Pitchfork

Ryan Adams just posted a rather lengthy blog entry on his website. The gist: He's through with music, for now. According to the post, the final date of his current tour with the Cardinals-- March 20 at Atlanta's Fox Theater-- will be his "last venture" with the group. [sic alert] "maybe we will play again sometime and maybe i will work my way back into some kind of music situation," he wrote, "but this is the time for me to step back now, to reel it in and i wish everyone peace and happiness."

The notoriously temperamental songwriter sounds pretty sincere. Apparently, he's sick of being taken for granted, battered by the road and having some serious hearing issues: "i lost more than anyone will ever know (hearing, someone i loved, my sense of dignity, a never ending losing battle with stage fright and now my hearing and balance due to an inner ear issue." Though, based on reports of hundreds (thousands?) of unreleased Ryan Adams songs over the last decade, he could probably still put out a new record every year for quite a while without picking up a guitar.

He digs into a lot more in the post. Some bullets:

-- He's not blogging anymore.

-- Though he will always be "viewed as an 'asshole'," he is actually not an asshole.

-- He is not feeling great about his legacy: "i am a punch-line and a footnote in what is worse to yell at someone besides 'free-bird'. i mean, i lost."

-- He is still kind of a hippie: "never listen to those loud dissatisfied bystanders who only want to see you fail because that will be entertaining for that moment. hold fast to your dreams, hold faster to your heart and never step out of the light of that love that made you whole."

-- He has three new books coming out and he "LOVES writing....yay!" The first tome is a collection of "soul poetry" called Infinity Blues that will hit bookshelves in April.

-- He's not smoking anymore.

-- He has about as much love for the music media as Kanye: "it is kind of ridiculous to blog as i am a musician and anything i say here just gets reprinted at some point out of context. i say NOT FAIR but it doesn't matter what i say anymore or what is fair anymore really does it- the 21st century media has it's own rules about what is true and what is not."

Touche, Ryan Adams. Touche.