Jimmy Ryan: Press

Performing Songwriter
Jan/Feb 06
TOP DIY PICKS

Jimmy Ryan sings like he means it. "You burned every bridge from here to hell,” he intones with a raw energy that burns out of the speakers. Bluesy electric guitar lines scream over piano, bass and driving drums in “Breaks My Heart.” Other tracks are more laid-back but no less passionate. Intricate mandolin lines decorate “Turn Around” as Ryan invites listeners to “get lost before we’re found.” The title track combines bluegrass with Allman Brothers’ southern rock as Ryan embodies a brimstone preacher, warning us that “You never know when darkness is gonna strike, even the brightest summer day could suddenly turn night.”
A veteran performer, Ryan fronted alt-country band the Blood Oranges, Beacon Hill Billies and Wooden Leg before striking out on his own. Gospel Shirt is Ryan’s second solo release and proves that he is indeed a force to be reckoned with.

The Patriot Ledger
‘‘GOSPEL SHIRT'' by JIMMY RYAN AND HAYRIDE

Jimmy Ryan is a longtime pillar of Beantown's roots music community, with close ties to the Twinemen, and a resume that includes his seminal work in the Blood Oranges in the 1980s, and with Morphine frontman Mark Sandman in Treat Her Orange in the '90s. His Hayride quartet includes nonpareil guitarist Duke Levine, bassist Andrew Mazzone and drummer Billy Beard - a veritable all star team of local roots maniacs.

This six-song EP does an incredible job of recreating that classic sound of The Band in its heyday, or the Rolling Stones' ‘‘Dead Flowers''-era country rock forays. In fact the vocalist on ‘‘Breaks My Heart'' (presumably Ryan) sounds so much like The Band drummer Levon Helm, he'll probably want royalties, but it is a marvelous, evocative piece.

‘‘Turn Around'' is a bit more backwoodsy, a dark ballad with more of a nod to hillbilly twang.

Ryan's mandolin is the focal point of the title cut, ‘‘Gospel Shirt,'' which becomes a thumping, driving shot of bluegrassy-rock, with gospel undertones. The wistful ballad ‘‘Only Even'' is another triumph of subtly laid back yet poignant acoustic instruments. ‘‘Santa Fe'' is that rare song that views a friend's faraway suicide with sympathy and fondness, yet also rides a hauntingly vibrant melody. The sprightly mandolin at the heart of ‘‘Hardest Time'' makes it an outstanding solo finale for Ryan.

The only drawback to this 22-minute CD is that it isn't yet a full-length album.

NO DEPRESSION
May/June 03

Jimmy Ryan is one of those names woven into the fabric of Americana music…. His contributions are considerable.
(see back issue for full feature re. Jimmy's solo debut)

Laura Cantrell at the IOTA

Mandolin player Jimmy Ryan shone throughout, and Mark Spencer added nice laptop-steel accents to several numbers, including the show closer, "Bees." This sparse-feeling effort was Cantrell's finest moment. Supported by the subtle touches of her musicians, Cantrell effectively, if not dramatically, crooned her melancholic tale of an old man's memories.

The Noise 5/5/05
JIMMY RYAN & HAYRIDE
Ruido Grande Records
Gospel Shirt
6 songs

Years before anyone ever heard of a genre called "Alt-Country," Jimmy Ryan had founded a great band called the Blood Oranges and had pioneered this style of rootsy, country tinged, back to basics rock 'n' roll that spawned a whole host of followers and disciples. After three albums, the band had broken up and soon Jimmy Ryan was playing mandolin with everyone including Morphine, Catie Curtis, Warren Zevon, Dumptruck, Jake Brennan and a whole host of others. If you hear a ripping mandolin on anyone's record, odds are it is him. If you enjoyed his outings with The Beacon Hillbillies and his '96 album Wooden Leg, then this new CD will be a treat. Produced by Billy Conway and Trina Shoemaker (Sheryl Crow, but don't hold it against her!) Gospel Shirt features such Boston luminaries as Duke Levine, Billy Beard, Andrew Mazone, Jabe Beyer, Laurie Sargent and a whole host of others. Music like this never grows old or tired. Ryan's mandolin playing and singing are in top form and the production is as crisp and snappy as the bales on a hay ride. Give this a listen!

Jimmy Ryan put's the 'man' in mandolin... click here for interview with Frank Goodman and Pure Music

BOSTON GLOBE
Jimmy Ryan, another Sandman friend, opened with an exquisite country set that evoked a cross between Gram Parsons and Richard Thompson… Ryan played a low-sounding mandocello, which Sandman picked out for him. Ryan used it well, as another tribute to his friend.

