Amoeba Music

Ryan Bingham celebrates his new album, "American Love Song" (out Feb. 15th on Axster Bingham Records), with a live solo acoustic performance at Amoeba Hollywood Tuesday, February 19th at 6pm!

Show is free/all-ages.

To attend the signing after Ryan's performance, purchase your copy of "American Love Song" in-store only at Amoeba Hollywood beginning February 15th. Signing space is limited.

Ryan Bingham was born in the small city of Hobbs, New Mexico, hard up against the Texas Panhandle. He grew up in the west Texas oil fields, then spent time as a teenage rodeo cowboy in towns all across the state. Along the way, he absorbed the Cajun culture of western Louisiana, the hardcore hip-hop favored by his Houston friends, and the border songs of the Mexican immigrants. Until he moved to California in 2007, he never lived in any one place for more than two years.

From the beginning of his recording career, with “Mescalito,” Bingham has defied easy classification. As a rising country star, he ranged from Woody Guthrie-style folk songs and Spanish-language balladry to gritty hard rock. It’s all American music; fittingly, he was honored as the Americana Music Association’s 2010 Artist of the Year. He’s enjoyed thrilling highs and suffered debilitating lows, sometimes all at once. While his career was taking off – he won both an Oscar and a Grammy for “The Weary Kind,” the theme song he wrote for the film “Crazy Heart” – he was coping with the tragic deaths of his mother, an alcoholic, and his father, who took his own life.

The losses put Bingham in a dark tunnel, and it took a while to crawl his way out. With the help of his wife, Anna Axster, and some inner soul-searching, Bingham has come back into the light. "American Love Song," the third studio album from the Axster-Bingham indie label (after 2012’s "Tomorrowland" and 2015’s "Fear and Saturday Night"), takes all his influences – both musical and experiential – and unites them in Ryan Bingham’s best, most fully realized record to date.

“I always really struggled with my identity – who I was, where I was from,” Bingham explains of his long, deliberate pursuit of wholeness. “I always had my cowboy hat with me, but at the same time, you adapt to your environment.” Being the new kid in town usually meant unwanted attention, and having to fight to defend yourself. “You’d blend in as a means of safety,” he recalls. “Now that I’ve grown up, I’ve shed those insecurities. I realized my identity is a blend of different hats, different shoes, different pants.”

The new album finds Bingham honing his creativity on two distinct levels, the personal and the cultural. He co-produced it with Charlie Sexton, the superb Austin guitarist who has played for years in Bob Dylan’s touring band. "American Love Song" was recorded at Arlyn Studios and Public Hi-Fi in Austin with additional recording at Matter Music in Los Angeles.