Music
Press
...lovers of roots music cannot do without this disc. We can expect that Bob Ryan needs some time to produce his masterpieces. Until the next time, we keep a sharp eye on him.
- ROOTSTIME (Nov, 2007)
English translation of the full review available on my MySpace page: www.myspace.com/bobryan66
(blog entry "The Belgian Review") - Rootstime.be
Honorable mention for the song
"Just Like You Mean It"
from the CD "The Spirit of Andy Devine"
- We Are Listening 2007 Singer/Songwriter Competition
(Oct 10, 2007)
- We Are Listening
(Bob Ryan is...)
"... a true tunesmith with a voice to match..."
Andy Olson - Radio Free Phoenix / internet radio (Sep 29, 2007) - Radio Free Phoenix
The Dutch Website altcountry.ne gave "The Spirit of Andy Devine" four horses on a five-horse maximum ratings scale. Here is part of that review:
The Spirit of Andy Devine by Bob Ryan is pure easy listening. Literally. Not because we hear smooth notes, but because Bob Ryan posses a beautiful supple voice, and writes peaceful songs. With the choir-like background vocals reminiscent of old fashioned country rock. The title number sounds like Michael Nesmith meets Scott Walker.
And "Heroes" is somewhat in the style of America meets Manassas.
The complete review can be found under "The Kudos" on my website,
www.bobryanmusic.com - altcountry.ne
Discography
1. Down Here on the Surface
Independently released CD,
copyright 1999 by Bob Ryan
No longer available
A collection of demo recordings, some engineered by Billy Williams and others by Gordon Barr. The CD contained early recordings of some of the songs that would later appear on "A Prison in the Heart" and "The Spirit of Andy Devine."
2. A Prison in the Heart
Independently released CD,
All songs copyright 2004 by Bob Ryan
Songs dedicated to and inspired by the land and people of Bosnia & Hercegovina. The CD contains several tracks used in (and written for) the soundtrack of the stage play "A Prison in the Heart" which Bob wrote and directed for stagings in Sarajevo, Bosnia (June 2002) and Phoenix Arizona (June 2004)
Fifteen tracks, five of which were instrumentals used in the play.
(tracks from this CD can currently be heard on
www.myspace.com/bobryan66
www.bobryanmusic.com/music.html
www.cdbaby,com/ryanbob2
3. The Spirit of Andy Devine
Independently released CD,
All songs copyright 2007 by Bob Ryan
Songs published by Leaping Armadillo Music (ASCAP)
Fourteen songs that explore the impermanence of this world as measured through the American cultural experience of the last 50 years. Stories of the American heartland, great American icons and the lonely highways like Route 66 that have served as the link between the self-assured romance of America's past and the stumbling uncertainty of her present.
Tracks are currently available on iTunes, digstation and other online outlets
CDs can be purchased through CDBaby at www.cdbaby.com/ryanbob
Photos
Bio
The lowdown:
Bob Ryan and his latest CD release "The Spirit of Andy Devine" were featured in an hour-long musical interview on Radio Free Phoenix, an old-school radio station reaching out from the heart of the Southwest via the internet (radiofreephoenix.com) His song "Just Like You Mean It", from that same CD recently received an honorable mention from the "We Are Listening" songwriting competition.
Bob began performing professionally at the age of 11 and was a member of a working band by the time he was 14. He began writing songs at about the same time.
As the son of a military family he crisscrossed America a dozen times in his first 20 years. That experience of rolling across the vast American landscape on lonely 2-lane highways during the 1950’s and 60’s left an indelible stamp on his life, and on his songwriting. The rivers, roads, mountains and plains of the American heartland, and the iconic images of American culture are woven deeply into his storytelling.
With a voice and style that defy easy classification, lyrics that are both unambiguous and poetic, and a gift for memorable melody, Bob Ryan shares moments of faith, doubt, love, and regret through music that is deeply felt.
Bob's songs chart a journey from childhood memories and misplaced love affairs to heroic icons and the once-romantic image of the great American West. Like a good journalist, he chronicles the experience of living “down here on the surface” of this lovely but impermanent world. And probes the universally shared experiences of the human heart – with lyrics that are always anchored to the earth while keeping an eye Heaven.
As influences, Bob cites the Beatles for awakening him to popular music, but Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell, Neil Young and Bruce Cockburn have all had major influence on not only his use of words, but the style that he feels most comfortable in.
As with those writers, there is a touch of the wide-open prairie in his music, and a deep afinity for the traditional music of the American South.
He has sought to strike the sometimes delicate balance between art and faith that has run through work of great artists like Flannery O'Connor, C.S. Lewis and G.K.Chesterton as well as songwriters such as Bruce Cockburn and Mark Heard. In fact, he points to authors and other artists as much as musicians and songwriters when it come to the images and moods that populate his songs. The writing not only of O'Connor, but of Richard Brautigan, Mark Twain, Lewis Carroll and Charles Dickens have had their impact. So have the Native American photographs of Edward S. Curtis, and the art of the great American Illustrators N.C. Wyeth, Maxfield Parrish and Howard Pyle, to name a few. Add to that the Marx Brothers, Frank Zappa and Walt Kelly and you have a vey mixed bag of influences, indeed.
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