music

The buzz on Ryan Adams' newest album is that it's his most sophisticated and serious work to date, but that didn't lessen the surprise over how much those same qualities applied to his concert Monday night at Cedar Cultural Center in Minneapolis.

"Sophisticated" is a relative term when it comes to the often erratic and bratty Adams, who four years ago ended a First Avenue gig by smashing a cocktail glass and moaning, "I just want to go home." On Monday, the 32-year-old Americana rocker still spewed a lot of the oddball, stonerish stage banter that fans have come to expect, and he pulled at least one rock-star antic by insisting that the stage lights be brought down to midnight-level darkness.

"I promise you I'm still here," he told his squinting fans, many of whom lucked into tickets or paid a hefty scalping upcharge to get into the 100-minute gig. It was his first U.S. date of the summer, in a venue one-fifth the size of where he usually plays.

It quickly became apparent that he had a reason for choosing the intimate space and dim lighting, and even his weirdly preppy coat-and-tie attire (think Rob Lowe in "St. Elmo's Fire").

This was Adams as we'd never seen him before (and could just barely see Monday): seated, without a guitar, focused and dramatic. He played nothing but sad songs. He never picked up an instrument. He never stood up. And he has never sounded as professional and polished.

Essentially an unplugged gig, the 20-song set found Adams and his six-piece backing band, the Cardinals, playing in a tight pocket from start to finish. While past shows sometimes led into guitar jams, voice was the most pronounced instrument here. Many of the songs from his new album, "Easy Tiger" (out next week), were defined by smoothly layered three-part country harmonies, including the opener, "Goodnight Rose."

Adams sang three-fourths of the tracks from "Easy Tiger," the best of which were the pained piano- and pedal-steel-tinged jewel "Rip Off" and the starkly poetic "Oh My God, Whatever, Etc." With softer arrangements, his talent as a brooding lyricist came through loud and clear in standouts such as "Blue Hotel," which he wrote for Willie Nelson's 2006 album "Songbird" ("She's inside me like a secret and I got no one to tell").

The older tunes he picked were all downers, too, including "My Winding Wheel," "Carolina Rain," "Let It Ride" and "Goodnight, Hollywood Blvd.," which was turned from a solo piano dirge into a gorgeous country shuffle.

"I need to take a Prozac and crush it into some of these lyrics," Adams cracked near show's end. But there was no joking about the clear-headed and absolutely uplifting performance.