Pitchfork

[Posted Friday, September 5th, 2003 06:00:00 Pitchfork Central Time]

Ryan Adams will finally release his troubled (and rejected) album Love Is Hell this fall-- but not in the form originally intended. Half of the songs will be released as the Love Is Hell, Vol. 1 EP on November 4th-- not coincidentally the same day Adams' more mainstream full-length Rock 'n' Roll hits shelves. The Love Is Hell, Vol. 2 EP will drop just a hair over a month later, on December 9th.

Adams reported the following about the Love Is Hell project last May on his own official message board: "'They' don't know what to do with it. I've heard adjectives like 'incredibly too depressing' and-- this one's funny-- 'dark.' Also 'not your best stuff.'" So, not at all unlike the marketing coup employed for the last two Back to the Future sequels, Lost Highway may hope to emphasize quantity over quality in this situation. But, forget not that Biff was the shit in number two-- pimping mad bling and betting on sports out of an almanac from the future. And Michael J. Fox was a cute cowboy in three. Ryan Adams is a cute cowboy as we speak. Michael J. Fox now has Parkinson's. And Adams looks like he has some type of palsy in his press photos. It's gotta be a push.

Rock 'n' Roll, Adams' new effort, is dubbed an "'80s rock" album by no less than New Musical Express (perhaps hoping to match it to Ryan's A-ha hairstyle). It's informally described as a "departure" by unnamed sources at Universal/ Lost Highway, complete with electric guitars and rock and whatnot. You can read all about the making of Rock 'n' Roll in the online diary over on Adams' website. I would fill you in on the details, but all of my attempts to read Adams' prose failed miserably. Be warned: it's filled with ultra-cool new spellings of old words like "thru" and heart-wrenching accounts of Adams' struggles with (gasp) cigarettes. Gram Parsons' ghost called from a Joshua Tree pay phone: says we're all pussies for caring about this baloney (cool new spelling).

If that were all on the Adams tip! Follow me, dear reader, into the utterly asinine. Along with the new rocker of an album, the as-yet-unreleased-and-rumored-to-be-subpar-former-album turned separately-sold-two-volume-EP, and an old lady who swallowed the dog to catch the cat she'd previously devoured to catch the fly stuck in her stomach, there are reports that a long-delayed box set of Adams demos (with the endearing title Career Ender) may be released soon as well. The box would include four unreleased albums: The Suicide Handbook, 48 Hours, Let It B-Minus, and Saturday Night Feverblister.

The first two albums are derived from 2001 recording sessions that bookended the making of Gold and include some of the material later released on Demolition. Both albums were leaked to the net earlier this year and are currently rearing their cute, spikey-haired heads on file sharing sites/programs all over the web. The latter two collections are sessions recorded with Replacements-esque backing band The Pinkhearts and yet another post-Gold session with one-time R.E.M. producer Scott Litt. Toward that end, we are seriously considering letting Adams review his own records for Pitchfork from here on out. Take it away, Ryan! "ALOT OF THESE RECORDS THAT ARE COMING OUT ARE NOT all GREAT, but i think they belong out there, considering i cant exactly say that i agree with the greatness factor expressed anywhere anymore." So there you go, 2.8. Tracklists follow for the true completist:

The Suicide Handbook:

01 Wild Flowers [alternate version]
02 Perfect and True
03 Tell It To My Heart
04 She Wants To Play Hearts [Demolition version]
05 Pretenders
06 Famous Eyes
07 Touch, Feel, and Lose [alternate version]
08 Firecracker [alternate version]
09 La Cienega Just Smiled [alternate version]
10 For No One
11 You Don't Know Me
12 Mara Lisa [same as "New York, New York" B-side]
13 Off Broadway
14 Cracks In A Photograph
15 I'm Waiting
16 Cry On Demand [Demolition version]
17 Miss Sunflower
18 Answering Bell [alternate version]
19 My California Love
20 Idiots Rule The World
21 Dear Chicago [Demolition version]

48 Hours:

01 Hallelujah [Demolition version]
02 Walls
03 Desire [Demolition version]
04 Angelina
05 Like The Twilight
06 Chin Up, Cheer Up [Demolition version]
07 Born Yesterday
08 Blue [same as "Nuclear" B-side]
09 One For The Rose
10 Karina [false start]
11 Karina
12 Little Moon