Seven Days
JIMMY RYAN
LOST DIAMOND ANGEL (Self-released, CD)
Jimmy Ryan has had a number of musical lifetimes over the past three decades, including a mandolin stint with Pine Island, Burlington’s seminal, legendary bluegrass band; a role as bassist for The Decentz, one of Vermont’s first and most memorable post-punk bands; and as the braintrust behind Blood Oranges, a quartet that played alt-bluegrass in the Boston area during the 1990s. On his first solo album, Lost Diamond Angel, Ryan takes the lead on vocals and writing credits and cranks out some rockin’ country-honk shot through with his ace mandolin playing. At its best, Ryan’s music sounds like the Glimmer Twins in their “Honky Tonk Women” period working out with a great garage band. And that’s a compliment. Star singer-songwriter Catie Curtis, with whom Ryan has frequently toured, returns the favor by filling in with harmony vocals in all the right places. Look for Ryan on one of his rare gigs in Vermont; meanwhile, check out this fine debut.

The Noise 7/5/05

JIMMY RYAN & HAYRIDE CD Release Party
T.T. the Bears, Cambridge MA
4/28/05

Boston, not nationally known for its country scene, has one of the most talented mandolin players anywhere. I am of course talking about Jimmy Ryan, the left-handed mandolin madman who with a new album out, still is kicking like a mule. The album is called Gospel Shirt, and it is amazing. Tonight, I get a chance to see some of the songs featured on said disc as well as some classic ones. Jimmy introduces his band, Hayride, along with Mark Spencer on guitar to the crowd. Mark is the original guitarist from The Blood Oranges, a band that Jimmy used to front back in the ’80s that many musicologists cite as one of the pioneers the alt-country music genre. I naturally gravitate to the front of the crowd as they start “Face Up,” one of my favorite songs of Jimmy’s, which displays his lightening quick mando-chops and fret accuracy. The ballad “John Brown” follows suite and “oohs” and “ahhs” are heard from the audience ensued by a wave of applause. The night ends up with the band leaving the stage and drinking whiskey with friends and family. Bill Monroe, eat your heart out.

Click here to read what The Netherlands think of Jimmy Ryan

A Holy Hayride

REVIEW: Jimmy Ryan
and Hayride: "Gospel Shirt"

By Alan Lewis
Special to the
Vermont Guardian


Seventies popular music was like a quilt made from
early heavy metal, sensitive singer-songwriters, Bruce
Springsteen, and disco - the whole thing stitched
together by the smiley-face mainstream radio pop of
the day.

But here in Vermont and in much of New England,
coffeehouses were alive with all kinds of stringbands.
Southern Vermont gave us Arwen Mountain, and the
north produced the marvelously named Banjo Dan and the
Mid-Nite Plowboys. One of the best stringbands was
Burlington's Pine Island, which rocked Vermont from
Brattleboro's Mole's Eye up to Hunt's in the Queen
City.

Pine Island had a couple innovative young pickers
in banjo buy Gordon Stone and Jimmy Ryan on mandolin.
A live album was an all-Vermont production - recorded
at the old Chelsea House in West Brattleboro and
released on North Ferrisburg's Fretless Records. In
the notes, Burlington arts journalist Susan Green said
that Ryan, on stage, might "display a certain subtle
intensity as he soars on the mandolin."

Next up for Ryan and Stone, who collaborate often
to this day, was a novel Burlington new-wave [rock]
band, the Decentz, featuring Stone on pedal steel
guitar while Ryan played expert electric bass.
Scenesters no doubt will remember the group's
signature song, a Ryan original, with its intoxicating
chorus, "Hold me tight, hold me tight, In the middle
of the middle of the night." Those were the days of
Zoot Wilson's N-Zones and the post-punk group,
Pinhead.

After the Decentz, Jimmy Ryan moved to Boston,
though he has been in and out of the state ever since.

The Blood Oranges, Ryan's 1990s ensemble, may be
his most legendary group. But Hayride, the band he
leads today, is arguably his best. And he has a hot
new record, "Gospel Shirt" (CD, Hi-N-Dry Records,
2005). Asked about hopes for the disc, Ryan's manager
Jeannie Smith said, "Being an independent artist makes
it a monumental effort to get the music out there, and
we are working at a very grassroots level with
Hi-N-Dry. We hope Jimmy's fans spread his music
around to make new fans."

Listening to recordings from various phases of
Ryan's career is a revelation. He is an accomplished
roots-rock songwriter and picker and is blessed with
amazing versatility. His music touches bases that run
from bluegrass to jazz to pop-rock and most everything
in between. And it's striking that literally everyone
contacted for this article observed that Ryan's
mandolin technique is most unconventional.

