Ryan Bingham
Roadhouse sun

THE REVIEW

Listening to Bingham is akin to a long conversation seated in a van lost among the vast highways on the border between New Mexico and Texas. Let's pretend the conversation is happening with the young Ryan (28 years old) who was born there. His hoarse voice betrays his appearance as a young and reckless man, somewhat like the early Johnny Depp.

Bingham has a lot to say. His stories are full of that dusty and on the road America that makes one dream but never materializes in daily reality.

"Roadhouse Sun" is Ryan's fifth album, although the first three are practically unreachable. It is the second recorded for Lost Highway and produced by the great Marc Ford, former guitarist of the Black Crowes, who also assists by playing various instruments. I can say in advance that this new work by the singer-songwriter, a young promise of American rock, is a step below the previous "Mescalito" which had astonished the purists of Americana.

With a patron like Joe Ely, it couldn't be otherwise. "Mescalito" sold well and Bingham's name began to spread outside of the States, leading him to play in Europe last year. I remember a Rolling Stones concert in Milan, crowded with people, which also amazed Bingham.

Bingham grew up on the street, and being on four boards playing is his daily bread, perhaps that's why, on the new album cover, also stands the name of the band that has accompanied him for several years: The Dead Horses.

This "Roadhouse Sun" continues the discourse interrupted by the previous work, adding some new elements. With the lack of the surprise effect from before, what strikes the listener remains the now mature voice and the ever raw and electric sounds in the more rock songs. The opener "Day Is Done" does not have the pathos that "Southside Of Heaven" had when it opened "Mescalito" but remains a good summary of what the album will offer further on. Songs inspired by Dylan, like the dedication of "Dylan's Hard Rain" or "Country Road" or honky-tonk country songs like the more carefree ones: "Tell My Mother I Miss Her So" and "Roadhouse Blues". The guitars roar in "Endless Ways" and "Hey Hey Hurray" while they become psychedelic in the long "Change Is", a real surprise of the album which brings Bingham back to the folk psychedelia of the Grateful Dead of the mid-'70s.

In short, between harmonica, banjo, and violins, Bingham reviews American music from the '40s to today with a raw, sparse, and unpretentious production, which makes him credible. Imagine listening to the best of American music history starting from Guthrie and passing through Hank Williams, Cash, Dylan, Springsteen, Young, Mellencamp, Earle, Ely. All characters of a certain weight and age (with some having passed away long ago) who may have found a young man capable of carrying on the tradition of American music in an honest and conscious way.