Concert review: Ryan Adams, Civic Theatre

Ryan Adams. Photo / Supplied

This captivating third visit by American singer-songwriter Ryan Adams was a departure from the previous excursions.

The last times he was here he was with The Cardinals, the band that had helped to turn his alt-country/folk-shaped songs into expansive rock'n'roll on a prolific run of albums throughout the noughties.

This time, it was Adams all alone with a couple of guitars, harmonica and an upright piano.

If last year's album Ashes and Fire was a notably stripped-back affair, this show took its songs - and older ones - right back to reveal the grain.

Which might have made for an evening of hushed melancholy. Except, well, Adams - amusingly self-conscious of being seen as a miseryguts - countered with lateral-minded comedy between songs, including a shaggy dog story about someone renovating the Auckland hotel room next to his with a jackhammer - as well as a musical ode to his cat, whom, it appears he misses more than it can possibly be healthy.

Adding to the sideline amusements was Adams acting as his own roadie as he swapped guitars and playing positions, explaining he stood for some songs simply to stop getting "a numb ass".

Out front, all that restraint might have risked something similar in his audience. But if the delivery was low wattage, Adams' vivid lyrics and shining melodies burned just as bright as he reached back to his pre-solo years in alt-country band Whiskeytown (16 Days) and pulled tracks off all of his many albums since.

Once-rowdy rock songs like Rescue Blues and New York, New York came rendered as piano ballads.

But mostly it was just Adams on his softly strummed and picked guitar sitting in behind his bruised, yearning voice as it picked the eyes out of the best singer-songwriter songbook of the past decade.

No, it didn't kick - or indeed, numb -ass.

But it was quietly, utterly brilliant all the same.