"He experiments with a unique, rock-tinged
picking style that often leaves audience members in
awe," said Smith. In fact, on record, Ryan's playing
seems to owe more to guitar influences than to
mandolinists, from Les Paul to Chuck Berry.

Southern Vermont music columnist Dave Madeloni,
in a recent e-mail, spoke of an early Blood Oranges
reunion in Massachusetts. Ryan "played some nasty
lead rock mandolin," he said. "What was cool was that
it was not just accompaniment, it was often THE lead,
which I have not seen before or since. The mandolin
is prominent in bluegrass, but not rock. This was
ROCK."

"My favorite instrument, at the moment," said
Ryan, "is a custom-built mandocello given to me by the
late Mark Sandman from the band, Morphine. He always
enjoyed the lower frequencies." Ryan still plays
occasional bass gigs, too, and added that he has been
"scratching around on the fiddle."

Asked about career highlights, Ryan said, "My
favorite Vermont show ever was the Pine Island reunion
at the Flynn a couple years ago. That was a powerful
feeling, being on stage again with those guys. We
hadn't hung out together much in the last 20 years or
so. Catching up was a blast."

[For an artist who enjoys widespread critical
acclaim and a loyal following,] Ryan is surprisingly
modest. The new CD's booklet credits him with
"mandolin, mandocello and singing (sort of)."

"I've been playing mandolin for 34 years. I
should be much better than I am given that amount of
time," he said in an e-mail. "I always have been a
laid-back kind of guy, so I never really was ambitious
about technique or a showbiz career." Still, over the
years his musicianship has improved where it counts.
His playing is now more fluid and rhythmically sharp.

"Gospel Shirt" [a six-song EP] is out on the new
Hi-N-Dry label and was recorded at the studio of the
same name, where Mark Sandman once cut his unique
tracks for Morphine. The production is crisp and
clean, while doing the best job yet of capturing
Ryan's vocals.

"Grammy Award-winning producer Trina Shoemaker
traveled to Cambridge in the heat of summer while six
months pregnant to produce the album," Smith said.
The best cuts are equal to any roots-rockers in
rotation on AAA radio. "Breaks My Heart," Hardest
Time," and the title track each seem a good bet for
airplay.

When asked how he chose mandolin in a
guitar-heavy era, Ryan said, "I was drawn to the
mandolin because everyone else was into guitar; and
hearing Ry Cooder's mandolin solo on The Rolling
Stones song, 'Love in Vain,' made me want to learn
about the instrument. Then I discovered Bill Monroe's
music and the bluegrass thing. That was all I needed.
Playing mandolin for a living is all I ever wanted to
do."

Vermont Guardian
April 29 - May 5, 2005
Culture section, page 19

Blood Oranges founder Jimmy Ryan has come back around to rurally inspired rock & roll with Wooden Leg, whose self-titled debut also features former Oranges guitarist Mark Spencer (now a regular in Freedy Johnston's band) and drummer Keith Levreault. Ryan's mandolin is placed up front in the mix, but this is not a bluegrass album: The guitars and rhythms keep the songs balanced. ~ Kurt Wolff, All Music Guide

BLOOD ORANGES
Corn River (East Side Digital) 1990
Lone Green Valley EP (East Side Digital) 1992
The Crying Tree (East Side Digital) 1994
BEACON HILL BLUES
Duffield Station (East Side Digital) 1993
More Songs of Love and Murder (East Side Digital) 1994
A Better Place (East Side Digital) 1996
SUNDAY'S WELL
We Don't Care Where Your Grandparents Are From (East Side Digital) 1994
WOODEN LEG
Wooden Leg (East Side Digital) 1996
CHERI KNIGHT
The Knitter (East Side Digital) 1996
The Northeast Kingdom (E-Squared) 1998

The Boston-bred Blood Oranges are one of America's finest and least formulaic roots-rock combos, balancing stylistic know-how and instrumental skill with a timeless emotional thrust, all the while consistently avoiding the genre's clichés. Corn River is an accomplished debut, showcasing singer/mandolinist Jimmy Ryan's bluegrass expertise and guitarist Mark Spencer's inventive picking on catchy tunes like "Pounding Pipes" and "Heart of Mud." (Bassist Cheri Knight threatens to steal the show on her vocal showcase, "Thief.") The band's arrangement of the country standard "High on a Mountaintop" is so authoritative that Nashville's own Marty Stuart lifted it whole for his hit version. The four new songs on Lone Green Valley (which also includes Corn River's recording of the traditional "Shady Grove") benefit from Eric Ambel's lucid production and the sensitive bashing of new drummer Keith Levreault, with tunes like Ryan's power-poppish "Fire Escape" and Knight's dark "All the Way Down" demonstrating increased musical and lyrical sophistication.

