In a world’s colliding moment for this writer, Ryan Adams has revealed that he will produce the new Lemonheads’ studio effort. For the upcoming record, Lemonheads head honcho Evan Dando will re-team with the band’s co-founder, Ben Deily, who separated from the group back in 1989. Plus, alt-rocker Juliana Hatfield – who has a long history with Dando and the Lemonheads’ brand – will play bass.

Adams’ tweet about his new behind-the-boards gig mentions he’ll bring the Lemonheads “back to the punker sounds” of the band’s early days. We can’t wait to hear the results.

Here’s a handful of stories to keep you entertained this hump day…

• The New York Times Magazine profiles legendary rocker Neil Young
• List Time: Paste details The 15 Greatest Sets of Musical Siblings
• Stream HT faves Frightened Rabbit’s new EP – State Hospital
• Looking to fill your NetFlix queue with Rock Docs? Check here
• R.E.M.’s Peter Buck discusses his forthcoming solo album
• Ben Folds Five tells the stories behind each track on their new LP

Finally, Primus has extended their 3D tour until the end of the year as the Les Claypool-led band will play a four-show New Year’s Run in California. The holiday action starts on December 27th at The Balboa Theatre in San Diego and moves to L.A.’s The Wiltern on December 29th before concluding with a pair of performances at The Warfield in San Francisco on December 30th and New Year’s Eve.

For a good stretch in the mid-aughts it seemed as if Ryan Adams was putting out a new record just about every few months. After stepping out of the spotlight for a handful of years, due to his struggles with an inner ear disorder, the prolific singer-songwriter returned in 2011 with the release with the highly recommended Ashes & Fire, an album he described as being full of  “elegant country-rock songs.” Tomorrow, Adams will get back to his old over-sharing ways as he will release Life After Deaf, a monster 15 LP vinyl-only box set. Yes, you read that right – 15 LPs.

According to our friends at CoS, “the set will feature will 144 tracks of Adams’ acoustic perfomances pressed on 15 LPs, as well a download card featuring all 144 tracks plus an additional 74 digital-only bonus tracks,” for a grand total of 218 tracks. The limited-edition set will go on sale tomorrow, via Adams’ webstore, at 1:30 PM EDT.

• List Time: Rolling Stone Goes Exploring Louisiana in 18 Songs
• Frank Zappa’s entire catalog is getting the reissue treat, first 12 albums out on 7/31
• Cover Alert: tUnE-yArDs & ?uestlove tackle Fela Kuti
• You can buy Michael Stipe’s two-story penthouse loft in SoHo for a mere $11 million
• Download This: Ben Folds Five – Mountain Jam – 20012-06-02 (via nyctaper)
• Party-rocker Andrew W.K. to speak at the My Little Pony convention

Finally, Pearl Jam is teaming up with Montana Democratic Senator Jon Tester for a pretty inventive concert giveaway for their September 30 gig, with Mudhoney, at the Adams Center in Missoula, Montana. The influential grunge-rock act will raffle off a prize pack that features round-trip travel and hotel accommodations, VIP passes to the show, where you’ll be sitting on the stage in reclining seats. And if that’s not enough you will also get to have dinner with the Senator and Pearl Jam bassist Jeff Ament. Any contributor to the Senator’s campaign will be automatically entered to win.

Consistent with the saying, “In order to be interesting; have interests,” (sage wisdom from the folks at eHarmony) coming up with interview questions for Neal Casal is a breeze – easier in fact than any artist I’ve ever interviewed. He just does so many different things.  He’s cranked out 12 solo albums to date, played with Ryan Adams as a Cardinal, joined Chris Robinson as a sibling in the Brotherhood, coached Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson on their vocals for Starsky & Hutch, become an avid photographer and taken pictures for a number of well-known album covers as well as Rolling Stone and Spin, and collaborated on albums with everyone from Willie Nelson to Minnie Driver. The list just goes on. The questions ask themselves.

Casal embodies the true spirit of the collaboration and approaches music in the best possible way – playing with people because you like each another. In discussing his latest solo effort Sweeten the Distance and all the other elements of his career, Neal Casal said something about his lifestyle as a hard working session musician that resonated, “The whole thing just becomes one big band.” Seems like the way it should be.

Hidden Track: So, obviously you do a lot of different things and work with a lot of different people; I was curious with regard to the solo material, do you approach it any differently and also any voids it might fill in terms of creative outlets you might not get to explore with your other projects?

