Ryan Davis & The Roadhouse Band - Dancing On The Edge [Tough Love Repress]

Originally released via Ryan's own label, Sophomore Lounge, in the US late 2023, Dancing On The Edge picked up incredible reviews: best of 2023 in both Pitchfork and Rolling Stones, 9/10 lead review in Uncut, and a raft of other notable publications.

At the frayed bottom-edge of Indiana – just a moderate bike ride north of Louisville, Kentucky – multi-instrumentalist, artist and songwriter Ryan Davis' Americana-noir soundwaves have been emanating for years in a myriad of forms. As driving force for the lauded State Champion, long-running member of Tropical Trash, administrator of the esoteric and excellent Cropped Out festival, and lone proprietor of the Sophomore Lounge label, Davis lays down his first proper ‘solo’ release with Dancing On The Edge, a rich, 2LP tapestry of tunes that absolutely glows over seven expansive cuts. It’s a pure collage of modernity and heritage.

After a period of introspection spent re-immersing himself in his drawing & painting practice, as well as his newfound delvings into instrumental music, Davis’ sea change was imminent. “I wasn't sure I would ever make another record of ‘song’ songs,” he says, “but last year I started writing again and it eventually took the shape of the record at hand. I worked painstakingly hard on the material. It felt virtually impossible to complete for a bulk of the time I spent trying to enter into it, but the process pulled me out of a strange place. I was eventually able to live inside of the songs enough to understand the world within them – to ultimately help shape them into what I understood them to be.” Indeed, there’s a load of inspiration captured in the grooves with Ryan’s unfiltered, folk-traditioned approach to poetic twists-of-tongue meeting head on with sublime instrumentation.

Recorded in early 2023 with help both in-studio and remotely from peers like Joan Shelley, Catherine Irwin (Freakwater), Will Lawrence (Felice Brothers, Gun Outfit, John Early), Jenny Rose (Giving Up), Christopher May (Mail the Horse), Elisabeth Fuchsia (Footings, Bonnie "Prince" Billy), and Aaron Rosenblum (Son of Earth, Sapat), 'Dancing on the Edge' draws backup perhaps primarily from Davis' tight-knit drinking buddies-cum-cast of collaborators in Equipment Pointed Ankh (records on Astral Editions, Bruit Direct Disques, Torn Light) – a five-headed hive-mind from which he drew impetus for his own foray into more abstract and improvisational terrain these past few years under the Roadhouse alias. The results herein are melancholic, gentle, minimal yet colorful in mood: a lilting highway accompaniment of crisp instrumentation and a relaxed, amiable approach to vocals with rhapsodic wordsmithery. Fans of the aforementioned artists as well as those of Souled American, David Berman, Kurt Vile and ‘Comes A Time’-era Neil should all easily find bounty.

While bare-boned and uncluttered in presentation, many of these pieces track over 6 minutes allowing a fair amount of expansiveness. Dancing On The Edge stares down into the navel of the American Experience underbelly with a fair amount of outward reach. Besides the Kosmische-synth and violin stabs reaching into a European element, stately organ swells build a musical bridge between 1969 Southern California and Felt’s latter era smooth moves, with layers of intelligent gesture taking this well beyond the realm of its archetypal indie troubadour/acoustic songwriter tag. Music and mint juleps never went down so well together."