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Ryan Davis from Ryan Davis & The Roadhouse Band, which released their latest album New Threats from the Soul in July.<\/span>Justin Murphy\/Supplied<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n When Ryan Davis first played in Toronto in October, 2024, you could barely see his face. On the brink of turning 40, and about two decades into a DIY career, he opened for 26-year-old breakout star MJ Lenderman with his hood up, hat low and sunglasses on, only his amber guitar catching the light. <\/p>\n The room at Lee\u2019s Palace was still filling up with concertgoers but already buzzing for Lenderman, on one of the last tours where his band still hauled and packed their own gear.<\/p>\n Davis played five songs, most pushing toward 10 minutes, and by the time he reached his closer, Flashes of Orange<\/i>, he had the room\u2019s attention.<\/p>\n A little over a year later, he\u2019s in Charlestown, Ind., sitting alone in a quiet park in a grey hoodie, claiming one last still afternoon before touring kicks back into gear. \u201cWhen I\u2019m not on the road, I\u2019m living a pretty quiet life,\u201d he says. \u201cBeing out in front of people every night isn\u2019t easy for me.\u201d That tension shows up in his songs: He balances humour with heartbreak, absurdity with tragedy, unhurried philosophizing that rewards a patient ear. It\u2019s the kind of storytelling that has found itself suddenly in step with the cultural moment. <\/p>\n For more than a decade he led State Champion, an indie Americana band with a country-punk sound and a cult following. In his current era, fronting the eponymous Ryan Davis & the Roadhouse Band, his writing has grown sharper, funnier and more resonant. <\/p>\n Growing up in Kentucky, Davis absorbed country music through osmosis in his early writing days. The deliberate draw toward its forms came later, through influences like John Prine, Townes Van Zandt and Gary Stewart. He leaned into writing inside the genre\u2019s walls and sometimes past them. \u201cI\u2019ve always liked to sort of set my limitations within the boundaries of folk and country and then kind of just push out of that from there,\u201d he says. <\/p>\n Davis\u2019s writing feels casual but it\u2019s the product of ruthless editing. \u201cThe genesis of the images and of the language is the easy part,\u201d he says. \u201cIt\u2019s just sort of things I pick up off the ground.\u201d<\/p>\n He writes rolling notes \u2013 rhymes, lines, couplets, roadside sightings, town fragments \u2013 and builds songs by pulling from the piles. \u201cI don\u2019t really sit down and write a song from scratch,\u201d he says. Instead, Davis comes to understand what the song is about in real-time, as he writes it, \u201cand as the song is writing itself.\u201d<\/p>\n