Neal Casal: Well, I’m a little bit better known for playing with other people than I am for my own work, but the fact is that my solo work is really the truest sign of what what I do, and I’ve done way more solo records than I have other things. You know, I’ve been doing these solo albums for 15 years, so it will always be the foundation of what I do. It’s the well stream of inspiration and ideas. Working with other people has really been from making friends in the world of music over all the years I’ve been in it.

Playing with other people is really just a bonus and these are offers that are too good to turn down. The solo stuff has really always been my home, you know? I just try with every record to do something different, work with a different producer or work in a different place to try to bring something new to it.

It differs quite a bit from when I work with other people, because when I work with other bands, I try to become the guitar player that I would want in my own band. You know what I mean? Since I know what it’s like to to be the lead singer, and the lead guy, I know what makes a good second guitarist. So, when I work with other people, I try to be that person I’ve been looking for myself. I think I bring an interesting perspective on it, which is partly why it’s worked out so well for me. One thing feeds the other and they both work really well together.

READ ON

A recent tweet by Ryan Adams (@TheRyanAdams) to the band Tennis (@TennisInc) praising their recently issued album Young & Old, and the subsequent re-tweet by The Black Keys drummer Patrick Carney (@patrickcarney), resulted in a humorous back-and-forth exchange between Adams and Carney that diverted into discussion of Black Sabbath. The trading of similes and metaphors continued into today when Carney mentioned being in the studio with Royal Bangs (@royalbangs).

@TennisInc the new record should exclude you from bills forever, it’s seriously so beautiful

Monday, April 2, 2012 12:00 am via Twitter for iPhoneReplyRetweetFavorite

@TheRyanAdams

Ryan Adams

! RT @TheRyanAdams: @TennisInc the new record should exclude you from bills forever, it’s seriously so beautiful

Monday, April 2, 2012 11:47 pm via EchofonReplyRetweetFavorite

@patrickcarney

patrick carney

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Here at Hidden Track, compiling our end of the year list of the 25 best albums has been eerily similar to the process of devising another top 25 list – the college football top 25. When we started four years ago, we attempted to devise a quantitative methodology that systematized the rankings and took the individual biases out of the equation, while still incorporating the collective views of everyone involved at HT. Well, that was sort of our BCS. This year we’re going back to the old school and running it AP Top 25 style. In other words, every writer on staff submitted their own personal top 25, and then we compiled the final list based  on a simple tally of votes.

Who knows, there may still be a few kinks to work through in future editions, but you can rest assured of one thing that will always make our list a cut above the rest: we consider everything. Our submissions include all styles of music from bluegrass to jazz, jam to indie, electronica to rap, as well as everything in between (but sorry Nefertiti’s Fjord it just wasn’t the year for lesbian-Afro-Norwegian-funk music). At the end of the day, we’re a music blog. Everyone is encouraged to write about what they like with no motives, no editorial biases, and no strings attached. We hope that comes across in our picks.

We’ve hit the mid-point of our week-long countdown of the 25 best albums of 2011, let’s check out numbers 15 through 11…

15) M83 – Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming

Key Tracks: Midnight City, Reunion

Sounds Like: Dreamy trip to the ’80s led by a modern spirit-guide

The Skinny: When Anthony Gonzalez moved to Los Angeles this year, he was feeling lonely and nostalgic for his cherished childhood and wanted to make a record that paid homage to those emotions and memories. The result is a 23 track masterpiece that ranges from arena-sized ’80s synth rock to deep ethereal sound scapes. The ambient pieces tie the monster vocal tracks together and combine to tell a heart-felt and vivid story from one of the world’s most underrated producers. Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming is the perfect marriage of sparse and gigantic, much like the heart of its protagonist child subject.

- Wade Wilby

• Previously: #25 – #21, #20 – #16
• Spotify: HT Staff’s 25 Best Albums of 2011 Playlist

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When Ryan Adams was announced as the latest act set to play a Live On Letterman webcast, I wondered how he would take to the environment. Before each Live On Letterman set the crowd is encouraged to get rowdy, take as many photos as they wanted and to tweet the night away – all the shit that Ryan Adams hates. When the singer-songwriter took the stage and avoided looking at anyone, I thought it might be a long night. Luckily Adams relaxed after a few songs and the audience was so taken by his gentle voice and gorgeous tunes that you could hear a pin drop, despite the pre-show announcement telling us to stand up and scream.

