Ryan Adams- Fox Theatre, Atlanta 3/20/2009

Photo taken by Ryan Adams Archive forum member nextolastsong

Last night I attended the Ryan Adams concert at the Fox Theatre in Atlanta. You may recall that this was somewhat of a make-up show for the show that he played in Alpharetta back in October in which he walked off the stage after an hour. After that experience, and after the so-so reviews I’d heard about the shows in Birmingham and Charleston, I really set my standards pretty low for this show, just in case. Luckily, it turns out these fears were unfounded, and Ryan and the Cardinals put on one of the best concerts I have ever been to. In fact, the first 45 minutes or so of the show were so good, they could have just played that, and I really would have been pretty satisfied.

They played for right around two and a half hours, with a 10 minute break about an hour and a half into the show. This was much better than the hour and 45 minute show that I was hoping for. The setlist was pretty incredible; lots of songs from Cold Roses, which is never a bad thing. The highlights for me were “Let it Ride,” a version of “Dear Chicago” that sounded like it belonged on Cold Roses and “Oh My Sweet Carolina.” Everyone went nuts during “Oh My Sweet Carolina,” especially after the line “all the sweetest winds they blow across the South,” and rightfully so. God Bless the South… There were plenty of songs from Cardinology, including the opener, “Magick,” and I’m now pretty tempted to go out and buy it.

Video taken by Ryan Adams Archive forum member LightBulb_Sunset

Overall the crowd was really good and really into and the Fox seemed pretty packed. Ryan was in a good mood and joked around a number of times, including his dedication of “Beautiful Sorta” to Method Man and Red Man. Anyways, this concert really restored my confidence in Ryan. I’ll admit that after the last show, I was really pretty turned off to him and didn’t listen to his music very much in the mean time. After last night’s show, however, I remembered again why I liked him so much in the first place. Great job, Ryan.

Here’s the setlist, obtained from a poster on Ryan Adams Archive:

1. “Magick”
2. “Let it Ride”
3. “Two”
4. “Everybody Knows”
5. “Beautiful Sorta”
6. “Mockingbird”>
7. “Dear Chicago”>
8. “Blue Hotel”
9. “Cold Roses “
10. “Natural Ghost”
11. “Easy Plateau”>
12. “Bartering Lines”
13. Band Intros
14. “Fix It”
15. “Magnolia Mountain”
16. “Please Do Not Let Me Go”
17. “Peaceful Valley”
18. “Freeway to the Canyon”

Break

19. “When the Stars Go Blue”
20. “Sink Ships”
21. “Oh My Sweet Carolina”
22. “Grand Island”
23. “Evening Joke”
24. “I See Monsters”
25. “Come Pick Me Up”
26. “Rescue Blues”
27. “Wonderwall”
28. “Goodnight Rose”