RYAN’S DEMO HELL

But he will send it to Holly's Demo Hell at NME...

Ryan Adams has said he will never release his much sought after solo cover album of THE STROKES‘ ‘IS THIS IT’ – but that someday would send it anonymously to HOLLY’S DEMO HELL in NME.COM for review.

Speaking to NME.COM from his New York home last week, the star also revealed that he has completed the “intense” follow-up proper to last year’s ‘Gold’.

Earlier this year, Ryan Adams said he had recorded his version of The Strokes‘ debut ‘Is this It’ on a four-track recorder. The news prompted a flood of enquiries, with some fans starting a campaign to have the album released.

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“I had an abscess on my tooth,” explained Ryan Adams . “And I was on vicodin, out of my nut for a whole week. Swollen fucking mouth and I couldn’t do anything, so I decided I was going to learn some records that I liked. So I just learned a bunch of compositions, but I learned them in a different way. So I went upstairs and started recording them on a four-track. One sounds like ragtime, some of them are like country and ballads, you know. It’s on a four track, in a bag somewhere.

“I told [The Strokes] about it because they came to me and said ‘Hey, what the fuck Ryan’ and I told those guys I never made a big deal out of it. I told them I would never release it because it’d be like riding their coat tails. To me that would be stealing their thunder. I won’t release a cover of their record. One, because I’ve got my own records to do, and two because its fun for us. It’s fun when I can play them their songs and they sound real weird – like bluegrass.”

He added: “You know what I’ll do – one day, when I have too many beers, I’m going to send it to Holly’s Demo Hell. I’ll send it under a pseudonym. Then I’ll find out if she really does listen to all those fucking tapes. I’ll put it under a crass fucking name, but once you get it you’ll know what it is. But it’ll be in a bag of fucking tapes. I’ll send it in just like that and I’ll never confirm or deny if it’s me. I told that to the guys and they’re like – that’s genius, that’d be really funny.”

Ryan Adams has become friends of [The Strokes] recently.

“They’re my neighbours,” he said. “Albert and Julian live exactly across the street from me. They’re my friends – they’re not my best friends, but I see them we go to the same bars. Fab, I talk to him more than anyone else. He’s such a beautiful guy. And when I see them its such a cool thing.

“They are by far the most important rock and roll band right now. Just as important as Oasis

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when Oasis

first came out – that fucking important. Those guys change stuff. They give me a job. One band breaks it for another band and I think they’re wildly important. I didn’t have The Rolling Stones, but they’re my Rolling Stones.

He also revealed that after almost two years of constant work, he decided it was time to take time out. After not writing or recording for six months during a self-enforced “creative death”, he recorded the follow-up to ‘Gold’ in five days.

“It’s pretty wild,” he said. |”Its definitely more intense than we thought it would be. It doesn’t sound anything like ‘Gold’. One of my friends said it sounds like a landslide right before it happens. Another said it sounds like [a][/a]

having a nervous breakdown and another said it scared him and made him want to trash his apartment. He said he never heard me sound like that and was I okay. It’s had a lot of intense reactions. Musically, I couldn’t really describe it.”

The album will be released early next year, he added. Before then, his collection of studio demos ‘Demolition’ will appear. It’s released on Monday (September 23). He returns to the UK for a brief solo acoustic tour in November.

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