Ryan Adams "To Be Young Is To Be Sad Is To Be High"

I saw this picture of Dave Kish digging through stacks in a record store, and I thought about how infrequently I do the same thing.

Not because I don't like to, or because I don't have time, or because record stores are fewer and farther between these days.

It's simply because I don't have to go to a record store to dig through stacks.

It's true that, more and more, instead of getting CDs sent to the station, we receive MP3s.  But still, mostly, music comes to us via the mailbox.

Every day Mike-from-the-front-desk comes back from our PO Box with a plastic mail carton full of envelopes.  Barbara or Jess or I will tear through envelopes and pile up the bounty, sampling as much as we can, setting aside what might go to What's New For Lunch or to Bill for The Blues or to Alison for the Local Music Cafe, etc.

A tiny fraction of what comes in makes it's way to regular rotation.  The rest can pile up.  And pile up.  And pile up.

When there's time, it's good to go for a second look.  Or in the old days, a first look.

I first arrived at WMVY in 2000, after 6 years at a small, independent station in a fairly rural part of the South.  Being small, we didn't get much service from the record companies.  We were never awash in CDs, on the level that I discovered when I got to MVY.  Barbara Dacey was Program Director at the time, and it was she who sorted through the mail that came in.

In the short period it took me to find my feet and get comfortable at the station, I asked if I could dig through the piles to see if there were any treasures in there I might like to check out.

When I found something I was interested in, I asked Barbara if I could take it home.

"Who is this?"

I told her what I knew about Ryan Adams, about his previous band Whiskeytown and about the good reviews for his solo debut "Heartbreaker."

"Let me hang onto that one."

So, the bad news was that I didn't get to snatch that disc.  The good news was that we added his first solo single, and for the last 13 years his subsequent releases have been a regular part of mvyradio.

A little extra digging can make a difference.


Hear the song on Youtube.

Whiskeytown “16 Days” (Acoustic)

Do you have a favorite album, that you’ve listened to so often, it doesn’t really surprise you anymore? And you wish, somehow, it had a new song on it? One that was recorded in the style and spirit of the album, but you’d never heard before?

Ryan Adams is one of those guys who can do all sorts of things. His tastes and talents run from folk, to Americana, to punk rock, to Dead-inspired grooves to straight-up Rock And Roll. Some fans will follow him, no matter what he does. And some just pine for the sound he created when they first discovered him.

I heard Ryan Adams around 2000, as his first major label band, Whiskeytown, was winding down with the album “Strangers Almanac,” and he had just recorded a stunning solo debut, Heartbreaker, with Gillian Welch and David Rawlings.

Whiskeytown certainly never had a hit, but one of their most memorable tunes, and a fan favorite, was “16 Days.” A tremendous song, no doubt. But I was blown away by the version that came out last year, as a bonus part of the “Strangers Almanac” Deluxe Edition.

Recorded in a style similar to the songs on “Heartbreaker”---stark and acoustic, emotionally raw---it reminds me why I loved Ryan Adams so much when I first heard him. Like discovering a new song on an old favorite album.

Hear a sample of Whiskeytown “16 Days”

See the band perform it in 1997, here

Buy the album, here