Big Colors

Middling. More tolerable than the self pity fueled Wednesdays feeling like a cousin to III/IV and Rock N Roll but his weird croon here seems strained. I'd be interested to know what this is like compared to the initially scheduled release. The album title is interesting here as the record itself is quite colored by his actions and while it's not as painful as Wednesdays it frequently feels just as moot.

Following Wednesdays, which was not a good album in my view, one could hardly anticipate what kind of record Ryan Adams would release next. He is a very diverse, prolific and, frankly, underrated songwriter, so he could very well produce a gem, and I think with Big Colors, he has done just that. This is his best work in years, maybe since 2007's Easy Tiger. The title track, Big Colors, is one of the prettiest songs in Adams' collection. After that, the album settles into several mid-tempo ... read more