The Oranges really blossom on The Crying Tree, a holistic Ambel-produced balance of the eclectic foursome's disparate elements. Ryan contributes fine, rollicking workouts like "Halfway 'Round the World" and "Titanic," but the real revelation here is the dusky-voiced Knight, whose four songs include the epic "Crying Tree" and the heart-rending ballad "Shadow of You."

Blood Oranges has spawned a variety number of side projects, most of them Ryan's. The Beacon Hill Billies (aka Beacon Hillbillies) is an ace bluegrass-based trio in which he shares the spotlight with singer/guitarist John McGann, while Sunday's Well (in which Ryan, billed as S‚amus O'Rjain, and McGann play supporting roles; McGann also produced We Don't Care Where Your Grandparents Are From), led by Sean Cunnningham, is an acoustic octet specializing in modified Irish traditionals. The more rockish Wooden Leg, which also features Mark Spencer (who also produced) and Levreault, places Ryan's songs, voice and mandolin in an eclectic array of acoustic and electric settings, with some tracks reminiscent of the Blood Oranges' country-rock stylings and others a bit more ethno-spacey.

Knight's solo album displays some subtle but significant variations on her contributions to the Blood Oranges. With Ambel producing and playing guitar, the music has a rougher edge that's well-suited to Knight's luminously mournful vocals. The images of loss, resignation and resurrection contained in richly emotional tunes like "Light in the Road," "That I Might See" and the title number reach an organic depth to which other roots-rockers might aspire.

[Scott Schinder]

Ryan accompanies Morphine

Wooden Leg - Wooden Leg (ESD)
Latest project from Jimmy Ryan, the frontman for Boston's late, great Blood Oranges, and also featuring fellow Oranges Mark Spencer and Keith Levereault. It's high-octane alt-country with shades of bluegrass -- much like the Blood Oranges. - Don Yates

Wooden Leg
East Side Digital, 1996
Cheri Knight
The Knitter
East Side Digital, 1996
Boston's Blood Oranges had become one of the most promising alternative-country bands - their last album, 1994's "The Crying Tree," was one of the masterpieces of the genre - before calling it quits last year. Blood Oranges frontman Jimmy Ryan formed Wooden Leg with fellow ex-Oranges Mark Spencer and Keith Leverault. Also, Oranges ex-bassist and sometime vocalist/songwriter Cheri Knight has just released a record. Wooden Leg's self-titled album is the more country-flavored of the two. Traditional country themes are everywhere, from tragedy ("Tuesday's Paper") to heartbreak ("Sweet Lies," "To The Bone"), and there's also an electrified cover of the traditional murder ballad, "Pretty Polly." Ryan's own mandolin plays a prominent role, but it's balanced by Spencer's searing lead guitar and an aggressive rhythm section. There are occasional experimental touches, such as a menacing lead vocal supplied via telephone by Morphine's Mark Sandman on "Out Of My Yard," but the record hews close to the BOs' seamless blend of high-octane country-rock with shades of bluegrass, deftly mixing acoustic and electric, traditional and modern, country and edgy rock.
Knight's album is discernibly different from her work with the Oranges. While there are a few quiet ballads, the album also features a loud and crunchy approach to roots music reminiscent of Neil Young's more electric work. Songs like the title song and "Megalith" wouldn't sound out of place on Young albums like "Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere," "Zuma," or even "Ragged Glory." From the acoustic mournful ballad, "Last Barn Dance" to the country-flavored breakup song, "Down By The Water," Knight more than demonstrates with her consistently strong songwriting why she needed to record her own album. While some Oranges' fans may mourn the loss of the band, the group's breakup has allowed the principals in the band to follow their own visions, and fans of alternative country are the richer for it.

WOODEN LEG
(East Side Digital)
Local singer, songwriter, and mandolinist Jimmy Ryan has vaulted from his most recent project -- urban assault bluegrass schizoids the Beacon Hillbillies -- into a lovechild of former Blood Oranges members. It's a stripped-down rock CD that recalls the Oranges and other roots-rock punks like Son Volt.
Granted, Ryan is not a born singer, and his disheveled lyrics are hard to make sense of; the only profundity to be found is on the traditional "Pretty Polly." But his sense of a contemporary sound is second to none. The Oranges and the Hillbillies, if nothing else, gave bluegrass a cool voice in the '90s. On Wooden Leg, light and fast anthems like "Nothing But Time" and "Hard Luck," studded by epileptic percussion and sweltering mandolin leads, are great stuff. The guts of the CD crystallize where Ryan's virtuoso mandolin and Mark Spencer's distortion-laden electric guitar push acoustigrass roots into heavy, punkier realms like "Pretty Polly" and the gloomy vignette "Out of My Yard," which features a languid Mark Sandman vocal.