Barry Ryan: Six-string statesman                

Minneapolis, 1980 -- A strippers-by-day, Rock'n'Roll-by-night club called Duffy's was showcasing Anglo-American group the Rockats during its Octemberfest. Only a year or so had passed since they'd split with Levi Dexter and realigned, having added several new members. 

Weeks before, they'd issued "Rockabilly Doll" b/w"Tanya Jean" (Kat Tale), giving early voice to the burgeoning US rockabilly movement. (I still own the 45 I purchased back then. Sadly, the accompanying brown/white/black mini-poster was lost to the ages.)

I was in that night's jam-packed audience. I was forever changed. The Rockats were everything a rank-and-file rebel could have hoped for. A formidable and precise, swinging Rock'n'Roll spectacle, they sported tailored cat style and showy, acrobatic professionalism. Under multi-colored strobes, the whole damn stage erupted.

And Barry Ryan was a major factor in their distinction. Having arrived from NYC Punk upstarts The Victims, he stalked the stage, reborn as the six-string statesman of a pomped subculture.

His onslaughts benefited beyond gauging from judicious dispatch. His styling drew on American popular music's Blues and Country roots, and crafted a glorious pastiche. 

(Scratch that past tense usage -- he remains among Rockabilly's premier pickers.)

Several years back, Barry reflected on the era that spawned the Rockats' first LP, a live explosion of creepered exuberance.

"Island Records head Chris Blackwell signed the Rockats on the advice of Grace Jones in late 1980. We went to London in December to start recording. For one reason or another, the sessions weren't matching up to our live shows. So the project was dumped and we came back to NY. 

"It was decided that the best thing to do was to do a live record. We recorded two consecutive nights at the Ritz, but I believe only the first night was used. Both nights were sold out and that's Billy Idol who introduces the band and also sang on the encore of Chuck Berry's "Around and Around," which wasn't included on the release."

Mr. Ryan performs a vital function, linking today and yesterday. The uproarious souls of gritty Blues and traditional Country step and whirl in gladsome union, spurred into fancy-footed Rock'n'Roll transmogrification. 

His hard-lived experience -- global touring, midnight stages, simultaneous uncertainty/exhilaration of Rock'n'Roll life -- resounds in each of his twanged, thrashed or elegantly touched-off notes.

Over decades, the Rockats counted various other remarkable guitarists as transient members. But to my mind, Barry always was the band's defining guitar voice. Others contributed especial piquance, but he was that group's constant. A Rockats without Barry's inimitable fretboard touches was inconceivable. 

The final release by the legendary group came in the form of 2021's Start Over Again.

Newly minted originals "Rock, Baby, Rock (All Night Long)," "Rockabilly Swamp," "Lucky Old Rockabilly (Walking Down the Pike),"and "Working Man" were apt complements to covers of Johnny Cash, Buddy Holly, and others. 

1980 single "Rockabilly Doll" b/w "Tanya Jean" was remastered and reminded of the combo's initial promise. 

In short, the music was such a capstone as to render many competitors' toils superfluous. Enough good cannot be stated of the Rockats' cohesive deploy of rockin' mannerisms. They'd never sounded more committed to good times.

Barry had earned further global renown. He carved out a legend with New York zydeco ensemble Lucky 7, waxed volatile solo endeavors, was often tapped for live appearances by legend Robert Gordon, and recorded and gigged with Gary Setzer as Rockabilly X.

Such men, through impassioned devotion to Rock'n'Roll and the magical effect it can have to better average people's lives, accomplish something far larger and more significant than any isolated work. They give us all a finer world.

All of which seemed possible, if only hinted at, that bygone Minneapolis night.

Online examples of Barry's prowess seem ubiquitous: "Rite Time" (1981 w/Tim Scott McConnell)  "Make That Move" (1983 w/Danny B Harvey)  "Downtown Saturday Night" (1994)   "Rockabilly Barry Ryan!" (solo)  "Black Slacks / Red Hot" (live w/Robert Gordon)   "Joshua's Plea"  (2012 w/Rockabilly X - Barry on vocals + guitar)

2025

Reilly

What Else Ya Got?   CD / digital

(Self-issued)

Laboratory slide-rule sharpies hypothesize that crafting sublime Rock'n'Roll both stalwart and mindful of its Poppish responsibilities is a matter of scientific calculation. This release illustrates their veracity. String-bending auteur Richard Reilly (erstwhile 1970s NYC Victim, a band whose whose Punk members included future Rockat Barry Ryan) has honed economical, trippingly fluid compositions that entrance with lissome lilts. Mannerly beat interpretation is of victory circle caliber. Visible here are twelve specimens of sideways-grin elegance that bound on limber legs.

