\n<\/p>\n
\n\tIn 2005, when the singer-songwriter Ryan Davis was 20, he left Chicago for Glasgow. It was part of an exchange program between the Art Institute of Chicago, where Davis was a junior, and the Glasgow School of Art, but progress on his fine art degree was an afterthought. Davis arrived in Scotland with a bag of clothes, a guitar, and a four-track tape machine, keen to record some demos and start a music career.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\n\tThe day he plugged his four-track in for the first time, it spit out an enormous spark.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cI didn\u2019t have a power converter,\u201d Davis recalls with a laugh during a recent Zoom interview from his home in Jeffersonville, Indiana, just across the Ohio River from Louisville, Kentucky. \u201cIt destroyed the machine. I didn\u2019t record anything until six months later when I got home. But I did write some songs.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
\n\tTwo decades later, now a freshly minted 40, Davis is preparing to release what could be considered a breakthrough album. New Threats From the Soul<\/em>, out July 25 via his own label, Sophomore Lounge, is the second offering from Ryan Davis and the Roadhouse Band, following their 2023 debut, Dancing on the Edge<\/em>. But this is no late start.<\/p>\n \n\tBefore starting the Roadhouse Band, Davis fronted underground favorites State Champion, who released four albums of \u201cpunked-up country gunk\u201d (their term) between 2010 and 2018. He also ran a label, booked shows in Louisville, and started a widely revered local festival. For many, Davis has long been a scene fulcrum, a tireless DIY hero, and a generational songwriting talent.<\/p>\n \n\tNo less an authority than the late Silver Jews and Purple Mountains songwriter David Berman once said, \u201cIf Bob Dylan was funny, if Tom Waits was relevant, Ryan might not be peerless at what he does best, which is writing large gregarious circles around his pitiful colleagues in the field.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tNew Threats From the Soul <\/em>could help many more reach that same conclusion. It\u2019s a remarkable collection of country-rock epics, teeming with unexpected musical detours and lyrical wonders. Catherine Irwin, a fellow Louisville singer-songwriter and a member of the alt-country group Freakwater, says Davis has \u201cthis way of distilling things into little nuggets that, once said, seem quite obvious.\u201d<\/p>\n \t\tEditor\u2019s picks<\/p>\n<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n \n\tThat goes for rich, crafty lines like, \u201cI\u2019ll start flipping through clippings of Modern Martyrdom Quarterly<\/em> classifieds\/Just to find me something to die for.\u201d And one-liners that put you on your heels, like \u201cI can\u2019t remember the last time the good times got so bad,\u201d or Irwin\u2019s favorite, \u201cBlacklight will find the jizz,\u201d from Dancing on the Edge<\/em>\u2019s \u201cLearn 2 Re-Luv.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\tWhen Davis asked her to contribute vocals to that song, Irwin insisted he let her sing that line. \u201cLike, of course, the blacklight will find the jizz. Why didn\u2019t I think of that?\u201d she cracks, adding: \u201cIt\u2019s the unspooling of the lyrics. It\u2019s like magical realism or something. The song could be nine minutes long, and it just seems like he\u2019s getting started.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\tTwo years ago, Dancing on the Edge<\/em> was something of a word-of-mouth hit. It was released with no real press push, but it garnered good reviews and real estate on year-end lists. New Threats <\/em>also comes after Ryan Davis and the Roadhouse Band spent last fall opening for MJ Lenderman \u2014 an avowed Davis fan and disciple \u2014 on his Manning Fireworks <\/em>tour.\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cHe\u2019s been an influence on me for a long time,\u201d says Lenderman, who once opened for State Champion in 2018. \u201cSo it makes sense that if somebody likes my music, they would appreciate what he\u2019s doing. I would hope they would do some digging and realize he\u2019s the real one.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n \t\tRelated Content<\/p>\n<\/h2>\n \n\tThat tour meant a lot to Davis. \u201cI\u2019m not trying to be hyperbolic, but it really changed my life,\u201d he says. \u201cIt was the biggest crowds I\u2019ve played to. Every show since then, someone has come out and said, \u2018I saw you with MJ, I had to see it again!\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tThe Lenderman tour and the acclaim for Dancing on the Edge<\/em> have brought Davis a level of attention he\u2019s never really had before. But as he prepares to release New Threats<\/em>, he maintains a healthy zen about this moment: For all the possibilities that could arise, he\u2019s still gotta figure out how to book a rental van for the Roadhouse Band\u2019s upcoming European tour. That has not dampened his excitement. While writing New Threats<\/em> proved to be one of the most \u201cmaddening\u201d creative experiences of his life, it still reverberates with the joy and energy he unlocked a few years ago after the difficult dissolution of State Champion.