Ryan Adams & the Cardinals
The Enmore Theatre
23 Aug 07

One has to start to wonder why Ryan Adams tours at all. He seems most content – if you can call the often melancholy work of the alt-country maestro that of a content man – when he is churning out volumes worth of material for his website or the general public. While his most recent album, Easy Tiger, has been largely praised as his strongest in years, the same may not be said of the first Sydney show on the tour supporting that album.

Shrouded in an almost mystic veil of blue lights and smoke, the often petulant Adams emerged to perform a rousing rendition of Easy Tiger opener “Goodnight Rose”. At this point, the band and the crowd had reached a mutual agreement to chill out and enjoy what was set to be a formidable show. However, when the lights had failed to come up several songs into the first set, the inevitable calls for song requests and “Turn the lights up” came across loud and clear from a few isolated members of the audience. I say isolated because they were in the minority, and in a capacity crowd of a few thousand, Adams being Adams still seemed to take this as the standard for the entire crowd’s reaction. As the first half of his show came to a close, he admonished the audience with words to the effect of “We do two sets a night. I hope you learn how to behave for the second one”. The crowd shifted restlessly, having been spoken to for the very first time by our instructor (a few quips from the band aside), and we waited once more to the strains of a Chinese opera over the PA.

The second set certainly saw far fewer calls from the audience. At least we had learned our lesson. However, Adams seemed to have taken even the cheering as a personal affront, almost punishing the audience by testing the limits of their patience with ten minute drum and feedback renditions of otherwise crowd-pleasing songs. He was almost going out of his way not to play some of the more popular tunes, including current single “Two”.

When the band was hitting its stride, there were moments of pure brilliance. Unlike the last tour, where the Cardinals seemed to be a backing band for Adams, here they were one cohesive unit functioning as one. Some beautiful harmonies, especially on “Easy Plateau” and “Cold Roses”, stood out and made us remember why we put up with the moods. Likewise, the more guitar heavy version of “Mockingbird” (all off Cold Roses) proved Adams’ ability to flawlessly move between genres, even when re-imagining his own songs. “A Kiss Before I Go” was another highlight. Unfortunately, all of these moments of brilliance were shadowed by the contempt Adams clearly felt for the huddled masses of fans.

While crowd abuse is often a problem at shows, and I make no apologies for anyone who acts like an idiot at a show, there is always going to be a certain amount of give and take with the minority audience that refuses to accept the band has a setlist and a certain style, and will call out their obscure b-side until they pass out. However, with the rising cost of tickets, it was a fair bet that almost everybody who was at the show was paying to see the artist, and those fans received nothing but contempt from the performer. For the majority of professionals, the often playful heckling and song requests are something that you just have to deal with. It may not be right, but Adams has performed enough shows to realise this now. The moody act may just be that – an act – but one has to start to wonder after a while if the artist is ever going to realise that after 13 years of touring, the audience is there to see him. As regular concert goers, we’ve learned how to behave. The question is whether Mr. Adams will ever do the same?