After a career that spans decades, former Blackhearts guitarist Ricky Byrd will release his debut solo album on February 5, 2013. Titled 'Lifer,' the record is a classic slice of rock and roll that plays to Byrd's strengths as a writer and riff-maker.
Byrd as perhaps best known for his stint with Joan Jett, but he's also worked with Roger Daltrey, Ian Hunter and many more. His songs have been recorded by 45 other artists and have been featured in film and television, but the appropriately-titled 'Lifer' is his first solo album. He recorded in his native New York City as well as Nashville, working with five-time Grammy winning Executive Producer Ray Kennedy (Steve Earle, Ray Davies, Sheryl Crow). Byrd co-produced the album with Bob Stander.
According to a press release, "The early Rolling Stones are what gave him the original reason to believe, and their misfit awkwardness was something he related to. It’s what he felt and they were what he wanted to be. It’s what The Who and Mott The Hoople did to him.
"So he grows up and ends up playing with Daltrey, Ian Hunter and lots of other idols. Now the circle completes. The kid from the Bronx finally creates the record he was put here to make, on his own terms, by his own rules and with all the swagger, attitude and street smarts he first honed as a punk kid hanging out in the back room at Max’s Kansas City."
Byrd says he wanted to make an album that was true to his roots. “My main goal with this record was to try and craft the songs with the same heart and soul that filled the music I listened to as a kid in my parents Bronx apartment," he states. "The music that even at that young age, made the hair go up on my arms."
Track Listing for Ricky Byrd, 'Lifer'
1. Rock ‘N’ Roll Boys
2. Let’s Get Gone
3. Foolish Kind
4. Ways Of A Woman
5. Wide Open
6. Dream Big
7. Harlem Rose
8. Married Man
9. One Less Love
10. Things To Learn
11. Turnstile ‘01
Comments