<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cWhen you\u2019re young, the whole world is open to you, you\u2019re gonna live forever,\u201d he says. \u201cI just turned 40 and I was thinking, I\u2019m healthy, my friends are excited to be playing this music with me, I\u2019ve got a good thing going. I feel like I\u2019m the happiest I\u2019ve been making music for most of my life. The wave is here, I might as well ride it. And if it continues to happen, that\u2019s great, and if not, I\u2019m glad I acted when I did.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n \n\tDAVIS HAD A \u201cpretty long leash\u201d growing up in Southern Indiana and Louisville. He and his friends got into \u201cgood trouble,\u201d skateboarding around town and chatting with people in the street. \u201cA lot of what I found to be funny about life, or interesting about other people, that I\u2019ve since grown to express in my songs, it all started from that,\u201d he says. \u201cEven before we get into musical influences.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tThose were numerous: In an email, he recalls the skull-opening power of Beck\u2019s Mellow Gold<\/em> and says that, if it weren\u2019t for Nirvana, he\u2019d \u201cprobably be managing a Chase Bank in Miami.\u201d When he began writing lyrics, Nas, Mobb Deep, and Eminem were as influential as Bob Dylan, Elliott Smith, and Jason Molina. Davis served as the lead singer in a few punk bands in high school, but it wasn\u2019t until college that he tried to pair his lyrics with guitar chords.\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\tDavis recorded his first demos in early 2006 after returning from Scotland. That summer, he started a MySpace page under the name State Champion \u2014 \u201ca stupid in-joke,\u201d he says, acknowledging the fact that the kid who fronted those high-school punk bands was also an accomplished jock. (In 2003, Davis won the long jump at the Kentucky State Track Championships with a leap of 21 feet, eight inches. He was inducted into his high school\u2019s athletics hall of fame in 2012.)<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tCourtesy of Ryan Davis<\/p>\n \n\tState Champion eventually became a full-fledged band, releasing their first proper LP, Stale Champagne<\/em>, in 2010. Along with fronting that band, Davis played in others, including Tropical Trash, who once toured with Louisville indie greats Slint. He put out a plethora of music from artists across the DIY punk, folk, country, rock, and experimental spectrum through his label, Sophomore Lounge. And he co-founded the local festival Cropped Out, which his friend, the singer-songwriter Will Oldham (a.k.a. Bonnie \u201cPrince\u201d Billy), calls in an email \u201cone of our country\u2019s greatest and most exploratory DIY festivals.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tIt was a fervent and fertile decade, but by the end of it, most of these endeavors had run their course. Cropped Out began to feel less like a \u201chub of activity\u201d for the local community, Davis says, and more an event for out-of-towners to come in for three days, proclaim, \u201cLouisville\u2019s great,\u201d and then leave.\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\tThe end of State Champion was difficult, too, exacerbated by the 2019 death of David Berman, with whom the band had grown close. \u201cThere was this series of events that made the whole thing really just sting for a couple of years,\u201d says Davis.<\/p>\n \n\tTaking stock of the career he\u2019d built in the 15 years since frying that four-track in Glasgow, Davis realized he was \u201cburned out\u201d on songs, lyrics, and singing. He\u2019d created and accomplished so much, yet was still delivering burritos on the side. When the Covid-19 lockdowns hit, all Davis wanted to do was sit inside, play keyboard, and draw.\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cIt was like, is this all there is?\u201d Davis says. \u201cI don\u2019t know how to do anything else. What am I actually going to do for the next 40 years, if I live to be that old? I had these totally useless skill sets of writing weird songs and drawing. I was struggling with how to be in your late thirties.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tYet Davis was quietly prolific. He drew, painted, and started making music with Equipment Pointed Ankh, a group founded by his friend Jim Marlowe. Those improvisational, instrumental sessions were revelatory. A group of friends sloughing off a decade\u2019s worth of \u201ccollective damage from all the shit we\u2019d put ourselves through\u201d and saying: \u201cAll bets are off. Let\u2019s make some sounds. Let\u2019s do something that is for no one but us, have fun, and see if we can do it.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\tAfter that, Davis made a few instrumental albums under the name Roadhouse and began writing lyrics again. As his next project took shape, Davis initially shied from presenting it under his own name, something he\u2019d never done before.\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\tWhen he did settle on Ryan Davis and the Roadhouse Band, he reasoned, it was best to just say: \u201cHere\u2019s me. This is what I know how to do. This is everything <\/em>I know how to do. I\u2019m not good at anything but this. If this is the only record I ever make, if we never do a tour, that\u2019s fine. But this is where I\u2019m at in life.