By the end of the night, Adams had spun yarns about Moonlighting and KISS that had the crowd in the palm of his hands. Offering an hour-long set chock full of tunes from his latest LP, Ashes & Fire, the North Carolina native showed why he was one of our generation’s greatest songwriters, with the voice of an angel to boot. A sure highlight was Adams’ emotion-laden performance of the Whiskeytown classic Jacksonville Skyline. Ryan also knew his audience and went to the piano to deliver a stirring New York, New York. Add in a Bob Mould cover (Black Sheets of Rain), and you have one of the best Live On Letterman performances to date – which is saying a lot. If you missed it, here’s your chance to watch…

Set: Oh My Sweet Carolina, Ashes & Fire, If I Am A Stranger, Dirty Rain, New York New York, Do I Wait, Lucky Now, Jacksonville Skyline, Black Sheets of Rain, English Girls Approximately, 16 Days

When Ryan Adams announced a batch of dates that will take his tour in support of Ashes & Fire into 2012, the HT fave singer-songwriter also added a December 5 appearance on The Late Show with David Letterman that will be followed by a full Live On Letterman set. Considering how hard it was (is) to get tickets to see Adams perform on this tour, the Live On Letterman webcast will offer fans a chance to see him free-of-charge. We’ll be on hand and will provide a full report following the show. If you want to attend, check out this contest from our friends at MyFreeConcert.com.

As we head into the home stretch of 2011, two albums that we expect to make the litany of Best Of lists that will be hitting the interwebs in the next few weeks are Ashes & Fire and A Creature I Don’t Know the latest records from Ryan Adams and Laura Marling respectively. The pair of singer-songwriters recently appeared on an episode of Live From Abbey Road, where Adams confessed that he scrapped 80% of his most recent album after hearing Marling’s sophomore effort. The pair each performed a set of their own tunes, as well as teaming up for this gorgeous rendition of the Adams’ classic Oh My Sweet Carolina. Let’s check it out…

Ryan Adams & Laura Marling - Oh My Sweet Carolina

This past Friday night singer/songwriter Ryan Adams performed in front of a hushed crowd who hung on every song he sang and every word he bantered at Seattle’s Benaroya Hall. Adams’ fans are notorious for keeping audience members in line when they start to disrupt his performance and Seattle Weekly blogger Gwendolyn Elliott got a taste of this zealousness when she showed up late, took notes on her Blackberry and chatted with a friend.

Some around Elliott chided her for coming in late, asked her to put away her Blackberry and shushed her when she laughed with her friend at a comment Adams made. Elliott was so put off by the crowd that she actually left the concert before it was over to have “a wild night.” The blogger’s “review” on Seattle Weekly’s Reverb site barely mentions the music. Instead, she takes Ryan Adams fans to task for being militant by going into detail about her experience. Adams came across the review and didn’t appreciate Elliott’s angle. He put up a post on his Facebook page urging fans who thought the “review” was as disappointing as he did to contact Seattle Weekly. As you might have guessed, a shit show broke out in the comments section with one Ryan Adams fan after another taking their shots at Elliott’s rudeness, writing skills and even her appearance (weak sauce).

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Singer/songwriter Ryan Adams was looking forward to his recent chat with LA Weekly writer Drew Fortune. Adams is a big fan of two of the publication’s scribes and expected to talk about his new album, Ashes and Fire. Instead, the conversation went south after Fortune asked about Adams’ sobriety, his wife (Mandy Moore) and the perception that Adams is “too prolific.” Eventually Adams cut the call off and told Fortune to study up for a follow-up conversation the next day.

When LA Weekly published the interview, Fortune framed the situation to say that Adams hung up on him. Ryan had such a major issue with that mis-characterization of what happened that he penned a response to the interview that is way more interesting than Drew’s article. We highly suggest reading Fortune’s feature and then Adams’ response for an example of how not to interview a notoriously hard person to interview.

In other RA news, Adams has released a video for Lucky Now…

Written by Elton John and Bernie Taupin, Rocket Man first appeared on the 1972 John album Honky Château. An excerpt from, His Song: The Musical Journey of Elton John explains,

This song might never have happened but for Bernie’s sighting in the quiet English countryside of either a shooting star or an airplane. He started thinking about astronauts, who were no longer heroes but incumbents in what was rapidly becoming (to him) an “everyday occupation.” These thoughts filled his mind as he drove along a dark road and the first lines of the song song came to him as if planted by some extraterrestrial force: “She packed my bags last night/pre-flight,/zero hour, nine A.M./and I’m gonna be high as a kite by then.” He rushed home to transcribe the words and, the next day, finished the lyrics, borrowing the song title from obscure number by Tom Rapp, who had, in turn, been inspired by the writings of Ray Bradbury.