Recommended: "The Cure," "What Else Ya Got?," "Linda Lee," "Girl on the Radio," "I Still Want You," "Memphis DQ," "So Mixed Up," "Boomerang," "Nothing of My Own," "You Won't Be Around," "Voice in My Heart," "Talk Too Much"

Videos: "What Else Ya Got?"    "You Won't Be Around"   "Voice in My Heart"

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Rockats

Live At the Ritz   digital LP

(Island)

Though Danny B. Harvey wasn't on Live At the Ritz -- the guitarist later joined the Rockats for Make That Move and American Bandstand -- he has just posted all tracks from the historic LP on his Bandcamp site. 

Recently, Barry Ryan, the group's definitional guitarist and backup singer, shared behind-scenes recollections of the record and its origin: 

"Island Records head Chris Blackwell signed the Rockats on the advice of Grace Jones in late 1980. We went to London in December to start recording. For one reason or another, the sessions weren't matching up to our live shows. So the project was dumped and we came back to NY. 

"So, it was decided that the best thing to do was to do a live record. We recorded two consecutive nights at the Ritz, but I believe only the first night was used. Both nights were sold out and that's Billy Idol who introduces the band and also sang on the encore of Chuck Berry's Around and Around, which wasn't included on the release."

In 1981, I grabbed Live At the Ritz the moment I glimpsed it in an Iowa record store. An Iowa-to-Minneapolis transplant the year prior, I'd purchased the "Rockabilly Doll" b/w "Tanya Jean" Kat Tale 45, and gone on to see the Rockats play local club Duffy's two October nights in a row. (I picked up a gray Rockats t-shirt the first night.)

Ritz is as close to a time machine-trip back to Duffy's as I'll ever secure. 

That night, the cavernous club was dim and seemingly filled beyond capacity. Frequently, stories passed around morph during the process. It was true that former New York Dolls drummer Jerry Nolan had previously been a Rockat. But by the time talk reached my ears, someone said the group would that night be debuting a new member -- Sylvain Sylvain. Of course, that proved to be false. But as soon materialized, the actual line-up made a flamboyant-enough splash, themselves.

When house lights dimmed and multi-colored stage ones shone, every starring cat threw himself into frenetic gymnastics while dealing rowdy bop impeccabble in its precision. The outrageously pomped and nattily attired group was much more riveting spectacle than mere pastime. 

Punk-era brashness cranked volume and reinvigorated classic Rockabilly swagger. It surefooted in modern raiment before the Stray Cats loomed on MTV. Originals abrim with rollicking fun shared set-space with covers reinvented with jaw-jutted flair.

Singer Dibbs Preston was and remains in the uppermost tier. Barry and Tim Scott (McConnell) constituted a six-string dyad versed in both tradition and fresh thinking. Drummer Lewis King (nee Curt Weiss) urged others on with the dynamism of a gone superman. And no one could navigate a doghouse -- and dance in circles with it -- like Smutty Smiff; his exultant yelps intensified the sprawling ballyhoo.

I jostled through the crowd and stood transfixed before a thundering speaker for some 15 minutes. And it wasn't until two days had elapsed that my full hearing returned. But I was 21 and didn't care.

Ritz was recorded, mixed, and pressed in only 48 hours, a land-speed record that furthered the disc's urgency. 

The t-shirt I bought at Duffy's in 1980 disappeared sometime over the decades. But my original Live At the Ritz vinyl remains in my collection. And it's not going anywhere.

Recommended: "Rockin' Baby," "Rite Time," "My Way," "Go Kat Wild," "Love This Kat," "Start All Over Again," "Krazy Baby," "50 Miles From Nowhere," "At My Front Door," "Wrong Rite Reason," "Room To Rock," "All Thru the Nite," "I Wanna Bop"

Videos: "Rockin' Baby"   "I Wanna Bop"

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