

• If I could tell you something, I would tell you it all
  

But I don't know anything anymore
I let the dirt and the rain and the cold come in
They were outside just poundin' on the door

• • Cracks in the Photograph

• Well, everybody wants to go forever
  

I just wanna burn up hard and bright

• • Firecracker

• Dancin' where the stars go blue
  

Dancin' where the evening fell

• • Where the Stars Go Blue

• The night plays games
  

And the people they come and go

• • Nobody Girl

• Well, the night makes moves
  

And it shatters like broken glass

• • Nobody Girl

• The night destroys the sun
  • Gonna Make You Love Me

• Sleep now and your angels will come, dear
  • Wild Flowers

• Forever only takes its toll on some
  • Wild Flowers

• So close your eyes
  

So close your mouth
And do this all in time to the music
That screams like a child in the back of your mind
In a clown's saloon

• • Goodnight, Hollywood Boulevard

• And I do this all in time to the music
  

That dance like fools set on fire

• • Goodnight, Hollywood Boulevard

• Note to self: don't change for anyone
  

Note to self: don't die

• • Note to Self: Don’t Die

• So, I am in the twilight of my youth
  

Not that I'm going to remember
And have you seen the moon tonight
Is it full?
Still burning its embers
The people dancing in the corner, they seem happy

• • Anybody Want to Take Me Home

• Walking through a star field covered in lights
  

Wasted like you're losing your job you're so fired
We're just like the ones we used to make fun of

• • Beautiful Sorta

• Let's take a ride to the easy plateau
  

Where the cold don't come and the wind don't blow
Moonlight flickers on the water below

• • Easy Plateau

• Bad nights lead to better days
  • Easy Plateau

• The mirrors in the room go black and blue
  

On a Sunday morning in her Saturday shoes

• • Cold Roses

• Daylight comes and exposes
  

Saturday's bruises and cold roses

• • Cold Roses

• And the pain in the morning comes as easy as it goes
  

Can't find the truth in a house of lies
And you can't see tomorrow with yesterday's eyes
One shot, one beer and a place where nobody cries

• • A Kiss Before I Go

• All the cars are lined up on a Saturday night
  

With the sky full of nothing but moon
And I lose my reflection in the bottles of wine

• • The End

• Oh, my God, I miss those things
  

And it's a hard way to fall
And this ain't the easy way down
And it's a hard thing to love anyone, anyhow

• • Hard Way to Fall

• Lord take me home
  

To the peaceful valley
Down the winding river
To your city your soul
I've grown so tired
And my hearts grown heavy
To walk any longer
To your cities of gold

• • Peaceful Valley

• Trying to find a peaceful song
  

To sing when everything goes wrong
Till the peaceful valley calls me home

• • Peaceful Valley

• Can I still smoke my cigarettes and have my coffee
  

Up there in heaven with a bottle of wine

• • Peaceful Valley

• Hope this place don't never change
  

Goddamn it Nashville, don't never grow up

• • Saturday Night

• Put your troubles behind you and go on to bed
  

Let go of the worry, there's so much nobody understands
Don't live your life in such a hurry, life goes by us so so fast

• • Goodnight Rose

"All wrapped up, in the ribbons of your heart."

 "16 Days"  Strangers Almanac

External links

• Answering Bell