We’ve got seven covers of this classic, have a listen and place your vote.

The Contestants:

Artist: David Fonesca
Album: Dreams in Colour
The Skinny: This uptempo version by Portuguese singer David Fonesca is sung in English with an almost comical drumbeat that switches to hand clips at the chorus. Released in 2007, Its got over the top vocal dubs and is definitely a bit cheesy, but I gotta say – I like it.

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Pretty epic music video for this cover too:

READ ON for more covers of Rocket Man by Elton John…

For an artist that has been as prolific as Ryan Adams, it’s hard to believe that he hasn’t put out a proper studio album of new material since 2008′s Cardinology. We’re talking about a guy who ambitiously released three records in the same year, including Cold Roses - the sprawling double-disc of Grateful Dead inspired psychedelic country-rock. After disbanding The Cardinals in 2009, Adams has stepped out of the spotlight performing only sporadic gigs, got hitched to Mandy Moore, became a Facebook enthusiast and dabbled in heavy metal with his vinyl-only release Orion.

On October 11, Adams will release Ashes & Fire, which he has described as a record full of  “elegant country-rock songs,” the new LP was produced by Glyn Johns, whose credentials read like a who’s who of rock elite from The Beatles to The Band to Bob Dylan to The Clash. Glyn also happens to be the father of Ethan Johns, who produced a number of Adams’ previous releases. Ashes & Fire also features guests spots from Norah Jones and Benmont Tench (Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers). Let’s check out this solo acoustic performance of the album’s title track, whose sound harkens back to Adams’ Whiskeytown days…

Ryan Adams will head out for an eight-date acoustic West Coast tour that kicks off on October 11 at the Balboa Theater in San Diego, Calif.

If you went to see Emmylou Harris perform at the El Rey Theater in Los Angeles last night, hopefully you got there early as Ryan Adams played a surprise set in which he debuted three songs from his forthcoming Glyn Johns-produced album. Adams also tackled Blue Hotel from the Follow The Lights EP as well as the melancholy Everybody Knows from Easy Tiger…

Ryan Adams – Blue Hotel

Ryan Adams stuck around for Emmylou’s set and even joined his friend and longtime collaborator for a duet on Oh My Sweet Carolina.

• More Ryan Adams Videos From Last Night: Dirty Rain, New Song 1, New Song 2,

[via Consequence of Sound]

On Friday night, for the first time since March of 2009, the semi-reclusive – though still prolific - Ryan Adams returned to the stage to perform as part of Judd Apatow’s benefit concert for the non-profit writing and tutoring center 862LA. During his short four-song set the singer-songwriter debuted three new tunes and was joined by his wife Mandy Moore for the Heartbreaker classic cut Oh My Sweet Carolina. Check out this video of the lovebirds rehearsal for the gig…

Ryan Adams w. Mandy Moore – Oh My Sweet Carolina

We’re quickly approaching the end of the year which means it’s time to start thinking about Warren Haynes’ annual Christmas Jam. According to the Asheville Citizen-Times, this year’s event will again be one day and will be held at the Asheville Civic Center on December 11. We’re still a few weeks away from the initial artist announcement.

In other news, Danny Clinch posted a note on Ryan Adams’ Facebook Page discussing a feature length documentary the noted photographer/filmmaker is preparing on the year he spent with Ryan Adams and the Cardinals…

“For those of you who, like myself, are fans of Ryan Adams and music in general you may be interested to know that I am currently well into a rough cut of a feature length documentary on the roughly one year of time I spent w/ Ryan and the Cardinals. Ryan can pack alot into a year (or a day, or a minute) and he did just that. Making three great albums , 29 , Cold Roses , and Jacksonville City Nights , oh and producing a Willie Nelson record (Song Bird) , meeting and touring w/ Phil Lesh , ( I can’t believe I missed the metal record he made one night – I think I needed the sleep) , not to mention his paintings. To be honest , Ryan is pretty interesting and to get a good look into his creativity and madness is gonna be a treat, trust me. We are looking for for any video you might have of Ryans fall in liverpool or any live performance of “29″. Please message me on our facebook page or email 3tree@earthlink.net. thanks in advance for you support.”  [via The Steam Engine]

Finally, Billboard reports that Primus is working on their first new studio album in 11 years. The new album would be the first featuring current and original drummer Jay Lane, who left the band before they recorded Frizzle Fry. Claypool tells Billboard that the band is “recording musical ideas from sound checks and whatnot, even live shows” for possible inclusion on the LP.