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tAnd then, Davis adds, \u201cPeople liked it.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/p>\n \n\tDAVIS BEGAN WRITING New Threats From the Soul <\/em>in spring 2024, about six months after releasing Dancing on the Edge<\/em>. Most of the album was finished (save for some overdubs) by the time he hit the road with MJ Lenderman in October. Such a quick turn around was unusual for Davis, who was used to letting \u201cthings bake for several years\u201d in between albums. (State Champion released records in 2011, 2015, and 2018.)\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cI had this feeling that if I gave myself the amount of time I usually do, I was going to blink and it would be five years later,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd who knows what life looks like. I just decided, I\u2019m going to hunker down and try to see what I\u2019ve got in the tank.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\tBut while New Threats<\/em> came together quickly, it did not come easily. Making Dancing on the Edge<\/em> and the Equipment Pointed Ankh records felt \u201cvery liberating and celebratory,\u201d Davis says. Writing the songs on New Threats<\/em> did not.<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cEvery decision I made, I was questioning,\u201d he says, adding: \u201cMaybe it was a fear of not being able to do it again. I\u2019m waking up in the middle of the night, thinking, \u2018I shouldn\u2019t have written the verse that way.\u2019 I\u2019ve never thought about music like that, but I really cared about it a little too much.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tIt was in the studio that Davis reclaimed that celebratory mood. Sessions with the Roadhouse Band are \u201calways so much fun,\u201d he says. \u201cA lot of laughs, a lot of drinking, but drinking with intent. It never gets off the rails. We\u2019re putting in 12-hour days. We get a lot done, but we have a good time doing it.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tIt\u2019s also where the arrangements kicking around in Davis\u2019 head come to life. The whole process becomes \u201ca lot less cerebral and more like you can dance to it,\u201d he says. The band offers ideas, and new ones emerge. Though country rock at their core, Roadhouse Band songs are flush with woodwinds and pedal steel, weird horns and synthesizers. On \u201cMonte Carlo\/No Limits,\u201d a violin line is paired with a skittering drum loop reminiscent of the \u201cAmen\u201d break central to U.K. jungle and drum-and-bass.\u00a0<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tJustin Murphy*<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cI think I\u2019ve probably spent more time with Ryan Davis in the back of a van or sleeping on somebody\u2019s floor than maybe anyone in my life,\u201d Marlowe says. \u201cAnd [his songs] seem very true to how we talk; how Ryan sees and thinks about things. He\u2019s very articulate, and in a way where it\u2019s \u2014 like all the good ones \u2014 mysterious. But I still sort of know what he\u2019s saying.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cI know Ryan has angst,\u201d Oldham says. \u201cBut the vibe he puts across is one of balanced and thoughtful calm. I\u2019m not sure how he does what he does, nor where his aesthetic originates. He\u2019s world-class.\u201d<\/p>\n \t\tTrending Stories<\/p>\n<\/h2>\n \n\tAs Davis prepares to release and tour New Threats<\/em>, he admits he \u201ccan\u2019t fathom being able to write another song at this point.\u201d And yet, before everything kicks off later this summer, he\u2019ll have a few weeks to himself, and he\u2019s thinking of heading to his dad\u2019s cabin in south central Kentucky, where he wrote much of this album.<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cI think I\u2019m gonna try to go down there for a few days,\u201d he says, \u201cand just stare at some birds and see what I\u2019ve got in terms of songs. Just see where I\u2019m at with things.\u201d<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In 2005, when the singer-songwriter Ryan Davis was 20, he left Chicago for Glasgow. It was part of an exchange program between the Art Institute of Chicago, where Davis was a junior, and the Glasgow School of Art, but progress on his fine art degree was an afterthought. Davis arrived in Scotland with a bag<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11573,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[54],"tags":[299,4996,4994,4995,1456,2143],"class_list":{"0":"post-11572","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entertainment","8":"tag-album","9":"tag-lenderman","10":"tag-louisville","11":"tag-songwriter","12":"tag-talks","13":"tag-tour"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11572","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11572"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11572\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/11573"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11572"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11572"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11572"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
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